Facilitating the Comprehension of Academic Content in the TOEFL iBT Test Preparation Classroom

Abstract

The Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) iBT test is required by many universities for admission which has fostered training businesses in many Asian countries. Although there is an abundance of academic content in TOEFL test material, most of the research attention has focused on its linguistic aspects, such as teaching English vocabulary and grammar mainly because academic knowledge is believed to be unnecessary for achieving a good performance as claimed by the exam organizers (Educational Testing Service in Why choose the TOEFL test? (For test takers), 2012). Although some recent studies have found otherwise (Deniz in TESL-EJ 23:1–9, 2019), this gap in TOEFL preparation courses still exists. Using an autoethnographic approach, this study examines the first author’s teaching experience in TOEFL preparation by consolidating the teacher’s teaching notes, students’ narrative of course experience, and 20 h of classroom recordings into an analysis of implementing discourse strategies, translanguaging, and CLIL theories in a TOEFL preparation course. This study also explores how these theoretical insights can help to mitigate the tensions between the practical goal of helping students to pass the test and the long-term goal of expanding students’ linguistic repertoire in academic genre.