An automatic speech recognition-based mobile learning approach to facilitating Japanese as a Foreign Language learners' listening performance

هدف از این پژوهش، بررسی رابطه‌ی بین هوش هیجانی، استقلال، خودتنظیمی و تمایل به برقراری ارتباط با مهارت خواندن و درک مطلب فارسی­آموزان غیرفارسی‌زبان است. 141 نفر از دانشجویان 28 کشور جهان که در 12 دانشگاه ایران بودند، در این پژوهش مشارکت کردند. این افراد در مراکز زبان فارسی دانشگاه­ها مشغول به یادگیری زبان فارسی به عنوان زبان خارجی بودند یا دانش‌آموخته‌ی زبان فارسی از همین مراکز بودند. دانشگاه­های منتخب تحقیق حاضر در بخش­های مختلف کشور، یعنی شمال، جنوب، شرق، غرب و مرکز ایران واقع شده­اند. ابزار مورد استفاده در پژوهش حاضر، آزمون خواندن و درک ­مطلب فارسی و چهار پرسشنامه‌ی تمایل به برقراری ارتباط، خودتنظیمی، خودراهبری و هوش هیجانی بوده است. نتایج ضریب همبستگی پیرسون نشان می‌دهد که هر چهار متغیر با مهارت خواندن و درک مطلب رابطه­ی مثبت و معناداری دارند. همچنین، بین تمامی زیرمؤلفه­های استقلال، هوش هیجانی، خودتنظیمی و این مهارت نیز روابط مثبت و معناداری وجود دارد. به منظور سنجش قدرت پیش‌بینی کننده‌ی 4 متغیر مستقل به همراه زیرمؤلفه‌های تشکیل‌دهنده‌ی آن‌ها نسبت به مهارت خواندن، از روش‌های آماری رگرسیون چندگانه و استاندارد شده استفاده شد. هر 4 متغیر مستقل و اغلب زیرمؤلفه­های مربوط به آن­ها قدرت پیش­بینی خوبی از مهارت خواندن دارند. به‌علاوه، به منظور فراهم آوردن بینش عمیق­تر در مورد متغیرها و برآورد قدرت روابط علی میان آن­ها، مدل معادله‌ی ساختاری از طریق نرم‌افزار ای‌ام‌ا‌اس استفاده ­شد. هر چهار متغیر مستقل پیش­بین مهارت خواندن و درک مطلب بودند و از میان آن‌ها متغیر تمایل به برقراری ارتباط قوی­ترین پیش‌بین این مهارت بود.

The use of video streaming services has exploded over the past several years. However, although the use of video is a well‐studied topic in computer‐assisted language learning literature, the use of video streaming for out‐of‐class, informal foreign language (FL) learning has received little attention. This study addresses this gap in the literature. Specifically, the study investigated Japanese university students’ practices regarding the use of subscription video streaming services (SVSSs) for informal FL learning and examined their opinions about the use of these tools for informal FL learning. A survey was administered to second language English students at four Japanese universities to achieve the study’s goals. In addition, semistructured interviews were conducted with 12 of the participants to gain more insight into their opinions of SVSSs for FL learning. A total of 256 students participated and fully completed the survey. The results indicate that informal FL learning through SVSSs is common among FL students and that learners have favorable views toward their use for language learning. These findings highlight the need to examine students’ digital practices such as video streaming in order to bridge the gap between out‐of‐class informal language learning and formal language learning in the classroom.

Foreign Language (FL) learning has undergone a shift away from the communicative approach and towards a pedagogy of Multiliteracies. In an ever-changing society characterized by a digital and multicultural context, the necessity of developing Intercultural Communicative Competence (ICC) in FL learning across all levels through a pedagogy of Multiliteracies has become a priority. In this regard, musical input is an ideal medium to explore culture in the FL learning classroom which enables the integration of affective experiences from an intercultural perspective. The reasons for the implementation of musical input into FL learning curricula to develop ICC is twofold: on the one hand, it may serve to stimulate students’ awareness towards the target culture; and, on the other hand, it may be an effective way to engage students in intercultural encounters from an affective point of view. A corpus has been designed in order to analyze those studies on the development of ICC in FL learning across all levels through a Multiliteracies approach. The findings demonstrate that the use of musical input to develop ICC in the FL learning classroom through a pedagogy of Multiliteracies is scarce. Moreover, this study seeks to promote musical input-based activities to facilitate the development of ICC in the FL learning classroom through a Multiliteracies pedagogy.

A Cross-sectional Study of Relationship between Attitudes toward Foreign Language Learning and Academic Motivation

Twenty-five years ago, the author contributed a historical review of evidence on the foreign language (FL) learning problems of low-achieving and learning disabled (LD) students. Educators had proposed a new disability, FL learning disability, and developed policies permitting LD students to substitute courses or waive the FL requirement. The introduction of this new disability was premature because empirical evidence found no relationship between FL learning problems and LDs. Even so, several misguided assumptions about a unique disability for FL learning and a special relationship between FL learning problems and LDs persisted, and an LD diagnosis became the de facto criterion for FL course substitution/waiver policies. In this updated review, these assumptions and evidence falsifying them are examined. Cultural reasons for the assumptions about FL learning and LDs and the adoption of course substitution policies are proposed. The author concludes with recommendations for policymakers.

Learning a language through another language is trivialto any type of language learning, whether it is the learning of a local or a foreign language. South Africa’s language policy for higher education recommends the study of foreign languages (FLs) and indigenous languages.A decade after its adoption, the learning of a foreign or indigenous language in that foreign or that indigenous language, respectively, at universities has been overlooked. In essence, the learning of foreign languages at the country’s universities dates back to the 19th century, when the first higher education institution,the South African College was established. At that College a Department of General Literature that offered Dutch, English, Latin and Ancient languages was established. English and Dutch teachers provided instruction in the English and Dutch language, respectively. The instructions involved theory, history and practice of English grammar and literature or Dutch grammar and literature. The learning of indigenous languages at the country’s universities began in the 20th century under the departments of Bantu Studies. They were learnt through English, and then later through English andAfrikaans. The instructions involved theory, history and practice of English grammar and literature. The aim of this study is to gain knowledge on the different approaches that may be used to learn a foreign language and an indigenous language. The study focuses on the complex challenges facing the country’s universities to adopt new, different and best models for the teaching of foreign and indigenous languages after many decades of using English and Afrikaans mediums. A case study method is used for this study. The emphasis is on the learning of foreign versus indigenous languages in South African universities (SAUs). The paper consists of an introduction, the theory of Grammar Translation Method (GTM), a case study on the learning of foreign versus South African indigenous languages (SAILs) at the SAUs, and a conclusion. Keywords: foreign language, indigenous language, learning, English, Afrikaans

Motivation, a major contributor to the acquisition of language skills, can be promoted consciously through principled methods. This study investigated the impact of cooperative learning (CL) on foreign language (FL) learners' motivation in Iran. Both quantitative and qualitative measures were applied to pursue the aims of this study. The participants were 180 male and female intermediate FL learners in three groups. The Experimental Group 1 (N = 60) received two CL techniques: Student Teams‐Achievement Division and Cooperative Integrated Reading and Composition (CIRC). The participants in Experimental Group 2 (N = 60) received Round‐Table and Think–Pair–Share techniques. The participants in the Control Group (N = 60) were taught the same materials conventionally without any CL strategies. The Language Learning Orientations Scale (LLOS‐IEA) was used before and after the intervention to track changes in FL learners' motivation. The results indicated that the integration of CL techniques into FL classrooms had a significant impact on FL learners' motivation in both experimental groups. The post‐hoc Tukey's Test also depicted no statistically significant difference between the two experimental groups after the intervention. The results of Kruskal‐Wallis test comparing the three groups in subscales of LLOS also revealed that all subscales—amotivation, intrinsic (Knowledge, Accomplishment, and Stimulation) and extrinsic (External Regulation, Introjected Regulation, and Identified Regulation) motivation—were statistically significant. In addition, the analysis of the qualitative data revealed some cultural and contextual constraints associated with Iranian context.

BackgroundNowadays, wechat applications are very popular in China. Through the text, pictures, sound and video on the wechat official account platform, all-round communication between individuals and between individuals and the media has been realized. Wechat official account platform is an important functional module of wechat application. On this platform, enterprises and individuals can create an official account to communicate and interact with specific users. Its forms of communication and interaction are very diverse, including text, sound, pictures, pictures, text messages and videos. This paper applies the wechat official account platform to foreign language (English) teaching for primary school students. Developed foreign language (English) learning resources suitable for wechat official account platform.Subjects and Methods330 public primary school teachers were investigated by stratified sampling, including the experimental primary school in F City, the First Affiliated Primary School of s Normal University and the experimental primary school in district a of F City. From the deep understanding of the wechat official account platform, the strong support for the wechat official account platform, the diverse forms of the wechat official account platform, the diverse contents of the wechat official account platform, and the diversity of the wechat official account platform, we conducted a questionnaire survey, and realized the implementation of the wechat official account and the practical teaching resource platform from the perspective of psychology. In addition, the study also found that foreign language anxiety was negatively correlated with foreign language achievement. Similarly, there is a significant negative correlation between foreign language anxiety and self-efficacy. State anxiety, trait anxiety and foreign language learning anxiety are all positively correlated. The “anxiety” component of learners' personality characteristics plays a great role in the generation of foreign language learning anxiety. The correlation coefficient between LCAS and trait anxiety was 0.408, while the correlation coefficient between LCAS and state anxiety was 0.395. Both reached a significant level (P < 0.01). Self efficacy is positively correlated with foreign language achievement. Research shows that foreign language anxiety, gender and self-efficacy can be used as comprehensive variables to measure foreign language learning achievement.ResultsBased on the teaching concept of “teacher led and student-centered”, the traditional classroom teaching and network assisted learning were combined. Through the primary school foreign language (English) learning resource platform based on wechat official account platform \\ primary school foreign language (English) reading resource platform based on wechat official account platform \\ primary school foreign language (English) counseling and Q & a platform based on wechat official account platform, Let students realize resource-based autonomous learning in order to achieve the best effect of foreign language learning.ConclusionFrom the survey data, the teachers of the surveyed schools have realized the advantages of oral English teaching on wechat public platform. Wechat public platform has built a bridge for communication between teachers and students and realized free dialogue between teachers and students. Therefore, the platform has become an oral English training base. Carry out students' English teaching and develop English learning resources suitable for wechat public platform. Based on the concept of “double master”, these two teaching methods are combined with traditional classroom teaching and network assisted learning. Based on wechat public primary school English learning resource platform, wechat public primary school English reading resource platform or wechat public primary school English counseling platform, let primary school students realize autonomous learning and optimize primary school English learning.AcknowledgementsThis project is supported by Zhejiang Industry-Education Integration Engineering Base (Zhejiang Development and Reform Commission society [2020] No. 319).

Family factors significantly influence the development of critical thinking (CT) dispositions. Yet, the dynamics of this influence among foreign language (FL) learners remain underexplored, with potential moderating factors still unclear. Building on social capital theory, social support theory, and ecological systems theory, this study explored this relationship among FL learners and further investigated whether teacher support moderates this connection. A total of 16,006 secondary students from China participated in the study, spanning grades 7 through 12 (M age = 14.842 years, SD = 1.416). Data were collected using student-reported CT disposition scale, FL teacher support scale, and SES questionnaire. Multiple regression analysis revealed a positive relationship between SES and CT dispositions of FL learners. Furthermore, moderation analysis showed that teacher support positively moderated this relationship. That is, higher levels of teacher support enhanced the positive effect of SES on CT dispositions among FL learners. This research has both theoretical and practical implications for the development of CT dispositions among FL learners.

MacIntyre (1995, p. 90) takes the position that language anxiety plays a significant causal role in creating individual differences in foreign language (FL) learning. He suggests that our Linguistic Coding Differences Hypothesis (LCDH), which posits that language aptitude is the primary source of individual differences in FL achievement, reduces affective variables to a position “devoid of explanatory power.” Our response defends our position that language aptitude is likely to account for the largest part of the variance in FL learning. We also describe ways in which affective variables can influence FL learning, although the instances in which they play a causal role is likely to be small. We also suggest that both methodological and conceptual difficulties exist with theories that attribute affective and social context variables in FL learning to causal factors. We then propose ways in which MacIntyre and others could counter our argument and posit that a “Strong Inference” approach to research on the variables affecting FL learning would be beneficial to the FL field.

As context plays a critical role in foreign language (FL) learning, context-aware technology is a promising tool for supporting FL learning. The present study examined studies published between 2000 and 2018 to understand the trends of technology and related research and the current issues with context-aware technology in FL learning. This review included 75 empirical studies and 13 system-descriptive studies. The empirical studies were further examined in terms of publication year, methodology, participants, languages, device types, and the effectiveness of the technology based on FL learning results. Most of the studies indicated positive effects of the technology in the affective, linguistic, socio-cultural, and cognitive domains. The review also found issues with the reviewed studies, including the research methods, research sustainability, and practicability of the technology. The review results showed that the number of publications per year fluctuated rather than increased over the studied period. Students’ perceptions of the use of context-aware technology in FL were the most common focus of the reviewed research; far fewer empirical studies were found that assessed students’ actual language learning outcomes. The results of this study suggest that more long-term, pedagogy-informed empirical studies based on students’ actual learning outcomes are required to verify the effectiveness of context-aware technology on FL learning and to help effectively integrate such technology into learning in the future.

A widespread belief of ‘the earlier the better’ in foreign language learning has led to generous investment from both families and societies on young children’s foreign language learning. Nonetheless, the outcome of such investment is often under expectation. This article aims to discuss if there is an optimal age to learn a foreign language. By putting together both related theoretical and empirical research in the international literature, this article forwards the message that the general belief of ‘the earlier the better’ in foreign language learning is often misleading, and too early investment in children’s foreign language learning may become a big waste. Ultimately, the key factor in effective foreign language teaching and learning is how to adapt the teaching style to match the learning style of students rather than when to let children start learning a foreign language.

Family context has been found to influence achievement emotions, but the factors that might moderate this association remain relatively unexplored. To address this gap, this research examined the moderation of teacher–student relationships (TSR) in the link between family socioeconomic status (SES) and emotions in foreign language (FL) learning drawing on control-value theory of achievement emotions and attachment theory. The research involved 4,155 eighth-grade students from China, who completed scales reporting their SES, FL enjoyment, FL anxiety, and FL burnout. The moderating effect model demonstrated that TSR played a moderating role in the relationship between SES and negative emotions in FL learning such as anxiety and burnout. However, no significant moderation was observed between SES and FL enjoyment. Specifically, a warm TSR was found to alleviate the negative impact of low SES on negative emotions in FL learning, such as anxiety and burnout. Conversely, TSR did not demonstrate the capacity to enhance the positive emotions associated with FL learning, such as enjoyment, among students from higher SES backgrounds. This research suggests the necessity to intervene with low SES students, with the aim of fostering supportive TSR and ultimately alleviating negative emotions in FL learning.

This qualitative study explores how a French-Chinese web collaborative blog-writing project provides a space for understanding the various metalinguistic approaches that foreign language learners' use to facilitate foreign language learning and intercultural communication. It adopts a multilingual-plurilingual approach, an interlingual approach and a web collaboration approach as a framework. Qualitative data was collected from the blogs and online interactions of 22 French Foreign Language (FFL) learners in China, and 24 Chinese Foreign Language (CFL) learners in France. The findings reveal the increased development of FFL and CFL learners' metalinguistic awareness, plurilingual competence, and bilingual skills that is accomplished through web collaboration. Implications regarding web-based tandem language learning and peer-assisted web collaboration are discussed.

Despite the growing body of research regarding the effectiveness of MALL (mobile-assisted language learning) technologies on foreign language (FL) learners’ speaking skill development, a comprehensively quantitative meta-analysis regarding the effect sizes of these studies is still lacking. To solve the problem, this study reported results based on a meta-analysis of 20 effect sizes among 932 participants from 18 experimental and quasi-experimental studies. The results showed that the overall effect size was significantly large, suggesting the use of MALL for FL learners’ speaking skill development is more effective than traditional methods. Furthermore, learner-related, instruction-related and methodology-related moderator analysis results indicated that instructional approaches and intervention durations were significant moderators, while proficiency levels, educational levels, language types, intervention settings, software types, measured outcome types and duration intensity did not find a significant moderating effect. The results of the study provide some pedagogical implications into the use of MALL technologies for FL learners’ speaking skill development.