Iranian Language Research Articles

The effect of drama method and drama-based activities on Iranian pre-intermediate EFL learners’ speaking skill

Although Iranian language learners spend many years in language classes, many of them have problems when communicating in a foreign language and their abilities to communicate and speak in the target language is lower than their capabilities in paper and pencil tests. Apart from lack of fluency, they suffer from self-confidence and anxiety. This study was conducted to examine the benefits of drama method and drama-based activities to enhance verbal communicative skill. The question whether students’ attitudes employing drama method will change about English instruction was also investigated. The experiment was conducted with 20 Iranian students whose major was not English and their proficiency levels in English language were pre-intermediate. Experimental group was instructed through drama method for 18 sessions (two 1.5 hour sessions in a week). Role-play for pre/post tests and questionnaire for learners’ attitude were used through this method. The findings revealed that mean score of students in the experimental group was higher than that of the control group. Drama method and drama based activities provided the students with more occasions to speak the second language in classroom, and use language in activities which are like a real life situation and make declarative knowledge turned to procedural knowledge. Drama method enhanced students’ self–confidence and decreased their anxiety. Being related to real life situations, drama based activities are more purposeful for learners, hence they motivate them more than usual. Generally speaking, it can be concluded that drama method enhances speaking ability of the foreign language learners, and learners’ attitude toward drama-based teaching is positive.

Syntactic relations of nominals in the North Western Iranian languages (with special focus on Mazandarani and Gilaki)

Syntactic relations of nominals in the North Western Iranian languages (with special focus on Mazandarani and Gilaki)

Analysis of English Language Textbooks of the Iran Language Institute In Order to Specify the Student’s Involvement Index of the Teaching Learning Process

Increasing students’ involvement in learning activities is one of the most important methods in effective teaching and learning process. When students are actively involved in the learning task, they learn more than when they are passive recipients of instruction. Text booksare the most important elements and have a very crucial effect in the process of language teaching and learning while prepared and developed by considering the potential educational usage and designed based research studies and modern educational technologies to meet the needs of diverse learners and enable pupils to engage actively with lessons to develop their thinking and interpreting power. The purpose of this study was analyzing the text content of the Iran English language textbook at the language institute to identify whether the contents in the textbook appropriate for involving learners in the learning task and may contribute to improve learning? The content of English language textbook for the adult learners was analyzed by criteria derived from adapting the involvement developed based on William Rummy technique. The content analysis covered the components of the textbook such as texts, activities, questions, and figures and diagrams. The results revealed that only the texts, questions, and activities given in the textbook encourage student’s involvement in the teaching and learning process.

An Investigation into Language Identity of Iranian EFL Teachers

This study presents a survey of Iranian English teachers and their language identity. The participants who completed the survey in this research included 60 English language teachers who belonged to different genders, age groups and English language teaching experiences. To investigate and collect the data, we used a validated questionnaire which included 19 items and was administered online and by hand. The results of the analyses showed that firstly participants possessed a moderate degree of language identity. The results also exhibited that there were no significant differences between the male and female participants regarding their language identity. However, there was a significant relationship between age and language identity. On the other hand, it was found that there were no differences between teaching experiences and language identity. Finally, we can come to conclusion that the results of this survey were very informative about how Iranian language teachers think of Persian language in comparison to English.

Kajian Proses Islamisasi di Indonesia (Studi Pustaka)

The purpose of this study to describe the entry of Islam to Indonesia and the process of Islamization in Indonesia. The results show that, A). There are three theories about the coming of Islam to Indonesia: 1) The theory of Gujarat by Snouck, said the entry of Islam comes from Gujarat, based on: a) the lack of facts that explain the role of Arabs in spreading Islam to the archipelago. b) Indonesia-India trade relations have been established long time ago. c) The oldest inscription of Islam in Sumatra illustrate the relationship between Sumatra with Gujarat. 2) Theory of Makkah, Hamka declare the entry of Islam to Indonesia first century H / 7 M, 3) The theory of its review to the Persian culture among Indonesian Islamic community have similarities with the Persians, among others: a) the 10th anniversary of Ashura Muharram or as a memorial day for the deaths of Shiite martyrdom of Husain. b) their clear affinity between Shaikh Siti jenar with Iranian Sufi Al-Hallaj. c) use of the term Iranian language in Arabic letters spelling system. d) a headstone on the grave Malikus Saleh (1297) and the tomb of Malik Ibrahim (1419) in Gresik booked from Gujarat.

Assessing Reliability of Two Versions of Vocabulary Levels Tests in Iranian Context

This study examined the equivalence and reliability of the two versions of the Vocabulary Levels Test in an Iranian context. This study was motivated by the fact that the Vocabulary Levels test is increasingly being used in Iran for both research and pedagogical purposes without having been checked for validity and reliability in this context. The equivalence and reliability of the two versions of the test were examined through the parallel-form approach to reliability in Classical True Score theory. Seventy-five intermediate learners of English as a foreign language at the Iran Language Institute took the two versions of the test with one week interval between the two administrations in a counterbalanced fashion. To examine the equivalence of the two versions, the means and variances of the scores obtained for the two tests were compared using paired-sample t-test and one-way ANOVA, respectively. The results of the analyses indicated that the difference between the means of the two versions was significant, and the two versions cannot be considered as parallel forms. To assess the reliability of the two versions, the correlation between the scores obtained from them was estimated using Pearson Product Moment correlation. The results of the analyses showed that the two versions are highly correlated and are reliable tests. It is concluded that the two versions should not be treated as equivalent in longitudinal and gain score studies.

AN INVESTIGATION OF CHALLENGES IN THE PRODUCTION AND COMPREHENSION OF SPEECH ACTS AMONG IRANIAN EFL LEARNERS: A QUALITATIVE APPROACH

The purpose of this research was to investigate the challenges that Iranian EFL learners encounter in the production and comprehension of speech acts in English in a variety of communicative situations. The participants of the research comprised 30 Iranian EFL learners. For this purpose, semi-structured interviews were utilized as the instrument for the collection of data and the data were analyzed qualitatively through thematic analysis. The results showed that most of the respondents (28 out of 30) declared that they have more problems in formal situations to perform speech acts. In addition, the findings of learners interview showed that the problems Iranian EFL learners faced in producing the speech acts include grammar, expression, vocabulary, and structure. One respondent just mentioned that she had problem in the comprehension aspect. The implication of this study is for Iranian language instructors, materials writers and curriculum developers to provide language learners with more input and practice in the language classrooms.

An Investigation of Iranian Learners’ Utilization of Politeness Strategies and Power Relations in Refusal Speech Act across Different Communicative Situations

This study aimed to examine the L2 pragmatic knowledge of Iranian intermediate learners of English through the performance of the speech act of refusals in English across diverse situations. One hundred and twenty five Iranian learners whose language proficiency was at the intermediate level took part in this research. The required data were collected by mean of an Oxford Placement Test (OPT) and a Written Discourse Completion Task (WDCT). The results showed that most respondents tended to use more indirect strategies (55.5%) to refuse another speaker’s suggestion or request either with higher or lower power or within different social distance. They utilized direct strategies with 24.1% and adjuncts to refusals with 18.9% respectively. The findings are illustrative of the fact that the variations in the use of different strategies are less seen in the data. In other words, learners employed almost the same semantic formulas or pragmalinguistic forms to refuse affairs in most of the situations. It can be said that learners might not have enough awareness or consciousness regarding the use of different pragmalinguistic forms in performing the refusal since they did not have sufficient understanding of context and contextual factors involved as well. Therefore, the results can suggest that the learners lack sufficient pragmatic knowledge in confronting different situations. The implication of this study is for Iranian language instructors to teach a variety of speech acts’ strategies, politeness strategies and draw learners’ their attention to the contextual features in opting out the appropriate strategy in a variety of situations.

Impact of Using Instructional Video Games on EFL Learners' Vocabulary Retention

This study aimed at investigating the impact of Instructional Video Games (IVGs) on the vocabulary retention of Iranian language learners. To do so, 32 male and 43 female, between the ages thirteen to thirty one years old, in Padideh Derakhshan Institute, Sahinshahr, Isfahan, Iran were selected as a whole population. First, the World English placement test was administered, and 60 learners were chosen as the participants of the study. Next, a test of novelty as a pretest of vocabulary was administered at the early stage of the study to ensure the novelty of to-be-instructed words and participants' unfamiliarity with those words. The experimental group members were treated with the new way of learning, IVGs, to practice the new words in each lesson, but control group members were treated with by memorizing the new words through a list. After four weeks both groups sat for vocabulary posttest, and about one month later they sat for delayed posttest. The results were compared statistically. The statistical analysis indicated significant difference in vocabulary retention on learners of the experimental group.

The Relationship between English Language Learners’ Perceptions towards Classroom Oral Error Corrections and Their Pronunciation Accuracy

<p>Inevitably, language learners make mistakes, and teachers correct them. It is, also, crystal clear that language learners have different attitudes towards error and error correction strategies. Needless to say, language teachers’ awareness of language learners’ perceptions towards error and error correction strategies can heighten the quality and the quantity of language teaching and learning process. This study based on the findings of a questionnaire and a test given to 82 male and female English language learners in Iran Language Institute (ILI) investigates: 1) whether ILI English language learners have positive or negative attitudes towards classroom oral error corrections; 2) whether there is a relationship between ILI English language learners’ perceptions towards classroom oral error corrections and their pronunciation accuracy; 3) if there is a relationship between ILI learners’ gender and their attitudes towards classroom oral error corrections. The findings of this study show that ILI English language learners have absolutely positive attitudes towards classroom oral error corrections, which means they want to be corrected. The findings, also, show that there is not any significant relationship between ILI English language learners’ perceptions towards classroom oral error corrections and their pronunciation accuracy. The findings, also, show that there is not any significant relationship between ILI English language learners’ perceptions towards classroom oral error corrections and their gender.</p>

English

Due to students' poor level of English achievement in Iran and the fact that some language institutes attribute this problem to students' lack of motivation, this study aimed to investigate the effect of motivation on students' English achievement. In this research motivation is considered in relation to certain individual difference variables which may have important effects on motivation and L2 learning but no attention has been given to them in Iranian English learning context. Hence, this study intended to investigate the causal interrelations between the variables namely, attitudes toward the learning situation, integrativeness, motivation, strategy use, self-efficacy, and English language achievement. To this end, an adapted form of Gardner's (2001a) socio-educational model of second/foreign language learning was used. Research participants were 240 intermediate EFL learners at the Iran Language Institute. The participants were administered the Attitude Motivation Test Battery [AMTB], the Self-Efficacy Questionnaire [SEQ], and the Strategy Inventory for Language Learning [SILL]. Results yielded by Structural Equation Modeling showed that motivation had a direct significant influence on English achievement. However, the effect of motivation on English achievement was stronger when it was affected by attitudes toward the learning situation, integrativeness, and self-efficacy. Thus, to improve students' English achievement in Iranian EFL context, it is necessary to consider not only motivation but also self-efficacy and attitudes, on which students' motivation depend. Keywords : Motivation; Self-efficacy; Attitudes toward the learning situation; Integrativeness; Strategy use; English Achievement DOI: http://doi.org/10.17576/3L-2016-2203-08

Validity and Reliability of the Test of Everyday Attention for Children (TEACh) in Iranian 8-11 Year Old Normal Students

Background: There is no valid and reliable Persian tool to exclusively assess all of the components of attention. Objectives: The aim of this study was to define content validity and reliability of the Test of everyday attention for children (TEA-Ch) in Iranian normal children aged 8 - 11 years. In addition, we defined the construct validity of TEA-Ch with four subtests of Wechsler intelligence scale for children. Materials and Methods: Ninety-six 8 - 11 year old students in Tehran filled the first version of TEA-Ch (A) and four subscales of Wechsler’s intelligence scale for children. Thirty- five students were simultaneously scored by two raters. Moreover, the second version of the test (B) was administered on 18 students within two weeks after the first version. The intraclass correlation coefficient was calculated for test-retest and inter-rater reliability of the raw scores in each of the TEA-Ch subtests. Discriminate validity between the TEA-Ch and the four subscales of the Wechsler’s intelligence scale for children-fourth edition (WISC-IV) was assessed, using Pearson’s correlation of SPSS Version 16. Results: The experts confirmed the content validity of the TEA-Ch after translating some items and modifying them based on Iranian language and culture. The moderate to good test-retest reliability was indicated with the ICC from 0.40 to 0.82. Moreover, the relationship between the scores of the two raters in TEA-Ch was 0.78 to 1, indicating excellent inter-rater reliability. Only five subtests of TEA-Ch were correlated with Wechsler’s subscales (r = -0.314 to 0.339). Conclusions: According to the results, the test is valid and reliable and can be used for normal Iranian children. Furthermore, attention needs to be assessed by special tools and the results revealed that TEA-Ch is designed to achieve this goal.

Validity and Reliability of the Test of Everyday Attention for Children (TEACh) in Iranian 8-11 Year Old Normal Students

Background: There is no valid and reliable Persian tool to exclusively assess all of the components of attention. Objectives: The aim of this study was to define content validity and reliability of the Test of everyday attention for children (TEA-Ch) in Iranian normal children aged 8 - 11 years. In addition, we defined the construct validity of TEA-Ch with four subtests of Wechsler intelligence scale for children. Materials and Methods: Ninety-six 8 - 11 year old students in Tehran filled the first version of TEA-Ch (A) and four subscales of Wechsler’s intelligence scale for children. Thirty- five students were simultaneously scored by two raters. Moreover, the second version of the test (B) was administered on 18 students within two weeks after the first version. The intraclass correlation coefficient was calculated for test-retest and inter-rater reliability of the raw scores in each of the TEA-Ch subtests. Discriminate validity between the TEA-Ch and the four subscales of the Wechsler’s intelligence scale for children-fourth edition (WISC-IV) was assessed, using Pearson’s correlation of SPSS Version 16. Results: The experts confirmed the content validity of the TEA-Ch after translating some items and modifying them based on Iranian language and culture. The moderate to good test-retest reliability was indicated with the ICC from 0.40 to 0.82. Moreover, the relationship between the scores of the two raters in TEA-Ch was 0.78 to 1, indicating excellent inter-rater reliability. Only five subtests of TEA-Ch were correlated with Wechsler’s subscales (r = -0.314 to 0.339). Conclusions: According to the results, the test is valid and reliable and can be used for normal Iranian children. Furthermore, attention needs to be assessed by special tools and the results revealed that TEA-Ch is designed to achieve this goal.

Investigating the Role of Experience in Reflective Practice of Iranian Language Teachers

The emergence of reflective thinking in humanities touched the field of language teaching deeply. Language teaching in EFL contexts was not far from this effect, where reflection on teaching has gained a lot of attention and research in the last decade. To bring to light the different dimensions of reflective thinking in language teaching, the current study was an attempt to examine the effects of years of professional experience on practicing reflective teaching in Iranian context. To this aim, a five-point Likert scale questionnaire was adopted including 29 items investigating five different dimensions of reflective teaching including practical, cognitive, affective, meta-cognitive, and critical dimensions. As our subjects, 62 EFL teachers participated in this study with 1 to 26 years of professional experience who were classified in 5 different experience groups. The results of the study showed no significant difference among 5 experience groups of teachers in their commitment to reflective practice in language classrooms.

The role of eye dominance in recalling lexical items in second language acquisition

The purpose of the study was to investigate whether participants’ eye dominance can be an indicator of success in recalling lexical items in second language acquisition (SLA). In this regard, the present researchers selected 30 participants from a relatively popular English language center, Iranian Language Center located in Bandare-e Anzali, Iran. The participants were also homogenized on their language proficiency level using the Babel English Language Placement test. They were found to be at intermediate level of language proficiency. By means of a convergence near-point test, the researchers selected the participants who were right-and left-eyed dominants. The results of independent samples t-test indicated that eye laterality is not a valid indicator of participants' success in recalling L2 lexical items.

Effect of Homonymous Set of Words Instruction on Vocabulary Development and Retention of Young Female Elementary Learners in Iranian EFL Context through Metalinguistic Awareness

Vocabulary learning is indispensable in the process of second language (L2) learning and plays a pivotal role in this regard. At the heart of this issue is the homonymous conflict, which is more problematic and very difficult to deal with. Therefore, the current study was undertaken to cast a little bit of light on homonyms instruction in the area of learners’ L2 vocabulary development and retention. In this vein, four intact classes of Iran Language Institute (ILI) comprised of 46 young female EFL learners aged from 9-10 years old enrolled in the present study whose English proficiency level was elementary. Signing the Assent form, the participants were given a proficiency test for homogenizing. They were divided into two groups of experimental and control. The former group favored the explicit, simultaneous and concurrent homonymous set of words instruction; however, the latter one encountered the accidental and incidental homonyms instruction through various texts. The results obtained from vocabulary achievement test indicated that in the vocabulary development phase, both methods appeared to be significantly effective in the short run, but the participants in the experimental group revealed a better performance. Moreover, after administrating the delayed post-test, the analysis elicited that homonyms instruction significantly hindered the vocabulary recovery and retention of the learners just in the Experimental group three weeks later. Hence, the outcome of this piece of study provided various remarkable implications for teachers to reinforce learners’ vocabulary repertoire through context, and led to give some insights into homonyms instruction via metalinguistic awareness.

A Descriptive Analysis of Disagreement Strategies: The Case of Iranian EFL Learners

<p>The purpose of this research was to describe the L2 pragmatic knowledge of Iranian EFL learners by producing the speech act of disagreement in English in different situations. One hundred and twenty Iranian EFL learners took part in this study. The required data were accumulated through a Written Discourse Completion Task (WDCT). The results showed that most participants tended to make use of more indirect strategies (44.85%) to disagree with another speaker’s statement either with higher or lower power or within different social distance. The respondents’ most frequent strategy use refers to counterclaims with 44.8%. On the other hand, challenges with 8.8% and Irrelevancy of claims with 3.2% were respectively among the least frequent strategies used in all situations. The results showed that learners almost utilized the same strategies in different disagreement situations with the same frequency. Therefore, it indicates that they did not notice the situational variables of social power, distance and imposition to vary their choice of strategy. In other words, they did not have the contextual understanding of the mentioned factors. Therefore, the results can suggest that the learners lack sufficient pragmatic knowledge in performing the studied speech act. The implication of this study is for Iranian language instructors, materials writers and curriculum developers. </p>

On the Consideration of Environmental Factors and Social Milieu Effective in Iranian EFL Learners

It has been known that teaching and learning a language in an ESL context is by far easier than teaching and learning it in an EFL context and that learning a language must take place in a social context. Foreign language milieus are those in which students do not have enough opportunities for communication in the target language beyond their classroom settings whereas in second language contexts, the target language is readily available out there (Brown, 2001). Given the important role that language learning resources could potentially play in EFL contexts, in the present study an attempt is made to shed light on the environmental factors and resources which Iranian language learners rely on and to explore the possible resources which exist around them and of which not all of them are necessarily aware. To this end, a group of students studying in Iran Language Institute in Shiraz was chosen. The data of the study were gathered through a questionnaire and a semi-structured interview. The findings suggested that they rely on very few resources outside the classroom setting. In addition, it was revealed that in an EFL context, such as Iran, there is a range of resources which foreign language learners could rely on and which could present them with opportunities in all four language skills.

Religious Commitment Inventory - 10: Psychometric Properties of the Farsi Version in Assessing Substance Abusers

Background: There is growing interest in studying the impact of religion/spirituality (R/S) on mental/physical health in Iran; however, little attention has been paid to the role of R/S in addiction. Objectives: This study aim to evaluate the reliability and construct and convergent validity of the Farsi version of the religious commitment inventory-10 (RCI-10) in a sample of substance abusers. Patients and Methods: The original English version of RCI-10 was translated into Farsi, the official language of Iran, using standard forward-backward translation. The reliability of the Farsi version was evaluated by assessing internal consistency; convergent validity was assessed via correlations with other measures of religiosity. Principal component analysis was utilized to assess the construct validity of the measure. Results: The Farsi version of RCI-10 had high internal consistency and satisfactory convergent validity. Factor analysis revealed a three-factor solution for the scale. Conclusions: The results of this study, while preliminary, suggest that the Farsi version of the RCI-10 is a reliable and valid measure of religiosity and can be used in health research with Farsi-speaking populations.

The Writing Performance of Iranian EFL Learners in the Light of Metadiscourse Awareness

In the framework of language teaching, the writing skill requires to be encouraged during the language learners’ course of study. Since metadiscourse markers help transform a tortuous piece of text into a coherent and reader-friendly one, knowledge about the metadiscourse, amongst other things, is used to improve writing skill. The current study aimed to investigate the influence of instruction of metadiscourse markers on intermediate EFL learners’ writing performance by using metadiscoursal taxonomies proposed by Hyland (2005). For this purpose, a pet test was administrated to 60 intermediate students in Iran Language Institute in Urmia. Having being homogenized by Preliminary English Test (PET), they were assigned randomly into two groups. Both the control and the experimental group sat for a pretest of writing test in the form of a cloze test which aimed to measure the learners’ initial knowledge of writing performance. The experimental group was exposed to explicit instruction of metadiscourse markers for seven successive sessions. On the other hand, the control group didn’t receive any instruction. Eventually, a post test designed to evaluate their writing ability with the focus of metadiscourse markers was administered to both groups. The findings implied generally that the implementation of metadiscourse markers (via instruction) significantly improves EFL learners’ writing ability.