Second Language Research Articles

L2 discourse marker use in interaction: The case of pues in Spanish

AbstractWhile discourse markers (DMs) are crucial for coherence and interactional competence, previous research suggests that learners' usage of DMs differs from L1 speakers. Prior research has taken either a discourse‐functional or interactional approach, yet combining these two methods may provide greater understanding of the unique learner communicative needs that drive the acquisition and use of DMs. This investigation contributes to research on interlanguage DM use by quantitatively investigating the frequency and functional distribution of the Spanish DM pues by L2 and L1 speakers of Spanish from a discourse‐functional perspective and qualitatively examining pues as an interactional resource. Oral interviews with 58 L2 and 14 L1 speakers of Spanish were analyzed, revealing distinct frequency and distributional patterns across groups and unique L2 interactional needs that are supported with the DM pues. Results inform L2 learners and teachers of the importance of DMs for interactions and provide classroom implications.

Health literacy of rheumatology patients in three clinics in Australia and its association with sociodemographic and clinical characteristics.

To describe and compare health literacy (HL) using contrasting instruments of Rapid Estimate of Adult Literacy in Medicine (REALM) and the Health Literacy Questionnaire (HLQ) in patients attending three Australian rheumatology clinics and their associations with sociodemographic and clinical characteristics. We conducted a cross-sectional study of rheumatology patients at Liverpool (Sydney) and Canberra public hospital clinics and a private Liverpool clinic using the REALM test and HLQ sociodemographic and clinical questionnaires. One-way analysis of variance and multivariate ordinal and binary logistic regressions were used to examine the association between HL and sociodemographic and clinical factors. A total of 278 people participated (111 Liverpool public, 112 private, 55 Canberra public clinic). Compared with Canberra, Liverpool patients were older, non-native English speakers, had less than a tertiary education and were more likely to have comorbidities. A total of 40% of Liverpool public, 29% of private and 13% of Canberra patients had suboptimal REALM HL scores (P < 0.05). Lower REALM scores were associated with male gender, <10 years of education, being born outside Australia/New Zealand and English as a secondary language, but was not associated with clinical characteristics. All nine HLQ domain scores did not differ across sites despite intergroup comparisons as stratified by REALM bands. Completing 10 years of schooling was associated with better scores in three HLQ scales: 'Navigating the healthcare system' (P = 0.009), 'Ability to find information' (P < 0.001) and 'Reading and understanding information' (P < 0.001). Patient HL as measured by the REALM differed across sites, explained by differences in gender distribution, country of birth, English as the primary language and years of education. HL as measured by the HLQ did not differ across sites and was more informative for understanding differing patient HL needs.

Adapting to multilingualism: Persian dubbing strategies in animated films

ABSTRACT The incorporation of foreign language(s) into modern films is an inherent aspectof contemporary filmmaking. Multilingual films impose numerous challenges in the dubbing process. That is probably why research on the translation of multilingual filmscan lead to intriguing results. This study aims to uncover the tendencies in dubbing multilingual animated films into Persian. To achieve this, six multilingual films featuring additional foreign languages alongside the main language, English, were selected. These films were examined to identify potential changes in dubbing approaches over a decade-long period (2013–2022). The framework proposed by Minutella (2021, (Re) Creating Language Identities in Animated Films. Palgrave Macmillan) was adjusted and subsequently applied to the corpus in the current study. The findings revealed fascinatingshifts in Persian dubbing practice. In the earlier years, the third language (L3) was either omitted or substituted with Persian. On the other hand, in more recentyears,these strategies were replaced with techniques aimed at preserving the foreign essence and local nuances portrayed in the original movie. To put it differently, the foreign expressions were repeated in the dubbed versions or preserved to some extent.

Is there a cost when predictions are not met? A VWP study investigating L1 and L2 speakers.

Research has found that both first language (L1) and second language (L2) speakers make predictions about upcoming linguistic information, with predictive behaviour being impacted by individual differences and methodological factors. However, it is not clear whether a cost is incurred when a prediction is made, but not met. L2 speakers have less experience with their L2 and parsing can be cognitively demanding, which together may lead L2 speakers to incur prediction costs differently relative to L1 speakers. In this study using the visual world paradigm, we test whether L1 and L2 speakers predict in the same way, within the same time frame, and incur the same costs if predictions are not met. We also explore the role of proficiency and speech rate. We found that both groups predict in a similar way and within a similar time frame. In addition, neither group incurred a prediction cost when the target was the most likely alternative, though L2 speakers take longer to shift their attention to the target object when predictions are not met. We argue that this reflects a slowing of lexical access rather than a specific cost of prediction. We only found prediction differences when speech rate was included in the analysis, highlighting the importance of attending to speech rate in studies using the visual world paradigm. Overall, this study supports research showing that both L1 and L2 speakers may make multiple partial predictions about upcoming information rather than predicting one specific lexical candidate while inhibiting less likely lexical candidates.

“That Was a Good One”: Talking About Irony in Study Abroad

AbstractRecent research on second or additional language (L2) pragmatics instruction in study abroad has incorporated the technique of encouraging students to gather data about pragmatics, for example, by asking members of the host country to complete questionnaires, practice using pragmatic features, or answer questions about pragmatics (e.g., Hernández, 2021; Mir, 2021). Such studies have reported positive learning outcomes of pedagogical interventions involving this technique but have not closely examined the nature of the talk about pragmatics among students and local people. The goal of this study is to examine talk about irony in Spanish elicited through an instructional activity carried out by study‐abroad students in Mexico and their Mexican interlocutors, focusing on the information that the latter provide. The findings revealed that Mexican interlocutors provided examples of irony, metapragmatic explanations, and corrective feedback but that there was considerable individual variation.

Audiovisual speech perception of multilingual learners of Japanese

ABSTRACT Due to the complex nature of languages and the way they are used, it is often difficult to research multilinguals because of the considerable variation in the ways their spoken languages may impact their perceptions. For this reason, foreign language education research has largely been focused on English L2 speakers, overlooking how different languages might impact perception in multilingual speakers. Focusing on Japanese as a Second Language (JSL) learners, this research investigated how multilinguals responded to audiovisual cues in Japanese and English. Utilising web-based eye-tracking technology facilitated by WebGazer.js. Participants were asked to complete a novel phonetic distinction task while their gaze behaviour was measured. Contrary to initial theoretical expectations, the findings did not reveal significant mediation by gaze behaviour on the relationship between multilingualism and task performance. However, the study found that when looking at the duration of fixation on the mouth, there's a significant difference between native English speakers and native speakers of Asian languages when listening to English or Japanese. These findings indicate that further research that explores the nuances of gaze behaviour among multilingual learners of non-English languages (such as Japanese) is necessary.

Using administrative early-years education data to identify children at risk of persistent absenteeism

In a post-pandemic world, school absence is an ever-increasing concern for governments, school leaders, and local authorities worldwide. School absence is associated with poor academic outcomes and long-term illness (physical and mental). Absenteeism increases the risk of financial difficulties in adulthood and involvement in the criminal justice system. As a result, the upstream costs to already overstretched public services are crippling. In England, all children are judged by teachers on their “school readiness” over their first year of formal education. We hypothesised that early childhood problems (i.e., not school ready) might be an antecedent of absenteeism. We tested this by investigating the pre-pandemic association between school readiness and persistent absenteeism using a population-linked dataset. Analyses included 62,598 children aged 5-13 years from the Connected Bradford database (spanning academic years 2012/13-2019/20). Special educational needs (SEN) status, English as an Additional Language status, socioeconomic status, sex, and ethnicity were covariates significantly associated with persistent absenteeism. Children who were not “school ready” had increased odds of being persistently absent later in their education journey after controlling for these covariates. School readiness was associated with even greater odds of being persistently absent over two or more years. These findings show: (i) the potential of using existing administrative data to identify children at risk of disengagement from the education system; (ii) absenteeism reflects stark structural inequities. As the rates of absence is still rising, schools can use these data to flag the children who may benefit from early intervention to keep them engaged in school.

Research on a New Model of Cultivating Creative Thinking in the Language Discipline Based on ChatGPT--Taking Project-based Learning of Senior Secondary Language as an Example

This paper This paper discusses a new model of cultivating creative thinking in the language discipline based on ChatGPT, aiming to provide new ideas and methods for language teaching reform. ChatGPT, an advanced natural language processing technology with powerful language comprehension and generation capabilities, provides new means and methods for language teaching. The study presents a case study of the teaching practice of the new model of creative thinking cultivation in language discipline based on ChatGPT through the casestudy method, which provides guidance for the further improvement and optimization of the new model. The model takes ChatGPT as the core, combines the characteristics of language teaching and students' needs, and designs teaching processes and activities suitable for cultivating students' creative thinking. The study emphasizes the importance of changing teaching concepts when using the Humanistic Version of the senior secondary language textbook, as well as incorporating practical language activities to improve students' core literacy through personalized participation and practice.

Social annotation and dialogic teaching and learning in English language arts

AbstractThis research study explores the role of social annotation in supporting dialogic teaching in secondary English language arts. Grounded in Bakhtin's dialogism and building upon research into online discussion, this study describes how a high school English teacher and her students used a digital annotation tool to read and talk about texts. Analyzing student annotations based on discourse features associated with comprehension and high‐level thinking, the study examines the extent to which social annotation supports quality dialogue. Findings highlight the need for open‐ended prompts and teacher scaffolding of online discussions, and authors suggest that dialogue enhances comprehension of texts when students go beyond reporting on others' thoughts and instead share their own ideas, connections, and questions about the text.

The Impact of Teacher and Peer Support on Preservice EFL Teachers' Work Engagement in Their Teaching Practicum: The Mediating Role of Teacher L2 Grit and Language Teaching Enjoyment.

The academic study of work engagement among pre-service teachers during their practicum has been notably sparse, with even fewer investigations examining the influence of environmental stimuli on their engagement levels and the role of individual psychological and emotional factors throughout the practicum. To address this research gap, the present study, informed by the Stimulus-Organism-Response (SOR) theory, has developed a structural equation model. This model posits teacher support and peer support as stimuli, L2 grit and the foreign language teaching enjoyment as the organism, and the work engagement of pre-service teachers as the behavioral response. A quantitative survey was conducted among 516 preservice EFL teachers to examine the relationships among variables in the model. Findings showed direct predictions of work engagement by teacher support, L2 grit, and FLTE. L2 grit and FLTE sequentially mediated the relationship between teacher and peer support and work engagement. This study identified the factors influencing preservice EFL teachers' work engagement, contributing to a deeper understanding of their psychological characteristics and emotional experiences during the teaching practicum. Additionally, the study offers practical implications for universities and internship schools to enhance preservice teachers' work engagement during the practicum.

Translingual Practices for EAL Writing Education in Non‐EMI Contexts

AbstractThis study explored the impacts of translingual practices on English as an additional language (EAL) writing education in a non‐English as a medium of instruction (non‐EMI) context at a Chinese university. The findings highlighted the benefits of translingual practices in enhancing students' comprehension, easing cognitive challenges, and fostering metalinguistic awareness. Students with limited English proficiency often turned to translingual practices for clearer content understanding. However, there was a growing concern among some EAL students that the heavy reliance on their mother tongue could limit their capability to connect with a wider, primarily English‐speaking audience. The findings also revealed that students' desire to achieve “native‐like” fluency led some students to adopt a deficit approach to other language resources in their EAL writing. To address these issues, this study suggests implementing strategic translingual practices, which can be achieved by leveraging students' full linguistic repertoire, teaching critical language awareness (CLA), and adopting a rhetorical approach to EAL writing education. This integrated approach can validate diverse linguistic backgrounds while ensuring effective communication tailored for various audiences. This study, thus, endorses an EAL writing pedagogy that embraces linguistic diversity and arms students with English norms and writing conventions to harness this diversity for more effective global communication.

Brain markers of subtraction and multiplication skills in childhood: task-based functional connectivity and individualized structural similarity.

Arithmetic, a high-order cognitive ability, show marked individual difference over development. Despite recent advancements in neuroimaging techniques have enabled the identification of brain markers for individual differences in high-order cognitive abilities, it remains largely unknown about the brain markers for arithmetic. This study used a data-driven connectome-based prediction model to identify brain markers of arithmetic skills from arithmetic-state functional connectivity and individualized structural similarity in 132 children aged 8 to 15years. We found that both subtraction-state functional connectivity and individualized SS successfully predicted subtraction and multiplication skills but multiplication-state functional connectivity failed to predict either skill. Among the four successful prediction models, most predictive connections were located in frontal-parietal, default-mode, and secondary visual networks. Further computational lesion analyses revealed the essential structural role of frontal-parietal network in predicting subtraction and the essential functional roles of secondary visual, language, and ventral multimodal networks in predicting multiplication. Finally, a few shared nodes but largely nonoverlapping functional and structural connections were found to predict subtraction and multiplication skills. Altogether, our findings provide new insights into the brain markers of arithmetic skills in children and highlight the importance of studying different connectivity modalities and different arithmetic domains to advance our understanding of children's arithmetic skills.

Amazwi Amasha: New Approaches to Sustainable Poetry Teaching and Learning

At many South African schools poetry is considered to be a “problem genre”, with both teachers and learners viewing it as “difficult” and as a genre that lowers schools’ pass rates in the National Senior Certificate (NSC) (Matric) examination. For this reason, schools tend to shy away from prescribing poetry at the Further Education and Training (FET) level (that is, in Grades 10-12). This article argues that the poems that are prescribed for English First Additional Language (EFAL) classes are difficult for learners to relate to because of having been written in contexts that are temporally and geographically distant from the learners’ life-worlds. In addition, many learners may not understand the particular variety of English that is used in canonical poetry. A new teaching anthology, entitled Amazwi Amasha (New Voices), containing South African post-1994 poetry, is in the process of being compiled to address the problem of learners’ alienation from their prescribed poems. This anthology forms the topic of this article. The theory and methodology underpinning the selection of poems and the design of learning activities to accompany each poem are described, along with the selection of themes that are relevant to young South Africans. The argument concludes that a more multimodal, interactive approach to teaching and learning poetry can help tap into the resources of this capacious and fascinating genre.

Individual differences in L1 and L2 anaphora resolution: effects of implicit prosodic cues and working memory

AbstractThe present experimental studies shed light on effects of implicit prosodic cues on anaphora resolution as well as on how these differ both within and between L1 and L2 speaker groups. In two self-paced reading studies, L1 and L2 participants read poem-like texts that contained anaphoric ambiguity. These stimuli were designed to include a rhyming scheme and meter that were either regular or disrupted. We expected a rhyme cue on a nonsubject pronoun antecedent (in the regularly metered and rhyming version of the texts) to induce competition effects in L1 speakers and cause them to adapt their interpretative preferences and processing strategies; yet, for L2 speakers we hypothesized that effects would either not be observed or that they would be attenuated. Additionally, we examined whether comprehender-dependent factors would modulate effects in each group. We tested both L1 and L2 participants on memory-related tasks. We also measured L1 speakers’ print exposure and L2ers’ proficiency in English. Results revealed L1–L2 dissimilarities in interpretative preferences and reading behavior, as L2 speakers were not equally sensitive to the prosodic cues introduced. The examination of memory-related measures provided evidence of within-group differences and between-group parallels: higher working memory in both groups modulated anaphora resolution, although for L2 speakers there was no additional influence of context.

Association between electronic media addiction and adolescents’ behavioral changes

Background Electronic media, such as computers, tablets, and mobile phones, are now widely used in areas of communication, education, entertainment, and business around the world. While there are many benefits to this, uncontrolled technology usage can lead to problems such as electronic media addiction (EMA). Aim This study aimed to investigate the association between EMA and behavioral changes among adolescents. Research design A descriptive correlational research design was used. Sample A purposive sample of 294 students. Setting This study was carried out in two schools in Cairo Governorate, the first one is Al-Moneera Preparatory Governmental Language School, and the second school is Al-Mobtadayan Secondary Governmental Language School. Tools The tools used in the study were sociodemographic and electronic media usage sheet, Multiple Screen Addiction Scale, and Adolescent Behavioral Changes Questionnaire. Results Of the study sample, 75.50% exhibited monothetic EMA and 24.5% exhibited polythetic EMA. Near half of the study sample (45.9%) had moderate behavioral changes and only 9.5% of the study sample had significant behavioral changes. Moreover, there was a significant positive correlation between EMA and behavioral changes among the studied sample. Conclusion The prevalence of EMA is higher among adolescents, which negatively affects their behavior. The main behavioral changes were aggression, hyperactivity, conduct problems, and emotional problems. Recommendations Safe electronic media usage should be endorsed into students’ curriculum.

Exploring stress encoding cues in English by Korean L2 speakers*

Exploring stress encoding cues in English by Korean L2 speakers*

Students’ language and subject learning attitudes in CLIL secondary education

ABSTRACT This study examines the attitudes of CLIL learners to both language and subject learning in the context of Madrid’s Spanish-English Bilingual Education Program. The research compared 70 students enrolled in two secondary school strands with differing CLIL exposure (high versus low) in terms of their attitudes towards the languages of instruction and their beliefs about how content subjects are taught in the L1 (Spanish) and the L2 (English). Their answers to two open-ended questions from a longer questionnaire were coded using thematic analysis. The results indicate that, whilst participation in either the high- or the low-exposure strand has an effect on students’ preferences regarding the language of instruction, it does not seem to influence their orientation towards the practical value of CLIL. In addition, students tend to attribute similarities and differences in the teaching of subjects in the L1 and the L2 to the content and to the change in language of instruction. These results are further discussed by addressing the amount of CLIL instruction across strands and by contextualising this approach in a primarily monolingual context and mindset, where certain expectations clash with fears and presuppositions concerning the effect on L1 literacy of learning in an additional language.

Educators’ adaptive assessment procedures in teaching English First Additional Language in Grade 6 inclusive classrooms in South Africa

Educators’ adaptive assessment procedures in teaching English First Additional Language in Grade 6 inclusive classrooms in South Africa

Investment in Learning English as an Additional Language

Learning additional languages is an experience and a process influenced by numerous aspects. This article presents a qualitative case study focused on the aspects influencing the investment of seven learners of English as an additional language, all of whom are pre-service teachers pursuing bachelor’s degrees in English education. The data under consideration is part of a larger intervention-based action research study that explored the language learning experiences of twenty pre-service teachers enrolled in a teacher preparation program at a public university in Colombia. The study is grounded in Darvinand Norton’s (2015) concept of investment and highlights the significance of communities of practice (Wenger, 2011). We analyzed open-ended interviews using Saldaña’s (2016) coding framework. The findings suggested that the investment of additional language learners can be influenced by their teachers’ pedagogical practices, the learning communities created by teachers, and the learners’ own imagined selves or identities. We discussed the implications of these findings for language teachers, language centers or institutes, and teacher education programs.

Freedom and constraints: English learners’ investment in writing through digital multimodal composing

In the field of teaching English as an Additional Language (EAL), digital multimodal composing (DMC) has been increasingly used as a pedagogical approach to support students' writing. While literature highlights DMC has the potential to encourage EAL learners' investment in writing afforded by digital tools, few studies have explored what contextual factors may shape EAL learners' identities in DMC and how they can impact their investment in English writing. This article reports on a qualitative study that investigates the contextual factors that come into play in EAL students' social identity and investment in English writing through DMC in an academic literacy course in China. Through thematic analysis, this study identifies that students' investment in English writing through the DMC project interacted with two major forces in the literacy classroom setting contextualized in the Chinese education system: freedom and constraints. Under such influence, students took on two conflicting identities: free composers and disciplined language learners. Further, I argue that they experienced tensions in these identities. However, the negotiation of the tensions tended to be productive in terms of students’ investment in English writing, which ultimately fostered an enriched understanding of writing.