A Comparative Study of Output Task Types on EFL Learners’ Comprehension of Target Forms

This study aims at investigating the role of output and the relative efficacy of two different kinds of output tasks (reconstruction task and picture-cued writing task) in comprehending of two English target forms namely called past counterfactual conditional and English passive form. One hundred Iranian EFL learners participated in the experiment. In terms of target forms comprehension, the results showed that the participants who received output opportunities during the treatment performed significantly on the immediate post test and delayed post test. In terms of the individual effect of each type of output task type, the results also revealed that both groups improved significantly after the instructional treatment in the comprehension of the target grammatical features and the effects lasted one month

Functional and Structural Characterization of SARS-Cov-2 Spike Protein: An In Silico Study

BACKGROUND፡ Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the cause of the global outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19), which has been considered as a pandemic by WHO. SARS-CoV-2 encodes four major structural proteins, among which spike protein has always been a main target for new vaccine studies. This in silico study aimed to investigate some physicochemical, functional, immunological, and structural features of spike protein using several bioinformatics tools.METHOD: We retrieved all SARS-CoV-2 spike protein sequences from different countries registered in NCBI GenBank. CLC Sequence Viewer was employed to translate and align the sequences, and several programs were utilized to predict B-cell epitopes. Modification sites such as phosphorylation, glycosylation, and disulfide bonds were defined. Secondary and tertiary structures of all sequences were further computed.RESULTS: Some mutations were determined, where only one (D614G) had a high prevalence. The mutations did not impact the B-cell and physicochemical properties of the spike protein. Seven disulfide bonds were specified and also predicted in several N-link glycosylation and phosphorylation sites. The results also indicated that spike protein is a non-allergen.CONCLUSION: In summary, our findings provided a deep understanding of spike protein, which can be valuable for future studies on SARS CoV-2 infections and design of new vaccines

The Role of Instructing Substitution as a Kind of Grammatical Cohesion on Its True Identification and Creation of Modal, Reporting and Conditional Contexts

In an effort with a two-fold research question regarding the role of teaching substitution as a kind of grammatical cohesion on the true identification of confusing substitution elements with cohesive or noncohesive roles in different contexts and also the production of modal, reporting and conditional contexts through clausal substitution acquaintance, the following procedures were taken. First 120 male and female EFL students were selected from Iranshahr Azad University. Having administered the language proficiency test, researchers selected 80 students as intermediate subjects according to their TOEFL band scores. First, pretests of cohesion identification (substitution) and production of modal, reporting and conditional environments were administered to both control and experimental groups. Then, the experimental group was exposed to the teaching of the above-said cohesive device. Finally, post-tests of substitution elements identification and modal, reporting and conditional contexts production through clausal substitution familiarity were administered. The results showed that cohesive device treatment helped students on the true identification of substitution elements. Another finding proved that EFL students may have no difficulty in learning certain rules or classification of rules and application of their clausal substitution knowledge in creating modal, reporting and conditional contexts. Our findings can have implications for the field of language learning and teaching by deepening our understanding of the nature of the cohesive devices used by Iranian intermediate EFL learners in the process of reading comprehension and also applying their knowledge of cohesive devices not only in reading skill but also in speaking and writing skills to have more fluent and accurate speakers, writers and successful readers

The Effect of Written Corrective Feedback on the Accuracy of Output Task and Learning of Target Form

The effect of error feedback on the accuracy of output task types such as editing task, text reconstruction task, picture cued writing task, and dictogloss task, has not been clearly explored. Following arguments concerning that the combination of both corrective feedback and output makes it difficult to determine whether their effects were in combination or alone, the purpose of the present study is to document the role of teachers’ feedback in improving the accuracy of linguistic form in output tasks and in acquiring target form. To this end, this study compared three groups of Iranian intermediate learners (N= 93), one with direct grammar feedback, the other one with indirect grammar feedback and the last one with no grammar feedback. In terms of the target form uptake from first to subsequent text reconstruction tasks, the analysis of the data obtained within ten treatment sessions indicated that the participants, who received written corrective feedback compared to those who did not, progressed significantly from the first to the subsequent output tasks. In terms of learning, the learners who had the opportunities for receiving feedback performed significantly better than those in non- feedback condition on the production and recognition post- tests although explicit feedback rather than implicit feedback led to greater learning of target form on the production test, but no significant differences were found in relative efficacy of the two written corrective feedback types as far as the result of the recognition test was concerned

Substitution as a Device of Grammatical Cohesion in English Contexts

The present study set out to investigate the effect of teaching substitution as a kind of grammatical cohesion on the true identification of confusing substitution elements with cohesive or non-cohesive roles in different contexts and also the production of modal, reporting and conditional contexts through clausal substitution acquaintance. To this end, the following procedures were taken. First 120 male and female EFL students were selected from Iranshahr Azad University. Having administered the language proficiency test, researchers selected 80 students as intermediate subjects according to their TOEFL band scores. First, pretests of cohesion identification (substitution) and production of modal, reporting and conditional environments were administered to both control and experimental groups. Then, the experimental group was exposed to the teaching of the above-said above-mentioned cohesive device. Finally, post-tests of substitution elements’ identification and modal, reporting and conditional contexts’ production through clausal substitution familiarity were administered. The results showed that cohesive device treatment helped students on the true identification of substitution elements. Another finding proved that EFL students might have no difficulty in learning certain rules or classification of rules and application of their clausal substitution knowledge in creating modal, reporting and conditional contexts. Our findings can have implications for the field of language learning and teaching

The impact of motivational and cognitive involvement on EFL learners’ task performance

Although the role of task factors which can influence learners’ affective characteristics such as motivation and cognition has been of researchers’ enduring interest, few empirical studies have investigated motivational and cognitive operational impacts on task performance in instructional settings. This study investigated the independent and combined effects of motivational and cognitive pre-task strategies on listening-task performance by intermediate learners of English at a private language institute in Guilan. After homogenising the proficiency level of learners, three experimental groups and one control group were nominated to contribute to the study. In each treatment session, the motivation, cognitive, motivation and cognitive, and control groups engaged in the pre-treatment listening tasks and took the post-treatment tasks following brief motivationally (EX1), strategically (EX2), and motivationally and strategically (EX3) instructions, while the control group did not undergo any special kind of treatment. The results from paired samples t-test suggested that motivational, cognitive, or motivation and cognitive strategy instruction helped all experimental groups improve all their five post-treatment task performance. Although the results indicated that motivational and cognitive pre-task strategies could be a substitute for each other, it was shown that the combined support and promotion of them could induce better results

Powerful Vocabulary Acquisition through Texts Comparison

This study aimed to investigate if dual version reading comprehension had a positive effect on Intermediate EFL students’ general vocabulary acquisition, receptive and productive knowledge of vocabulary and students’ synonymous power of words. Two groups were selected - the experimental group and the control group. The study included: (1) four pretests (2) the dual version reading comprehension, and (3) four posttests. It was found that there was no significant difference between the two groups of students on the pretests. However there was a significant difference between the two groups of the students on the posttests. Overall, the dual version reading comprehension vocabulary-learning made the experimental group learners outperformed the control groups in terms of their performance on four types of vocabulary tests. This indicates that students following dual version reading comprehension were more successful in vocabulary acquisition, and developing their receptive knowledge of vocabulary, transferring their receptive knowledge in to the productive knowledge and enhancing the memorization of the synonymous words.

Trend of tested and slaughtered cattle for bovine tuberculosis in Iran during 2000–2014

Objective/Background: Bovine tuberculosis is one of the zoonotic diseases and important in terms of both public health and its impact on the decrease in animal products and heavy economic losses. Consequently, its control is warranted. The key in controlling bovine tuberculosis is to test and slaughter the infected cows. In this method, animals >3 months of age undergo a comparative tuberculin test, and the positive cases are sent to a slaughterhouse. This study reviews the trend of coverage process of testing and slaughtering of infected cows in Iran during 2000–2014 to evaluate the bovine tuberculosis control in this period. Methods: In the current study, the data related to the control program of bovine tuberculosis and domestic animal population in Iran were taken from the Agriculture Ministry. Next, the yearly percentage of the tested cows and the proportion of positive cows to tested cows were calculated, and the process was drawn. Results: The results show that the coverage of a tuberculin testing process has been constant. The lowest percentage of test coverage was in 2005 with 11.8%, and the highest percentage of test coverage was in 2008 with 19.2%. On average, 15.7% of cows underwent the program of tuberculin test over this period. The results showed that the proportion of positive cases to tested cows increased in 2008 and 2009, and subsequently decreased in the following years. In addition, 0.13% of tested cases in this period were positive. Conclusion: The results of this study show that the coverage of a tuberculin testing process has been constant during this period. If more animals were covered by the program, more positive cases would have been detected and removed; this will have better effect in controlling the tuberculosis. The proportion of positive tests showed that it had been increasing in 2008 and 2009, and subsequently decreasing, which indicates decreased prevalence and efficacy of the bovine tuberculosis control program in the cattle herd that underwent the tuberculin test in these years