No abstract

Synchronous learning and asynchronous learning are the two main approaches to teaching available in distance education. The main objective of the study was to determine which approach to vocabulary learning, would facilitate vocabulary learning more for Iranian EFL learners. From among the targeted population of 82 intermediate students of an English institute in Isfahan, Iran, students between the ages of 12 to 18, a sample of 60 students were chosen based on their score on a quick placement test (QPT). The selected participants undertook a vocabulary pre-test and were divided into two groups of 30 who in terms of language proficiency and vocabulary knowledge were homogenized. Both synchronous and asynchronous groups were taught “Advanced Vocabulary and Idiom”, by the same teacher at one particular institute. In the period of 10 sessions of a semester, the synchronous groups were taught the vocabulary items in class synchronously and the asynchronous group was taught via email. After the post-test, the results with the t-test observed, indicated a significance difference between synchronous and asynchronous groups, p-value of .003, gender with the p-value of 0.027 and pre-test and post-test with the p-value of 0.047, but no significance was observed for age with the p-value of 0.127. The post-test results indicated that the synchronous group considerably outperformed the asynchronous group in the vocabulary knowledge they attained.

This study attempts to tease apart the effect of first (L1) and second (L2) language knowledge on the acquisition of syntactic properties of L3 English in order to test current generative theories in the field of third language acquisition (L3A). The property under investigation is adjective placement. Participants are L1 Azeri / L2 Persian, and L1 Persian learners of English as a third and second language respectively. To fulfill so, 180 bilingual and monolingual university students from Arak and Miyandoab took a general English proficiency test, a background questionnaire, and a syntactic structure test. The L3 proficiency was also considered. The data, then, were analyzed through utilization of descriptive statistics and two-way ANOVA. In relation to the hypotheses, results indicated L2 status as the determining factor in the acquisition of English adjective properties by Azeri-Persian bilinguals. Proficiency level in the L3 also proved to have a significant role. The implications of the study can be utilized in developing an educational and linguistic methodology for bilingual learners of English as an L3 in Iran.

The current study sought to examine the validity of a General English Achievement Test (GEAT), administered to university students in the fall semester of 2018–2019 academic year, by hybridizing differential information (DIF) and differential distractor function (DDF) analytical models. Using a purposive sampling method, from the target population of undergraduate students studying in different disciplines at Islamic Azad University (IAU), (Isfahan branch), a sample of 835 students taking GEAT were selected. The 60-item multiple-choice test comprised four sub-sections; namely, vocabulary, grammar, cloze test, and reading comprehension. The students’ test scores served as the targeted data and the validity of the test was examined through the application of Cochran-Mantel-Haenszel (CMH) and multinomial log-linear regression models for detecting DIF and DDF, respectively. To account for the assumption of uni-dimensionality, the test sub-sections were analyzed independently. Furthermore, the assumption of local independence was checked based on correlational analysis and no extreme values were observed. The results of the study identified five moderate-level DIF items and one DDF item signaling an adverse effect on test fairness due to the existing biased items. Notably, these findings may have important implications for both language policymakers and test developers.

In bilingual studies, repetition priming across languages or translation priming can be used to examine the mental representations of bilingual lexicon and language in memory. Motivated to demonstrate the effects of dividing attention during implicit retrieval of L 2 spoken words, we investigated the nature of the processes involved in translation priming. In so doing, we used behavioral measures (i.e. reaction time and accuracy) to study 60 Persian-English unbalanced proficient bilinguals performing translation priming in two language directions under two attention conditions. The present study compared a divided attention (DA) condition, in which participants carried out the priming task in auditory modality while simultaneously performing a secondary task in visual modality, and a full attention (FA) condition, in which participants performed only the priming task. We also examined secondary tasks costs produced by memory tests. Despite significant priming effects and symmetrical pattern of translation priming in the FA condition, translation priming effects in L 2-to-L 1 direction were absent in the DA condition. The secondary task was disrupted by memory test in this direction as well. The paper ends with discussion on the role of attention in L 2 spoken word processing and language direction in translation priming in light of models of bilingual memory.