This study investigated relationships between individual learner differences and the learning of two English structures that differed in their grammatical difficulty. Using a quasi-experimental design, 66 secondary-level learners of English as a foreign language from three intact classes were provided with four hours of instruction on two L2 structures –one considered relatively easy to learn (i.e., past progressive) and the other relatively difficult to learn (i.e. passive construction). The participants were pretested on their knowledge of both structures and posttested immediately after the instruction. Learners’ progress was measured via written grammaticality judgment tests (GJT) and oral production tasks (OPT). The instruments to measure individual learner differences included a computerized language aptitude test, an L1 metalinguistic awareness test, a motivation questionnaire, a backward digit span test, and a learner retrospection questionnaire. The results revealed that aptitude and motivation were the two variables that significantly contributed to learners’ gains with respect to the ‘passive’ and that L1 metalinguistic awareness explained significant variation in learners’ gains regarding the ‘past progressive’. These relationships were observed with learners’ performance on the written but not oral measures. A detailed analysis of the aptitude test components revealed that the grammatical inferencing subtask was significantly related to L2 gains on the ‘passive’ – again only with respect to learners’ performance on the written GJT. The results also revealed that learners with different aptitude profiles (i.e., low, medium, high) benefited differently from instruction on the two target features. High aptitude learners performed better than low aptitude learners on the ‘passive’ as measured by the GJT posttest. With respect to the ‘past progressive’ only learners in the medium aptitude profile group improved significantly on the written GJT. These findings confirm that language aptitude holds a role in language learning but that there are other factors (i.e., motivation and L1 metalinguistic awareness) that also contribute to L2 progress. These results also provide evidence from a classroom-based study that the grammatical difficulty of what is to be learned is a factor in determining what cognitive abilities L2 learners rely on in their efforts to learn a new language.

Children in Taiwan start their English classes in grade three. As they progress through the grades, they generally do not demonstrate high English proficiency. In addition, they also gradually lose their interest in learning English (“Education Minister,” 2009). To respond to the problem of achievement and motivation related to learning English, the Picture Word Inductive Model and Cooperative Learning were integrated as an alternative approach to the current instructional method in order to more effectively improve the Taiwanese elementary learners’ English literacy and highly motivate their interest in acquiring a foreign language. The focus of this study was to discover the participating teachers’ and students’ perspectives toward this new teaching approach and to understand the difficulties they encounter during the process of initiating and implementing an educational change. This eleven-month qualitative study involved three elementary English teachers and their 71 students from grades 4, 5 and 6 as participants. The data were collected through field notes from onsite classroom observations, teachers’ weekly reflective journals, in-class video recordings, and transcripts of teachers’ monthly meetings and personal interviews with the participants. Although one teacher and her students had to withdraw from the study because of intense pressure from school authorities and parents, the results of this study indicate that the remaining teachers and students highly recommended implementing this alternative approach in English classes and believed that this new way of teaching not only helped students become more autonomous and responsible for their own learning, but also provided them with more opportunities to interact with their peers. Although having doubts about this new approach at the beginning of the study and encountering difficulties during the process of implementation, the two teachers reported that their students’ English vocabulary had increased and they were able to compose meaningful English paragraphs as a result of this non-traditional strategy. The students also revealed that their motivation toward learning English had improved. Furthermore, the results show that support from school authorities and parents is essential to the initiation and maintenance of a change in education settings.

Children in Taiwan start their English classes in grade three. As they progress through the grades, they generally do not demonstrate high English proficiency. In addition, they also gradually lose their interest in learning English (“Education Minister,” 2009). To respond to the problem of achievement and motivation related to learning English, the Picture Word Inductive Model and Cooperative Learning were integrated as an alternative approach to the current instructional method in order to more effectively improve the Taiwanese elementary learners’ English literacy and highly motivate their interest in acquiring a foreign language. The focus of this study was to discover the participating teachers’ and students’ perspectives toward this new teaching approach and to understand the difficulties they encounter during the process of initiating and implementing an educational change. This eleven-month qualitative study involved three elementary English teachers and their 71 students from grades 4, 5 and 6 as participants. The data were collected through field notes from onsite classroom observations, teachers’ weekly reflective journals, in-class video recordings, and transcripts of teachers’ monthly meetings and personal interviews with the participants. Although one teacher and her students had to withdraw from the study because of intense pressure from school authorities and parents, the results of this study indicate that the remaining teachers and students highly recommended implementing this alternative approach in English classes and believed that this new way of teaching not only helped students become more autonomous and responsible for their own learning, but also provided them with more opportunities to interact with their peers. Although having doubts about this new approach at the beginning of the study and encountering difficulties during the process of implementation, the two teachers reported that their students’ English vocabulary had increased and they were able to compose meaningful English paragraphs as a result of this non-traditional strategy. The students also revealed that their motivation toward learning English had improved. Furthermore, the results show that support from school authorities and parents is essential to the initiation and maintenance of a change in education settings.

Originating in a curiosity of how literature is used in the EFL classroom, the aim for this study has been to examine if four teachers‟ purpose for, and procedure in, using literature in the EFL classroom concur with what is a useful method on the subject as demonstrated by a methodological model constructed from current research. For this study, a model of beneficial methods of using literature in the EFL class was constructed from selected current research. Because there is a lot of research in this area, there is no claim that this study includes all theories regarding the use of literature in the EFL classroom. Still, it was possible to construct a useful model of common and constructive methods of literature use in EFL education. The conclusion of this study is that the teachers‟ purpose when using literature in the EFL class varies with the different teachers. However, they do concur with that of the national syllabi and to some extent also to written research on the subject. Further on, the teachers do work both in accordance with, and opposite to, procedures that the methodological model establishes to be productive.

Cross-linguistic transfer has been found to exist, at different degrees, in the process of second/foreign language acquisition. Both the level of orthographic depth and the orthographic distance between L1 and L2 affect the rate of the word learning process in language acquisition. Compared to English, Chinese orthography encodes morphemes within and via characters, lacks inflectional affixation, and contains a significant number of compound words. Extensive morpho-syllabic characters may develop Chinese readers' morphological awareness, as well as their vocabulary. This study examined how Taiwanese children apply decoding skills they have developed in learning Chinese, while they read English words. The degrees of transfer from Chinese to English within a structural model of morphological awareness are examined and analyzed. In addition, moderation effects resulting from regional differences and the length of time spent learning English are also discussed. Students' morphological awareness is measured in six subtests which individually emphasize inflectional morphemes, derivational morphemes, and morphemes of compound words in Chinese and English, respectively. The results show that middle school students' Chinese morphological awareness facilitates their English morphological awareness development. These students also demonstrated the ability to detect morphemes in English, but only to a limited extent. They were skilled at decoding genuine compound words and were able to detect high frequency morphemes within pseudo-words. Their lengthy experience with morphologically complex characters and words in Chinese was most likely the major factor leading to such skill. Finally, in the development of English morphological awareness, the total length of time spent learning English and the length of formal English instruction experienced at the junior high school level were both found to positively correlate with the level of students' English morphological awareness, but not with the length of formal English instruction at the elementary school level. Such a discrepancy can be attributed to the current curriculum prevalent in elementary school which is only aimed at developing students' listening and speaking skills.

This study investigated perceptions of EFL learners towards the benefits and the challenges of keeping a portfolio. The study also examined the students

Recent years have seen the emergence of Web 2.0 in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teaching and learning, in which students are exposed to an online space where they are not only passive recipients of the featured content but actively engaged in a dynamic interaction and construction of their knowledge and understanding. This study illuminates the nature of Web 2.0 technology integration in EFL writing and examines how the interactive and collaborative features of blogs and wikis were incorporated into an undergraduate writing course in Taiwan. This study adopted mixed research methods to explore the pre-determined dimensions and underlying factors related to and influencing learner satisfaction. A total of 37 Taiwanese EFL students were recruited. At the end of the writing course, they filled out the demographic and learner satisfaction survey online. Sixteen students and the instructor took part in the interviews. The quantitative data were collected from the survey and writing test scores, while the qualitative data were collected from retrospective interviews, online archived assignments, course-related materials, and observations. Correlation analysis was applied to identify the association between the different dimensions and factors with learner satisfaction. Descriptive statistics, interview data and writing test scores were analyzed to determine the impact of the different factors on learner satisfaction. Dimensions and factors correlated with learner satisfaction include: (1) course dimension—course effectiveness; (2) technology dimension—perceived usefulness (of wikis), perceived usefulness (of blogs), perceive ease of use (for blogs); (3) environmental dimension—learner community support, peer assessment system (for wikis); and, (4) instructor dimension—instructor feedback timeliness. No factors in the learner dimension were found to be associated with learner satisfaction. According to the instructor and students' reflections, the technology background of Taiwanese university students, and their learning needs and culture can explain the findings related to their satisfaction with the blog- and wiki-supported writing course. In light of the findings, several implications are drawn for instructional design, classroom practice and research methods in EFL writing. / text

The purpose of this research was to explore the overall perceptions of EFL teachers toward the extensive reading approach as they experienced the approach first hand. More particularly, EFL teachers’ perspectives on the applicability issues of extensive reading for secondary level curriculum in Korea were captured. Also, their personal experience with the approach, including the effect of extensive reading on their foreign language anxiety, was investigated. A total of fourteen teachers in a professional development program participated in the study. They were situated in a print-affluent classroom replete with approximately 1000 books including graded readers, young adult books, some magazines, best sellers and steady seller books. In the reading program, the teachers experienced sustained silent reading, and participated in classroom discussion and activities related to extensive reading. Also, these teachers were strongly encouraged to do outside reading. Data were collected from multiple sources to enhance the credibility of the study, that is, classroom observation including field notes and audio recordings, learner diaries, and interviews. Three surveys were also administered -- the Foreign Language Reading Anxiety Scale, The Teacher Foreign Language Anxiety Scale, and the Affective Questionnaire to Extensive Reading. The findings from the study showed that although the teachers were somewhat resistant to the idea of reading English-language books extensively prior to their participation, they became proponents of the approach once they had the experience of pleasure reading. They also expressed a fondness for graded readers and literature for young adults because of the simplified language and appealing themes that characterize such reading materials, and were willing to introduce them to students in secondary schools. Teachers also recognized the linguistic benefits of extensive reading including vocabulary expansion, positive reading attitude, and a sense of accomplishment from reading extensively. In terms of the applicability issue, however, the participating teachers recommended introducing the approach gradually rather than implementing it immediately, mainly because of the test-emphasized classroom culture of the secondary level curriculum in Korea. In a similar vein, teachers also addressed problematic factors that would be considered an obstacle to bringing the approach to the secondary curriculum. Those obstacles were problems related to curriculum and evaluation, motivating reluctant and struggling students, and teachers’ conflicted role in the extensive reading class. Therefore, as mentioned earlier, they proposed a gradual approach and the use of extra-curricular activities was mentioned as a possible first step to take. Regarding the effect of extensive reading on foreign language anxiety, the data from the scale and from interviews indicated that participating teachers were not highly anxious even prior to the program. / text

This study was an exploration of what English language content was represented in a classroom in which English was taught as a foreign language (EFL). The purpose of this study was to explore the way EFL teachers represent English language content/constructs in a classroom setting. The motivation behind this exploration is to contribute to the understandings of EFL teachers' practices in classroom settings. Doyle's task framework was employed, specifically with the intention to map what content representations emerged out of the teachers' classroom practices. All in all, the teachers' classroom content representations were found to be entrenched with the idea of high-stakes test preparation in Turkey.

Inmersos de lleno en la Sociedad del conocimiento, la incorporación de las Tecnologías de la Información y la Comunicación en los procesos de enseñanza y aprendizaje suponen un gran reto a alcanzar por parte tanto de instituciones educativas, como de un profesorado todavía poco formado y menos consciente de los cambios metodológicos a los que se enfrenta.En el marco de la formación del profesorado,la formación a lo largo de la vida se establece como prioridad en los programas educativos y de formación de la agenda europea (2007-2013) y a nuestro entender, ésta puede ser claramente ejemplificada por la creación de comunidades virtuales de aprendizaje en las que individuos con objetivos similares se unen para alcanzar retos en común. El uso de herramientas tecnológicas y de modalidades de formación basadas en entornos virtuales ayudan a la comunidad a generar e intercambiar conocimiento en un entorno en el que se participa de forma colaborativa, se comparten experiencias y se solucionan problemas, produciendo procesos de formación y aprendizaje continuos y en constante evolución.Tomando estas y otras reflexiones como punto de partida se originó la tesis doctoral que presentamos. Así pues, nos propusimos, en primer lugar, realizar un análisis de la situación actual de dicho profesorado en el uso de las tecnologías de la información y la comunicación. El primer gran bloque de esta tesis -o marco teórico y referencial- lo constituyen apartados tales como los grandes cambios metodológicos surgidos a raíz de la incorporación de las TIC y su impacto en la enseñanza y aprendizaje de la lengua inglesa. Seguidamente se realiza un exhaustivo y detallado análisis de los órganos que ofrecen formación al profesorado y a la oferta formativa en TIC dirigida específicamente al colectivo mencionado. Posteriormente se lleva a cabo una compilación de herramientas, recursos y actividades electrónicas dirigidas específicamente al profesorado de inglés teniendo muy en cuenta el ámbito pedagógico y su implantación en el aula, proponiendo pautas didácticas de fácil integración.El segundo gran bloque de la tesis lo constituye una investigación llevada a cabo durante tres años para obtener datos fehacientes respecto del conocimiento en TIC que posee dicho profesorado, la detección de sus demandas formativas reales, la situación actual de este colectivo en relación al acceso e infraestructuras tecnológicas y posibles barreras tanto metodológicas como actitudinales. Así pues se desarrolló una investigación tomando como muestra profesores tanto de educación primaria como de secundaria de todo Catalunya. Dicha investigación fue llevada a a cabo entre los participantes de ocho cursos de formación TIC para profesorado de inglés y para ello se utilizó la modalidad formativa semi-presencial. Para dar soporte a la formación a distancia se utilizaron dos plataformas diferentes: BSCW y Moodle que fomentaron la comunicación y la colaboración entre los participantes hasta límites insospechados.Los resultados obtenidos permitieron observar una realidad muy alejada de los parámetros que deberían ser considerados normales por lo que respecta al grado de formación TIC que tienen el profesorado de inglés. Por otra parte, el feedback recibido tras la realización de los diferentes cursos de formación también nos permitió realizar una propuesta de Plan de Acción formativo con el principal objetivo de capacitar al profesorado de inglés en el uso de las TIC. Así pues, se ofrece una propuesta formativa con los diferentes módulos y contenidos que, a nuestro entender, debería conocer y gestionar dicho profesorado. Finalmente, una de las revelaciones de todo el proceso fue la gestación y consolidación de una comunidad virtual de aprendizaje formada por los profesores participantes en el proceso de formación. / Deeply immersed in the Society of knowledge, the integration of ICT in teaching and learning processes suppose a great challenge to be achieved both by competent institutions and by a collective of teachers, which is still far from being well-trained and not conscious of the methodological trenes and changes to which they are confronted.Within the framework of teacher training, life-long training is established as a priority in the European agenda (2007-2013) and, according to our opinión this can be exempolified by the creation of virtual learning communities in which individuals with similar objectives unite in order to achieve common goals. The use of technological tools and training modalities help the community to generate and exchange knowledge in an environment in which oparticipation is done collaborately, experiences are shared and problems are solved, producing, thus, continuous processes of learning and training, which are in constant evolution.Taking these and other reflexions as departing point this thesis was originated. We carried in the first place a detailed analysis of the present situation of English as a foreign language teachers in the use of ICT. This first great section of this thesis orreferential and theoretical basis- is conformed by chapters which deal with the great methodological changes emerged out of the integartion of ICT and their impact in the teaching and learning of foreign languages. Followingly, there is an exhaustive analysis of the different organizations which offer teacher training in ICT , especially regarding the collective mentioned. Secondly there is a compilation of tools, resources and e.activities especifically addressed to the English as a foreign language teachers, taking into account the pedagogical field as well as its integration into the classrooms.The second main section of this thesis is conformed by an investigation which was carried out during three years in order to obtain relevant data regarding the knowledge of ICT that teachers have, the detection of their training needs and the real situation of this collective regarding their access to technology and the barriers that prevent them form using ICT.Tus, we Developer an investigation which took as sample teachers belonging to both Primary and Secondary Education from the whole of the catalan territory. The research was carried out with participants of eight courses of teacher training in ICT and used the blended modality. In order to support the virtual teaching we used two different platforms: BSCW and Moodle, which encouraged communication among participants and enhanced collaboration as well.The obtained results allowed us to observe that there are many challenges to be overcome. Otherwise, the feedback obtained after the courses were delivered allowed us to account for a Training Action Plan whose main aim is that of providing training and capacitation to teachers of English as foreign language teachers.