Rapidly developing mobile applications and ubiquitously accessing to the Internet provide the learners with extended opportunities to be independent from any time and location. In this regard, this study aimed to investigate the impact of Telegram application on collocation learning and retention by Iranian EFL learners. To this end, 40 high school participants whose homogeneity was guaranteed through a language proficiency test, were selected and randomly divided into two equal-in-number groups of 20 students in the experimental and 20 in the control group. To minimize the effect of participants' background knowledge in terms of collocations, a pretest was given to the participants a week prior to the treatment sessions. At the treatment sessions, the experimental group installed Telegram application on their mobiles or tablets for collocation learning and retention, whereas the control group was not allowed to use any tool. At the end of the treatment phase, a teacher-made collocation knowledge test parallel to pretest was conducted for both control and experimental groups in order to measure the learners' progress as a result of instruction. To ascertain that the participants were statistically different, an independent samples t-test was run between experimental and control groups' post-test scores. In order to determine the effectiveness of the program, a paired samples t-test was also conducted aside comparing the mean scores of pre-test and post-test of the control and experimental groups. Results of data analysis revealed a significant difference between the performance of experimental and control groups, of course, in favor of the experimental group confirming the effect of Telegram application on improving collocational knowledge among Iranian high school students. This study implies that utilizing Telegram as a newly emerging mobile application has various pedagogical benefits and fosters EFL instruction effectively. Therefore, it is suggested that EFL teachers should provide opportunities and facilities to activate this social network formally within the curriculum for the future.

In the context of Iranian science faculties, the study outlines the identification of the language needs of undergraduate science students in ESP classes. ESP has become an important activity within the teaching of English as a Foreign or second language (Howatt, 1984). Robinson (1991) maintains that the primacy of needs analysis is a critical concept in defining ESP and an ESP course is based on a needs analysis (Robinson 1991).The study was designed on a qualitative-quantitative survey basis using both interviews and questionnaires administered to a total of 100 undergraduate students majoring in biology, chemistry, and physics as well as 10 EFL instructors in Science Faculty of Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz. Employing a non-parametric test, Chi-squared test was used to examine the differences between the students’ responses and those of the instructors. The findings revealed discrepancies between the students’ and instructors’ perception of the language needs. Language instructors were outspoken critic of the students’ language skills. Similarly, students expressed their dissatisfaction with the methodology, the number of students, the amount of the course allocated time, and their improvement. Also, the science students reported limited vocabulary, poor pronunciation, deficient grammar, and teacher-centered class activities as ongoing issues in ESP classes. The respondents ranked reading, speaking, writing, and listening respectively as important skills. The study concludes that the instructors and course designers should consider students’ needs and wants to better prepare the students to use English language in their future professions.

Abstract:
In recent years, language learning research seems to be more concerned with factors that may affect the choice of language learning strategies among learners. Such factors have been identified as age, gender, personality types, motivation and learning styles. This study aims at investigating the possible effect of extroversion/introversion personality traits and gender on writing strategy preferences among Iranian English as a foreign language (EFL) at university level. The participants of the study were 50 male and female sophomore students majoring in English Translation and English Literature at Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz. The participants were asked to complete two questionnaires. One was Eysenck's Personality Inventory (1990) which determines whether they are extrovert or introvert and the other was Writing Strategy questionnaire (Ana Belen Cabrejas Penuelas, 2013) to pinpoint the kinds of strategies mostly used among them. The data analysis through SPSS software revealed insignificant relationship among extroversion / introversion personality traits, gender and writing strategy preferences in general and the subscales in particular. To discuss the obtained results in the present study, it may be concluded that possessing characteristics such as sociability and interactivity has less to do with a cognitive activity such as writing strategy preferences. In fact, being an extrovert person may affect oral communication and this trait tends not to impact the use of writing strategies. However, it is suggested that EFL teachers need to be mindful of gender differences and various personality types in terms of strategy use and develop strategy instruction accordingly.
 

 Regarding the impressive innovation in social relations due to formation of online social networks, on top of them, Facebook (FB), applied linguistic scholars along with other fields of study attempt to discover ways to benefit from it. The present study explored the possible relationship between online FB in-group interaction and speaking skill of Iranian Extrovert and Introvert intermediate EFL learners of Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz and Jahad Daneshgahi of Ahvaz. First, participants’ personality style was identified by Eysenck personality questionnaire. Then an interview with IELTS format as a pretest of speaking was conducted. In the second phase of the study, participants joined in an FB group and interacted for two months, after that another interview was conducted as posttest. To discover any significant difference in participants’ performance in terms of language production and grammar accuracy, two-related sample Sign test applied. The p-value for Introverts and Extroverts was 0.109 and 0.008 respectively, which implied the significant effects in Extroverts performance and the inefficiency of treatment for introvert learners. The findings of the FB group also suggest an increase in learners’ online meaningful interactions in target language, but the transfer of this knowledge into speaking was only successful in Extroverts. This combination of findings provides some support for the conceptual premise that Computer-mediated-communication if planned as a part of educational project would facilitate language learning. However, more research on this area needs to be undertaken before the association between textual and verbal interaction is more clearly understood.

Literary issues need to be scientifically disseminated, measured, and analyzed using various academic disciplines and discourses. In this context, great importance can thus be attached to teaching literature as a viable technique for developing linguistic competence and skills, particularly reading comprehension skill, among learners. Generally speaking, two main objectives for teaching literature can be considered as follows: (a) the study of literature, and (b) the use of literature as a resource for language learning. By the first goal, the special status of literature is in the focus of attention. By the second one, literature is presumed to be a suitable tool for language learning and thus on par with many other linguistic applications. In this study much attention is paid to the latter. Hence, this study is an attempt to examine the effect of teaching short stories through awareness raising and investigate any probable correlation between teaching literary materials through awareness raising in Iranian EFL classes and rise in learners’ reading comprehension. To this end, an experimental study was done. Participants were Iranian EFL students who were selected from Iran Language Institute for University Students. To homogenize the participants, The Oxford Quick Placement Test was administered and thirty of the learners who achieved lower intermediate English proficiency were selected as the research sample. Next, they were randomly divided into two groups, a control group (n=15) and an experimental one (n=15). The control group did not receive any special treatment for teaching the short stories and followed the conventional methods. Conversely, the experimental group was taught the same short stories in the same course of time using awareness-raising activities, such as teaching the elements of short stories such as theme, symbol, characterization, point of view, and plot, providing a list of key words and specific words contextualized in some sample sentences, and raising the awareness of the learners about the short stories. The participants of the experimental group were also provided with biographical information on the author to raise the learners’ awareness of the context of the short story in question. The collected data were then analyzed using SPSS version 21. An independent sample t-test was run. According to the obtained results, the experimental group demonstrated a better performance than the control group; however, the said outperformance is not significant. The findings of the present study also revealed that the male and female participants of both groups performed differently on the short stories.

The inductive- deductive teaching approaches were often employed in grammar teaching. Along with this issue, there has usually been wide discussion on the question of which method would be more beneficial to language learners. Thus, this research study attempted to discover the effect of inductive-deductive grammar teaching on grammar learning of field dependent- independent Iranian EFL learners. The participants were 82 freshman, male and female EFL learners. They were between 19 to 22 years old and selected from Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz, Iran. Firstly, a TOFEL proficiency test was administered to homogenize them. Secondly, a group embedded figure test was administered to screen them according to their FD-FI cognitive styles. Thirdly, they took a pretest, then received treatment and finally they took a posttest. The data collected were analyzed through the statistics of independent samples T-test. The findings of this research study revealed no significant difference between FD and FI cognitive styles in the amount of progress in grammar learning through two inductive and deductive modes of grammar teaching. Additionally, the analysis of data through paired sample T-test showed that inductive approach was more effective on the grammar learning of female and FD participants while deductive approach was more effective in the grammar learning of both male and female participants with the same cognitive styles. It was also indicated that inductive approach was effective on learn grammar when the participants were female with FI cognitive styles although it was proved ineffective when the participants were male with the same cognitive style.

Dynamic assessment (DA), rooted in sociocultural theory (SCT), holds the promise to remedy the pitfalls inherent in traditional static assessment procedures. To examine this promise, the present study aimed at investigating the difference between applying dynamic and non-dynamic assessment of Iranian EFL learners' collocational knowledge. Accordingly, 39 students of two third grade high school classes whose age ranged from 16-17 participated in the study and the classes were assigned randomly to the control and experimental group. First a pretest was administered to test students’ current knowledge of collocations. After that, the experimental group received instruction based on DA principles for 8 sessions whereas the control group received just the definition of the collocations based on the method of their language school and they received no mediation. Finally, after treatment sessions, a posttest was conducted. Three t-tests were run for answering the research questions. The results of the study indicated that dynamic assessment had a significant effect on Iranian EFL learners’ collocational knowledge and the group assessed dynamically performed better than non-dynamic group. The finding of the study can have useful implications for EFL learners, teachers and test designers.

 The rapid development of modern technologies, make the researchers, language teachers seek for newer ways of implementing them in the classroom setting, and creating a stress free environment for language learning. The purpose of this study was to investigate the difference between two modes of teaching listening comprehension, computer-assisted language learning (CALL) and traditional mode, to Iranian junior high school students. It also aimed to investigate the role of teacher in CALL class. The study was an empirical one, which employed quantitative research methods. The data were collected from two classes including 60 female students studying in grade 8 in junior high schools in Dezful. These two classes were assigned as CALL group (30 students) and traditional group (30 students). The class of CALL was held at the computer site in Maktab Zeinab junior high school and the traditional group received instruction in a conventional way in Bideli junior high school. Two classes were taught by the same teacher and covered the same materials in their weekly four-hour listening lesson over two months. The data came from listening test, pre- test, post-test and observation. The data was analyzed by descriptive statistics (mean and standard deviation) and T-test (paired sample t-test and independent sample t-test) was run. The results indicated a significant difference between the traditional and CALL modes. Therefore, it seems that the CALL mode is more efficient than the traditional in the improvement of students’ listening comprehension skill. Based on the observation, the researcher concluded that the nature of the EFL teacher’s role changed in CALL class when compared with the traditional class.

Abstract:
Learning a second language may entail mastering all four skills. This is not a simple task and mastering each of these skills requires many tough endeavors. Among such skills, reading has been the focus of many investigations and there is a host of works in this ground. Reading comprehension can be defined as an active thinking process through which a reader intentionally constructs meaning to form a deeper understanding of the concepts and information presented in a text. To be a literate figure in nowadays science-bound world is an inevitable option and reading plays a salient role in this ground. Hence, as Pressley (2006, cited in Westwood, 2008) hold, literacy instruction must include explicit teaching and practice in the essential strategies of reading to enable all students to read fluently, confidently and with understanding. The role of reading has been highlighted in the methods of language teaching from Coleman Report’s (1929) Reading Approach as well as nowadays new trends toward SLA such as Concept-oriented reading instruction (CORI) (Nation, 2009). Comprehension of written materials varies considerably across individuals, that is, there are good and poor comprehenders, in Westwood (2008) terms. Intuitively, personality is a key factor for explaining individual differences in L2 learning (Davies & Elder, 2004).Tasks in second language acquisition can be fruitful in variety of aspects. Tasks can be designed and implemented in different aspects of teaching contexts and will help teachers with little or no previous experience of using tasks themselves. This study aims to investigate the relationship between two personality types of Iranian EFL learners, Extrovert and Introvert, and their performance on five task types of reading comprehension. 30 participants (12 males, 18 females) out of 42 were selected through a proficiency test. Then, they were asked to fill out Eysenck’s Personality Inventory (EPI) to be known as Extrovert or Introvert. Five types of reading tasks, Matching Headings Task, Table Completion Task, Identifying Writer’s views Task, Multiple Choice Task, and Identifying Information Task, were asked to be done by participants in five separate sessions. The results of t-tests revealed no statistically significant difference between two personality types. Furthermore, the results of One-way ANOVA showed that Extroverts had better, but not significant, performance on Table Completion and Matching Headings tasks, while Introverts fulfilled Matching Headings Task better, again not significant, among five tasks. The results of this study could have some implications for educators concerned with the EFL teaching and learning, and practitioners as well.

 

Some social networks such as blogs have recently reached their top popularity among people especially youngsters who are interested in using Computer Mediated Communication (CMC) tools. Weblog is an Internet tool that is believed to possess great potential to facilitate learning in education. The purpose of the present study was to explore, first, if blog is an appropriate electronic tool to promote the EFL learners’ critical thinking, second, to what extent weblogging activities can influence critical thinking indicators. Third, if blog has any ability to improve peer learning, and the last, what the learners’ attitudes are towards using blogs in EFL learning. For the first and second research questions of the present study, students’ critical thinking was analyzed through the Newman, Webb and Cochrane’s Model and to answer the third and fourth research questions, the survey questionnaire was used for analyzing participants’ attitudes and perceptions towards using blogs in English Language Teaching. To this end, 25 male and female students from Shahid Chamran University were selected. The participants made use of blog as a supplementary material and put their writings in a shared blog which was designed by the researcher. This study found that blogging can help students to improve their critical thinking skills as well as their writing skills and the participants realized the crucial role of peer feedback which could be gained through comments. The result of this study also proves that the students formed positive attitudes toward using blogs in English language learning and blogs can be popular in the language classrooms, especially in the context of Iran where English is a foreign language.

SMS learning has an important role in vocabulary learning. The present study investigates the difference(s) between the two modes of learning English words, named SMS leaning and self-study, and also it aimed at finding out the difference(s) between male and female learning of the SMS-group. To fulfill the purpose of the study 40 learners from among 60 university students at BA level from different majors, were selected. After making the participants homogeneous through a proficiency test they were randomly divided into two equal groups of SMS learning and self-study, then a pre-test was administered and after that a post-test was also administered to find out the participants' progress. At the end of the study a questionnaire was given to the SMS group to find out their ideas and attitudes towards the learning. Interestingly most of the answers were in favor of SMS-learning. ANOVA analysis was run to find out the differences between the two groups. The performance of the SMS group was much better than the other group and also, there was no significant difference between male and female participants toward learning the English words in the SMS group. The result of this study is beneficial for Iranian EFL teachers and also university students who are getting ready for the MA exam entrance.

 

The present study aimed to investigate the relationship between different types of Iranian EFL learners’ personality traits and four types of listening tasks. This study also intended to see if the different performances in listening tasks are the result of different personality traits or the result of the structure of listening tasks. 68 intermediate level students – 29 males and 39 females – from Kanune Zabane Khuzestan Institute of Ahvaz were selected through a proficiency test as the participants. The personality traits of the participants were determined by administrating NEO Five Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI). Four types of listening tasks including minimal pairs, listening for gist, listening for details, and cloze tasks were utilized in this study. Then, Pearson Product Moment correlation analyses were conducted to measure the degree of the relationship between each personality trait and listening tasks of the participants. The results of the correlation analyses revealed that only Extraversion had a significant negative correlation with all tasks and overall listening tasks. In order to determine the advantageous personality traits when performing each listening task, five multiple regression analyses were conducted and it was revealed that only Introversion was advantageous when performing each listening task and other personality traits did not have a significant advantage in performing listening tasks. The results of the study can help material developers, teachers, and students to provide and use different methods of teaching and learning to make the language learning process more learner-centered.

 Idioms, being a central part of attention in English language, play an essential role in language learning and teaching since they are frequently used in written and especially spoken discourse. Thus, teaching and learning idioms is of great significance to language teachers to help learners improve their communicative abilities. This study was an attempt to investigate the effect of two different teaching techniques- etymological elaboration and Persian equivalents- on L2 idiom learning of Iranian EFL learners and also to investigate L1 transfer effect on idiom learning. To this end, 40 upper-intermediate EFL Iranian learners being homogeneous in terms of their language proficiency were randomly divided into two experimental groups, each including 20 students. The students of group A received instruction on 80 idioms through etymological elaboration and group B through Persian equivalents. The instruments used in this study were: TOEFL test, a pretest containing 90 idioms to minimize the effect of participants' prior knowledge of the target idioms and a post-test containing 80 idioms selected to be instructed. The materials were Oxford Dictionary of Idioms and Interchange Book Series vol. 3. After receiving idiom instructions which lasted about 20 sessions, a post-test including 80 multiple choice items based on 80 target idioms being taught, was administered to both groups in order to measure the degree of their idiom learning and also the transfer effect of L1. The data gathered from the post-test were analyzed by an independent sample T-test. The results of the study revealed that the group being instructed through etymological elaboration outperformed the group being instructed by Persian equivalents. First language transfer effect was also greater for the group being taught through Persian equivalents of the idioms. The results suggest the pedagogical value of etymological elaboration for the teaching and learning of idioms.