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The purpose of this study is to explore the effects of peer feedback combined with different task sequences on written performance in actual large-sized classrooms motivated by several problems in previous peer feedback studies—validity concerns in research design, peer feedback as only productoriented activity, the lack of effects of feedback on detailed written performance, and primary focus on affective and writing quality. A total of 89 undergraduates were divided into two groups: peer feedback in simple-complex task sequence (PSC) and peer feedback in complex-simple task sequence (PCS). The study employed eleven general and specific measure indices of syntactic complexity, accuracy, and fluency. The findings were that peer feedback influenced accuracy and fluency, and task sequence influenced syntactic complexity. The PSC increased general and specific accuracy, but decreased fluency, whereas the PCS increased general and specific syntactic complexity, specific accuracy, and fluency. Overall, peer feedback in a simple-complex task sequence improved accuracy in an extended manner, and peer feedback in complex-simple task sequence improved various aspects of written performance. The study suggests peer feedback could be a feasible way to improve actual written performance even in large writing classes when task sequences and task complexity are involved with peer feedback.

This classroom-based study investigated how task manipulation would affect second language learners’ interactional patterns in video-conferenced collaborative writing task. In Zoom-mediated courses in a university in Hong Kong, 22 students collaboratively wrote suggestions for improvements to their peers’ lesson plans using Office 365. To examine the impact of different task features on learners’ interactional patterns, the suggestion-giving task was manipulated in terms of discoursestructural demands (i.e., listing bullet-pointed sentences vs composing a coherent letter) and interactional demands (i.e., working in a pair vs working in a group of three or four). Data came from audio-recordings of the students’ peer collaborations and responses to a post-task survey. The results revealed that students rated writing a coherent letter considerably more demanding than writing bulletpointed sentences, resulting in fewer discussions on how to improve a given lesson plan. In addition, the students’ discussions were predominantly meaning-based with very little focus on the target language use. The findings of this study cast light on the importance of careful task design when implementing video-conferenced collaborative writing tasks.

During spoken discourse, disagreements and agreements take on discrete turn structures based on preference. A common assumption is that agreement is sought after, while disagreement is to be avoided. This stems from the fact that disagreements are a sign of conflict and, therefore, are deemed to be face-threatening. This study employs conversation analysis to examine how disagreement unfolds during small group discussions among advanced-level language learners at an Englishmedium university in Japan. It was found that at the turn-level, interactants drew on an abundance of mitigation tactics and positioned them strategically within their turns. An examination of extended sequences of turns revealed that learners could successfully engage in oppositional talk to satisfy both the transactional and interpersonal goals of the task. A pattern emerged in which discussions led off with uncertainty, but through the careful management of disagreement, participants were able to coconstruct knowledge. The group interaction presented in this paper evidences the ways in which sociopragmatic competence can influence the quality of cooperative, task-based language learning.

Motivation plays a significant role in teaching academic writing; thus, finding a reliable, valid, and streamlined approach is crucial. With the promising potential of Tan and Bensal’s (2021) Diametric Motivational Approach (DMA) on students’ academic writing proficiency (AWP), it is necessary to investigate its potency by operationalizing it. With a total of 310 Filipino college students from eleven different academic writing classes being the participants of this study, three main statistical analysis methods were conducted to achieve this study’s objectives of (1) operationalizing DMA and (2) validating the correlation between DMA and AWP. First, Confirmatory Factor Analysis was utilized to establish the DMA’s construct validity. Second, multiple regression analysis was used to analyze the significant relationship between DMA’s constructs and AWP. Last, through mediation analysis the direct and indirect effects of DMA constructs to AWP score were presented. The results established the construct validity of DMA and its significant relationship with AWP. Moreover, discussions of the direct and indirect effects of DMA constructs to AWP were elaborated. This paper could open doors to richer discussion and diverse suggestions for future researchers on how academic writing motivation must be approached.

This paper examines the motivation and investment of Korean students’ language learning experiences during their early study abroad in the United States. Early study abroad involved not only language learning process, but also why students engage in language learning. This study explored the participants’ ideal L2 self and ought-to L2 self from Dörnyei’s L2 Motivational Self System and imagined community, imagined identity, and non-participation related to the concept of investment. Data were collected from individual and group interviews with six Korean young adults who reflected on their early study abroad in their elementary or secondary school years. Motivation and investment represented language learners’ desires, and they were situational and contextual. Motivation and investment complemented each other such that students sometimes had motivation, but other times had investment or they had both but with a different focus. Imagined future selves can stimulate students’ language learning, and teachers should understand and balance students’ actual and imagined identities in their learning context.

Given the significance of psychological factors in forming biases, this study intends to introduce emotioncy, emotions evoked by senses, as a potential source of reading comprehension test bias. To this end, 514 English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners were asked to take a 30-item multiplechoice reading comprehension test along with the emotioncy scale. Based on the emotioncy scores, participants were classified into two groups of Low and High-emotioncy. Subsequently, Rasch modelbased Differential Item and Test Functioning (DIF/DTF) analyses were employed across the two target groups. The results showed that the reading comprehension test functioned differentially both at the level of the individual items and the whole test as a set of items, favoring the examinees with higher levels of emotioncy. Thus, the study provides evidence for emotioncy as a potential psychological source of reading comprehension test bias and discusses implications for educators and test developers.

English is becoming the global language of business, education, science and scholarship, and Englishmedium instruction (EMI) in higher education is a rapidly growing, multidimensional global phenomenon. Previous research on EMI has predominantly highlighted the forces driving this phenomenon, implementation challenges, and stakeholders’ language proficiency and attitudes, while very few studies have discussed changes in pedagogical practices to improve the quality of EMI at the micro level, particularly in the Asian context. This article investigates the effects of formative feedback delivered via a social Q&A online platform on learners’ performance and motivation and explores students’ perceptions of the use of the platform. It analysed pre-test, post-test, and questionnaire data from 130 students enrolled in an English-mediated business course at an EMI university in South Korea. These data were supplemented by the focus-group interview with eight students. The findings suggested that the application of the platform was viewed favourably by the students and that technology-mediated feedback significantly enhanced their writing performance and motivation, increased their language and content knowledge, and supported their active engagement. The findings have several pedagogical implications for other EMI contexts.

It has been argued that self-directed professional development is a necessary component of continuous, lifelong teacher learning. Research has predominantly focused on top-down, institution-mandated professional development, however, a paucity of data exists concerning self-directed teacher professional development. Therefore, the aim of this project was to explore the self-directed professional development that native English-speaking teachers (NESTs) in South Korea engaged in, as well as assess if these behaviors matched their stated beliefs about self-directed professional development. Employing a mixed-methods approach, data was collected from 56 teachers who completed online questionnaires, and 11 teachers who participated in follow-up interviews. Analysis revealed that in the 12 months prior to the study, only 35 teachers engaged in self-directed professional development. Findings indicated that the teachers who held education degrees and were interested in an EFL/ESL career were the most likely to engage in self-directed professional development. Of the participants that did not engage in self-directed professional development, the preeminent factors hindering involvement were a lack of ambition and/or ambivalence, lack of necessity, a shortage of career advancement prospects, and the COVID-19 pandemic. It could be concluded that most NESTs in the study did not engage in enough professional development to increase student learning outcomes.

Based on the supportive evidence for the existence of backward transfer of L3 on the interpretation of L2 reflexives detected by Ahn & Mao (2019), this paper explores potential factors that possibly affect the process of backward transfer of L3. Successful interpretation of reflexives--the searching for the antecedents to which the reflexives might be bound--is subject to the constraints of syntactic and discoursal factors, given that English is more syntactic-oriented, while Chinese and Korean are more pragmatic-oriented. The present study compares the accuracy rates in the Truth Value Judgment Task to examine the role of syntactic complexity in Chinese-English (CE), Korean-English (KE), and Chinese-English-Korean (CEK) language configurations. The results show that the Mean Dependency Distance (MDD) is a negative and significant predictor of the probability of accurate response in the TVJT. However, when the regression model is fitted by group, it is revealed that the regression coefficient of the MDD strikes a significant level with the CE and the CEK groups, but not with the KE group. The CEK group is more capable of rejecting the influence of syntactic complexity than the CE group, either because of their enhanced meta-linguistic knowledge or because of weakened reliance on syntactic constraints. The findings are in line with both the Cumulative Enhancement Model and the Foreign Language Effect Model.

Using an adapted questionnaire based on the Technology, Pedagogy, and Content Knowledge (TPACK) Model (Mishra, & Koehler, 2006), the study examined the impact of virtual teaching during the pandemic on language teachers’ perceived practice of technology integration one month after the return to F2F instruction to establish a baseline of their perception of competence. After nine months of continual F2F instruction, one-on-one interviews were conducted to obtain deeper insight into how TPACK was utilized in F2F instruction. The action research study drew on work (Rapanta et al., 2021) examining how the experience of teaching online in an Emergency Remote Teaching (ERT) (Hodges et al. 2020) context for one year can be utilized to understand teachers’ practice on the return to F2F instruction, while still responding to a dynamic and fluid educational situation. The results offer an in-depth knowledge of language teachers’ perceptions in terms of the interaction of three components of the TPACK model, with implications for not only higher education teacher workplace professional development, but also for professional development offered by language teacher associations (LTAs) to retain and attract membership.

Learners whose first language lacks a system for acknowledging countability and associated plural forms may experience problems in English when surrounding sentences are deictically referenced (e.g., that/those; it is/they are). Moreover, noun phrases may be omitted or repeated, resulting in further inaccuracies. This exploratory study (N = 81) sought to establish whether a synthesis of input-based and output-based contrastive instruction delivered through an online medium would improve deictic referencing accuracy in a controlled speaking task among Japanese university EFL learners. The findings revealed that for deictic plural forms, no significant differences were observed between the experimental and control groups. However, for noun phrase omissions and repetitions, the experimental group displayed significant within-group improvements, suggesting partial effectiveness of the treatment. The study reiterates the resistant nature of linguistic features influenced by the underlying concept of countability, yet highlights the rich potential that web-based contrastive instruction may provide in enhancing grammatical accuracy.

While CLT has continued to be one of the most widely applied approach in teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL) worldwide, there has been numerous studies that have pointed out various obstacles in applying CLT in the East Asian context. Jeon (1997) identified key issues in implementing CLT in the Korean context and followed up on the same issues in Jeon (2009) to examine whether there had been any changes after 12 years of implementation. In particular, three research questions were considered: 1) What are the key issues in applying the communicative approach in Korea? 2) Is there an order of priority in the importance of these issues? and 3) Are there any changes in the importance of these issues after 12 years of implementation? The results showed that while some new issues had come up, the top key issues had remained the same. This was a surprising finding since there had not been any major changes in the top key issues 12 years after the first study and pointed out the persistent need to seek out obstacles over the years. As there had been a global upheaval in the educational context due to COVID-19, major changes in English education was expected. Accordingly, this study is another follow up study that focused on revisiting key issues regarding the implementation of CLT in the Korean EFL context. In order to identify the key issues, a three-round Delphi technique was used. A total of 36 teachers participated in identifying the key issues, ranking the issues and revisiting the ranked issues to see if there needs to be any adjustments. The results showed that, after 26 years of implementation, some of the key issues had been modified and have either increased or decreased their importance. While there were some issues that have newly emerged, the issues that had stayed in the top ranking have remained the same. This calls for an urgent need to address such issues as the curriculum continues to stress the importance of CLT in Korea. Without ameliorating the hindering factors, proper implementation of CLT will be challenging for English teachers in Korea.