The present study investigates the relative effectiveness of two types two types of instructions, consciousness-raising instruction (C-R) and consciousness-raising instruction with feedback (C-R F) for teaching English requestive downgrades forms. The study was conducted by 3 intact classes randomly assigned as control group, C-R treatment group, and C-R F treatment group. For this purposes forty five homogenous students took part in this study. They were at intermediate level, and all were male. The result of participants" performance on pre-test, post-test, and follow-up test indicated that two treatment groups outperformed control group, and C-R F group performed better than C-R group. The results confirmed the benefits of L2 pragmatic instruction in EFL context.
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.
Abstract-This paper aimed to examine the effect of authentic and inauthentic materials in cultural awareness training on the listening comprehension ability of EFL learners. To this end, the Cambridge ELT placement test was given to 116 students, 60 of them who were at intermediate level were chosen as the sample. The participants were randomly divided into two equal groups, the control and experimental groups. They also took a listening pretest to investigate the possible difference between them. The control group underwent listening activities through inauthentic materials, while the experimental group dealt with authentic materials. Test scores in pre-and post-test were compared. Using SPSS, the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test of normality was run for the post-test scores to check the applicability of parametric statistics. A Paired-Sample T-Test proved that the listening comprehension ability of the participants has improved in a statistically significant way. A One-way ANOVA test was then run to compare the mean-scores of the groups in the post-test. All tests were at the alpha level of .05. The results revealed that the listening ability of learners in the experimental group had improved better than the learners in the control group. This study may have implications for improving EFL learners' listening ability.
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