Critical Evaluation of the New Headway Advanced and the ILI Advanced Series: A Comparison of Curricular Components and CLT Objectives Based on ACTFL

The critical evaluation of systematic planning, development and review practices of instructional materials intend to improve the quality of teaching and learning. This study investigates the objectives of communicative language teaching and curricular components of two important textbooks which are widely studied in Iran: the New Headway Advanced Series (2015), the Iran Language Institute (ILI) Advanced1 (2008). The evaluation is done in terms of two prospects; firstly, the interpretation of communicative language teaching objectives and secondly, curricular components of the books. To this aim, a checklist of 5 Cs standards and seven curricular components evaluation developed by American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) was employed. The evaluation reveals that the New Headway advanced series is more preferable and desirable than the ILI Advanced 1 due to the design and organization, authenticity, attractiveness, functionality, practicality and the other qualities mentioned above regarding communication, cultures, connection, comparison, and community in all aspects. The evaluation based on the seven curricular components- language systems, communication strategies, cultural knowledge, learning strategies, content from other subject areas, critical thinking skills, technology and the other features- indicates that the ILI textbook enjoys low standards and is not well developed in all components. The ILI textbook is highly reading and writing oriented and not appropriate for transactional and interactional learning purposes. This study acquaints language teachers and learners with the more desirable and cogent book

Motion events in English textbooks: a cross-linguistic analysis of Path

Understanding how motion events are encoded and retrieved across languages has significant implications for language teaching, learning, and cognitive linguistics. However, there is hardly any research in this area comparing the motion-related lexical patterning of English textbooks. To this end, this research was conducted to fill this gap. Primarily, we investigated the motion-related patterns in three textbooks taught in countries with different language classes according to motion typology. They were verb-framed (Turkish), satellite-framed (Australian English), and equipollently-framed (Persian). Three novels in each source language were analyzed to discover the effect of these languages on the development of teaching materials. This provided the research with deep insights into Talmy’s categorization. The results from the corpus displayed a weak modification of English in EFL textbooks in Iran and Turkey that might have stemmed from their source language cognitive styles. The results also indicated that the degree of emphasis on Path was close in these three languages, which demands a revisit of Talmy’s classification

An Investigation into the EFL Milieu and Availability of Language Learning Opportunities to Iranian English Language Learners

It is believed that ESL contexts are different from EFL contexts with regard to the language learning and teaching practices. Due to various types of language learning opportunities and resources in these two milieus, language learning practices take place differently in these two situations. ESL context provides learners with ample amount of language learning opportunities, while EFL context does not readily make these opportunities and resources available to language learners. Keeping that in mind, the researchers made an attempt to shed light on the resources and opportunities which may exist for English language learners in an EFL context such as Iran. To this end, a group of advanced language learners in Iran was selected, and the required data was gathered through a questionnaire and a semi-structured interview. Results obtained from both descriptive and inferential statistics indicated that the range of resources and opportunities used by language learners is very limited in this milieu. Moreover, it was revealed that in this EFL context, there are some new and widespread language learning resources and opportunities which can assist language learners in all four skills

Culture in English Language Teaching: A curricular evaluation of English textbooks for foreign language learners

A critical assessment of the current systematical planning and an in-depth review of the teaching materials efficiently improve fine educational materials to the benefit of developed learning and teaching contexts. In some countries, such as Iran, that belong to the expanding circle, local book writers provide English teaching materials that may ignore sociopragmatic language components, particularly culture. There is a blind spot and massive gap in the related literature regarding the inclusion and organization of cultural knowledge in these textbooks. This study investigated culture in Iranian schools by conducting a nationwide survey to fill the gap. The investigation was based on the components of the curriculum administered and used in Iran, namely Vision Series. The evaluation was aimed at two prospects; firstly, to interpret whether the English textbooks taught at high schools in Iran have standardized principles and elements regarding Communication and Culture. Secondly, to investigate the extent to which cultural knowledge and technology as the curricular components are implemented in the Vision Series. In this respect, the 5 Cs checklist developed by the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages was employed. The evaluation done by 120 English language teachers reveals that the textbook Vision 3 is more preferable and desirable than Vision 1 and 2, yet not significantly. The evaluation based on the seven curricular components indicates that Vision textbooks have standards at a low level and are not designed and developed to enhance language learners’ cultural competence in the target language. This study highlights the role of enhancing language learners’ cultural awareness in the expanding circle of World Englishes

The effect of type of task on EFL learners’ vocabulary learning

Depth of processing vocabulary has been the subject of heated discussion among vocabulary researchers. Yet, current literature lacks research comparing different tasks to investigate the acquisition of vocabulary knowledge among adult learners of English as a foreign language (EFL). To fill the gap, we designed five task-based groups based on Technique Feature Analysis (TFA) as a framework to predict the effectiveness of different vocabulary learning tasks with similar or different TFA rankings on L2 vocabulary knowledge gain. The participants were 130 EFL learners (mean age = 21.7, female 61.5%) randomly assigned to the vocabulary learning tasks: reading and multiple-choice items (TFA = 6), reading and choosing definitions (TFA = 6), reading and fill-in-the-blanks (TFA = 7), reading and rewording the sentences (TFA = 6) and composition writing (TFA = 8). The results of the study revealed that tasks with the same TFA scores led to similar vocabulary knowledge gains. While predictions of the TFA are partially supported, composition writing and sentence rewording tasks supersede other tasks in terms of their effectiveness in vocabulary acquisition

R code for the correspondence regression analysis of the metaphors of time data

R codes used for the correspondence regression analyses</p

R code for the statistical analyses of the metaphors of time study

The R code produces the .html file. The R code contains all lines necessary to reproduce the analyses.</p

Data study metaphors of time

Data used in the analyses</p