The Effect of Teaching Metacognitive Listening Strategy during Shadowing Activity on Field-Dependent and Field-Independent EFL Learners’ Listening Comprehension

This study aimed to compare the effect of teaching metacognitive listening strategies through shadowing activity on the listening comprehension of field-dependent (FD) and field-independent (FI) EFL learners. Since the researcher had access only to female participants,85 female EFL learners from a language institute in Tehran, at the pre-intermediate level of proficiency with the age range of 18-35 were selected out of the initial 120 participants based on their performance on a piloted PET. The Group Embedded Figures Test (GEFT) was administered to the selected participants in order to categorize them into the two experimental groups (49 FD and 36 FI). The participants including both FD and FI sat in several classes. During a five-week instruction period (twice a week), both groups practiced listening comprehension for 45 minutes through a combination of shadowing activity, and metacognitive strategy instruction with no difference in treatment. The results of the independent samples t-test demonstrated that there was no significant difference between listening posttest scores of FI and FD groups. Therefore, it was concluded that metacognitive strategy training coupled with shadowing activity could be equally beneficial in terms of listening proficiency for all students regardless of their perceptual tendency (FD/FI). The findings of the present study have implications for language teachers regarding metacognitive strategy training and listening comprehension enhancement

Genre-Based Instruction and Iranian EFL Learners’ Argumentative Essay writing: Performance, Structure, Perceptions, and Authorial Identity in Focus

The current mixed methods study was an attempt to approach genre-based instruction from a fourfold perspective. As for the quantitative phase, first, it was aimed to examine the effect of genre-based instruction (GBI) on EFL learners’ argumentative essay writing performance. Second, the study investigated the overall organizational structure of learners’ argumentative essays in control and experimental groups. The participants of the study were 71 learners selected out of an initial number of 95 chosen based on convenience sampling. The selected 71 learners were divided into two groups of 35 and 36 who were assigned to the control and experimental group, respectively. Then, a writing pretest was administered to the two groups. After the treatment, the participants in both groups were given a writing posttest. The quantitative findings indicated that GBI was significantly effective on learners’ argumentative writing performance. Additionally, the quantitative structure analysis showed that the number of the argumentative essay elements in the essays of the experimental group was higher than those of the control group. Afterwards, ten participants in the experimental group were interviewed to seek their perceptions towards the efficacy of GBI in teaching argumentative essay writing and their authorial identity construction. The qualitative analysis of the interviews pointed to the learners’ positive attitudes towards GBI and the usefulness of this type of instruction for improving their argumentative writing performance. Finally, the ten participants in the experimental group reported their positive perceptions with regard to their authorial identity construction

The Comparative Effect of Visual vs. Auditory Input Enhancement on Learning Non-Congruent Phrasal Verbs by Iranian EFL Learners

Vocabulary is one of the essential components of language and learning phrasal verbs as part of vocabulary is quite challenging for foreign language learners. The present study aimed at investigating the effects of visual and auditory input enhancement on learning non-congruent phrasal verbs. The participants of the study were 90 intermediate English language learners who were divided into two experimental and one control groups. The first experimental group received visual input enhancement and the second experimental group auditory input enhancement, and the control group no enhanced material. All three groups were tested on their knowledge of non-congruent phrasal verbs before and after the treatment, using a non-congruent phrasal verb test developed by the researcher. The results of the data analyses indicated that both visual and auditory input enhancement were effective in learning non-congruent phrasal verbs by Iranian EFL learners, and that both groups outperformed the control group in their achievement