Studies in Second Language Learning and Teaching
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Editorial
Get PDFThis final 2019 issue of Studies in Second Language Learning and Teaching brings together six original empirical studies and two book reviews. In the first paper, Marco Octavio Cancino Avila reports the results of a study that investigated the learning opportunities arising in classroom interactions, placing special emphasis on the contribution of teachers’ and learners’ overlapped turns. Using conversational analysis, he analyzed extracts from six classes taught by three teachers to adult learners of English as a foreign language in Chile. He found that teachers’ skill in appropriately handling learners’ turns that overlapped or directly followed their own had a positive impact on participation and language learning as long as learners were given adequate interactional space (Sert, 2015). The second contribution by Reza Shirani also focuses upon classroom interaction, with the caveat that the main concern is with the effectiveness of different types of corrective feedback (CF). The study explored the relationship between the level of explicitness of input-providing (i.e., recasts) and output-promoting (i.e., prompts) CF moves, and the occurrence of uptake and repair in a foreign language context in Iran. Using the model of error treatment proposed by Lyster and Ranta (1997) to analyze transcripts of 36 hours of classroom interactions in three intact classes, the researcher found that prompts tended to be used more frequently than recasts, which stands in contrast to previous findings, but at the same time produced evidence that greater salience of CF is a crucial factor for the occurrence of self-correction, which is in line with prior research
Identity development through study abroad experiences: Storied accounts
Get PDFThis study investigated three Japanese L2 learners who joined a government-funded, short-term study abroad program in the USA during their first year of college. Four years after the program, we interviewed the learners about their overseas experiences. We also asked what they had done during their university years after the program. We then analyzed their accounts to explore participants’ linguistic and personal growth during and after the program. Their stories offered important insights into what short-term study abroad programs should provide: critical experiences that participants embrace through meeting and communicating with new people in L2s for the purpose of mutual understanding. When participants perceived their experiences to be successful and valuable and felt a desire to become a more efficient L2 user, they took actions to improve their L2 skills in relation to other life goals after returning home. Furthermore, their L2 identities are likely interwoven with their current and aspiring personal identities. As such, their stories are self-development trajectories and evidence of L2-learning-mediated personal growth through social interaction. We propose that short-term study programs: (a) avoid an exclusive focus on L2 learning on-site, (b) include ample opportunities of meaningful social interaction, and (c) target first-year students.
Factors influencing language teacher cognition: An ecological systems study
Get PDFLearning about language teacher cognition (LTC) is useful for understanding how language teachers act in the classroom. Employing an ecological framework, this study aimed to explore the factors influencing language teachers’ LTCs at different levels. To this end, qualitative data using semi-structured interviews and observation were collected from 62 (30 males and 32 females) Iranian EFL teachers. The results indicated that, at microsystem level, factors such as teaching equipment and facilities, teachers’ mood and feelings, their job satisfaction, and language proficiency influenced LTC. At mesosystem level, LTC was influenced by teachers’ prior learning experience, the collaboration and collegiality among teachers working in the language institute, teachers’ self-efficacy, and critical incidents that happened when teaching or learning. Additionally, the results indicated that exosystem level factors including teacher appraisal criteria, the teaching program and curriculum, and teacher immunity affected LTC. Moreover, LTC was subject to the influence of the government’s attitudes about ELT and religious beliefs about self and interaction, and friendliness with students at macrosystem level. More importantly, it was found that the factors influencing LTC were interrelated and interconnected and in several cases, LTC was a product of joint effect of several factors at various ecosystem levels. Finally, findings in this study suggest that language teaching programs provide recent educational technology in the classroom, foster collaboration and collegiality among teachers, and clarify teacher appraisal criteria for teachers in order to help create positive language teaching beliefs
Korean language learning demotivation among EFL instructors in South Korea
Get PDFStudies investigating the motivation of L1 speakers of English to learn the national language of the host society they currently reside in remain rare, despite the exponential growth of such individuals residing in these nations this century. Previous such studies in South Korea have concluded that learning Korean as a second language (L2) is largely perceived as difficult, unnecessary and is therefore accompanied by experiences of demotivation and amotivation (see Gearing & Roger, 2018). However, these studies did not explicitly address demotivation and amotivation when examining experiences that affect the motivation to learn Korean of 14 English as a Foreign Language (EFL) instructors working in South Korean university language education centers (LECs). Therefore, this study investigates which learning experiences resulted in the amotivation of participants and how two participants who experienced demotivation employed strategies to remotivate themselves. Coding of semi-structured interviews and optional diaries found that despite intent, most participants displayed symptoms of both amotivation and demotivation. The main implication of this study is that in the absence of perceived necessity, affected individuals with insufficient internal motivation or vision to acquire Korean consequently attribute externally related demotivating experiences to pre-existing or resulting amotivation
A study of retrospective and concurrent foreign language learning experiences: A comparative interview study in Hungary
Get PDFDespite the fact that the influence of learning experiences on foreign language learning motivation has been widely acknowledged and emphasised, there are hardly any studies concentrating on these learning experiences. Hence, the aim of this study is to map the language learning experiences of former and current language learners in order to provide a detailed account of the possible components of the foreign language learning experience. Data were collected with the help of a qualitative interview schedule involving 22 language learners in two subsamples. Ten participants are English language teachers as former foreign language learners, while 12 students, current learners of English, have also been recruited. The most important result of our study is that foreign language learning experience seems to be a complex construct including immediate and present aspects as well as self-related components and attributions. Language learning success, the teacher’s personality, contact experiences, as well as attitudes towards the L2 seem to stand out as important components for both groups of learners. Apart from discussing the differences and similarities between retrospective and concurrent experiences, we will provide pedagogical and research-related implications as well
The role of international student interactions in English as a lingua franca in L2 acquisition, L2 motivational development and intercultural learning during study abroad
Get PDFCrossing borders features prominently as a theme in study abroad, not only in terms of students’ physical border crossings but also in their intercultural interactions with second language (L2) speakers whose background (linguistic and otherwise) they may perceive as markedly different from their own. Researchers have had a long-standing interest in study abroad participants’ interactions with other L2 speakers abroad for their perceived potential to enhance L2 development, L2 motivation and intercultural learning processes. The focus of existing studies in this area has been on the interactions of study abroad participants with host national students, while their interactions with other international students who are also L2 users abroad have received far less attention, despite the ever-growing international student populations at European universities. This study examined students’ views regarding the role that lingua franca (LF) interactions with other international students played in their L2 acquisition, their L2 motivational development and their intercultural learning during study abroad. The data were derived from an empirical study that involved 81 German ERASMUS students who were studying in the UK for up to one academic year. The students’ views were elicited at the end of their stay with open-ended questionnaire items, and their verbal responses were analyzed using thematic content analysis. The analysis of the students’ reflections revealed a number of functions in each of the three areas, highlighting the potential of international student interactions as a viable source of L2 acquisition, L2 self-motivation, and intercultural learning during study abroad
Crossovers: Digitalization and literature in foreign language education
Get PDFDigitalization produces increasingly multimodal and interactive literary forms. A major challenge for foreign language education in adopting such forms lies in deconstructing discursive borders between literary education and digital education (romance of the book vs. euphoric media heavens), thereby crossing over into a perspective in which digital and literary education are intertwined. In engaging with digital literary texts, it is additionally important to consider how different competencies and literary/literacy practices interact and inform each other, including: (1) a receptive perspective: reading digital narratives and digital literature can become a space for literary aesthetic experience, and (2) a productive perspective: learners can become “produsers” (Bruns, 2008) of their own digital narratives by drawing on existing genre conventions and redesigning “available designs” (New London Group, 1996). Consequently, we propose a typology of digital literatures, incorporating functional, interactive and narrative aspects, as applied to a diverse range of digital texts. To further support our discussion, we draw on a range of international studies in the fields of literacies education and 21st century literatures (e.g., Beavis, 2010; Hammond, 2016; Kalantzis & Cope, 2012; Ryan, 2015) and, in turn, explore trajectories for using concrete digital literary texts in the foreign language classroom
Towards a better understanding of the L2 Learning Experience, the Cinderella of the L2 Motivational Self System
Get PDFThe theoretical emphasis within the L2 Motivational Self System has typically been on the two future self-guides representing possible (ideal and ought-to) selves, leaving the third main dimension of the construct, the L2 Learning Experience, somewhat undertheorized. Yet, this third component is not secondary in importance, as evidenced by empirical studies that consistently indicate that the L2 Learning Experience is not only a strong predictor of various criterion measures but is often the most powerful predictor of motivated behavior. This paper begins with an analysis of possible reasons for this neglect and then draws on the notion of student engagement in educational psychology to offer a theoretical framework for the concept. It is proposed that the L2 Learning Experience may be defined as the perceived quality of the learners’ engagement with various aspects of the language learning process
Weaving webs of connection: Empathy, perspective taking, and students’ motivation
Get PDFL2 motivation is a relational phenomenon, shaped by teacher responsiveness (Lamb, 2017; Ushioda, 2009). Little, however, is known about the practices in which responsiveness is manifested. Drawing on research from the culturally responsive teaching paradigm (Petrone, 2013), and highlighting the role of empathy and perspective taking (Warren, 2018), the aim of this ethnographic case study of two lessons with a focus on poetry is to develop a relational understanding of the evolution of motivation. Analyses reveal how perspective taking has instructional and interactional dimensions, and how connections between lesson content and funds of knowledge with origins in students’ interactions with popular culture bring additional layers of meaning to learning. It is suggested that while connections that arise through perspective taking practices shape students’ in-the-moment motivational responses, they also accumulate in ways that lead to enduring motivational dispositions