The paper describes the considerations that were taken into account in the development of a tentative English language textbook evaluation checklist. A brief review of the related literature precedes the crucial issues that should be considered in developing checklists. In the light of the previous evaluation checklists the developers created a list of the evaluative criteria on which the construct of the checklist could be established. The developers considered matters of validity, reliability and practicality in the process of its design; however, further research is in process to refine the checklist. Such an instrument could be used by curriculum designers, material developers and evaluators, as well as English language teachers.

Previous studies have examined learner factors such as anxiety, self-efficacy, and achievement motivation in ESL/EFL (English as a second language/English as a foreign language) writing. Studies have affirmed that self-efficacy and achievement motivation could enhance writing performance, whereas anxiety may hinder writing achievement. This study aimed to examine individual differences in Iraqi EFL learners’ writing anxiety, writing self-efficacy, and writing achievement motivation in the Iraqi EFL context. A quantitative approach, specifically the correlational design, was employed to examine the abovementioned relationships. The sample of the study comprised 100 Iraqi undergraduate students majoring in English language from two Iraqi public universities. Data were collected via four instruments: three questionnaires, namely, Second Language Writing Anxiety Inventory (SLWAI), Writer Self-Perception Scale (WSPS) and Achievement Goal Questionnaire (AGQ), and one descriptive writing task. The findings of this study discovered that the higher the writing anxiety level, the poorer the writing performance, whereas the higher the writing self-efficacy and writing achievement motivation level, the better the writing performance. The findings of this study also indicated that both writing self-efficacy and writing anxiety, and writing anxiety and writing achievement motivation were negatively correlated, whereas writing self-efficacy and writing achievement motivation were significantly and positively correlated. This study suggests that these factors need to be taken into consideration in EFL writing instruction to facilitate the teaching and learning process of EFL writing, which in turn would help enhance the EFL undergraduates’ writing ability.

Abstract-Checklists are instruments that help teachers or researchers in the area of English Language Teaching (ELT) to evaluate teaching-learning materials like textbooks. Several checklists are available in the literature, most of which lack validity. The paper discusses the results of a survey that investigated a group of English as a Second Language (ESL) experts' (n=207) views on a checklist developed by the present researchers. The results showed an equal level of importance for all the items of the checklist. Additionally, based on the findings of factor analysis, two items were removed from the checklist. The study offers useful implications for ELT practitioners and researchers. Further research is necessary to field test the checklist for its validity and reliability.

Abstract-English as a Foreign Language (EFL) listening skill is considered a problematic skill particularly in a foreign language context where practice opportunities are limited. This study aimed to explore the listening comprehension problems of a group of EFL learners. Survey method was followed to collect data from a group of Iranian tertiary level EFL learners (n = 100) using the Listening Comprehension Processing Problems Questionnaire. The results indicated that the learners experienced moderate to high levels of difficulty in all three categories of listening comprehension problems, namely perception, parsing, and utilization. The findings are expected to have useful implications for syllabus designers and teachers who intend to address the listening comprehension problems of EFL learners.

This study aims to 1) explore the extent Iraqi high school students' use of writing strategies; 2) identify the contribution of proficiency level to writing strategy use; and 3) compare male and female students' writing strategy use. This study employed a quantitative approach, whereby a total of 132 high school students were randomly selected from the Karkh'sdistrict of Baghdad to constitute the sample of the study. A 30-item 3-point Likert scale questionnaire on writing strategy use that was adapted from Petrić&Czárl's (2003) writing strategy questionnaire served as the instrument of the study. The results of the study reveal that the frequency of strategy use was low among the participants. In addition, no significant difference was found between high and low proficiency students'strategy use. Finally, it was found that there is significant difference between female and male students' strategy use. Female students were found to use writing strategies more than males. The paper concludes with a discussion on the implications of the findings.

Abstract-The ability to summarize and paraphrase written pieces is one of the essential skills tertiary level students need in order to succeed in their academic endeavor. It involves the process of decoding a text, and then re-encoding it by making changes to the structure and vocabulary of the original text while maintaining its content. The present study analyzes a group of tertiary level students' written samples to diagnose their main areas of difficulty in writing business report summaries. For this purpose, a sample of 69 samples was collected from an intact group of learners. Two raters used an analytic writing scale to score the samples individually. Based on the results, majority of the students (about 70%) achieved 'excellent to very good' scores for the 'content' of their written samples. However, regarding the 'organization' and 'vocabulary' of their written pieces, respectively 75% and 97% of these students scored 'Fair to poor'. 'Good to average' results were achieved for a majority of the students' 'language use' and 'mechanics' skills. The findings of the present study accentuate the urgent need for remedy courses to help these students improve their organization and vocabulary skills in ESL writing. Further research is necessary to diagnose the learners' difficulty areas in other genres of writing such as argumentative and narrative modes.Index Terms-summary writing, vocabulary knowledge, English as a second language writing, paraphrase, writing problems

This paper reports the results of a corpus-based study on English grammar articles presented in the Malaysian Form 1 to Form 5 English Language textbooks. The study aimed to find out the distribution patterns of the articles and the distributions of their colligation patterns in the secondary school English Language textbooks. The findings showed that all the three articles (a, an, the) are presented in all the five English Language textbooks and that their frequency of occurrences has an increasing trend from Form 1 to Form 5. However, the distributions of the colligation patterns of the articles showed inconsistency from one form to another. Some colligation patterns were over-emphasized while others were neglected in the English language textbooks. This study indicates that a textbook corpus can be useful in analyzing the presentation of grammatical structures (articles, in the case of this research). The findings can provide guidance to teachers to improve their pedagogical practices in the teaching of articles and to cater to the weaknesses of the presentation of articles in the textbooks.

In the English as a second language (ESL) research context, teachers are committed to ensuring that students are aware of their writing skills and the kinds of errors they make in their writing. This explains why teacher feedback is frequently practised in the writing classrooms. Self-assessment is another supplementary strategy that provides opportunity for ESL students to take control of their learning. This study investigated the effects of self-assessment and indirect teacher feedback on self-regulated learning (SRL). A quasi-experimental design with an embedded experimental model was used in this research. Three intact classes were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. This study utilised both quantitative and qualitative data. The quantitative data were obtained through the Self-Regulation Strategy Inventory Self-Report. The qualitative data were derived from the SRL microanalytic protocol. The findings revealed that both self-assessment and indirect teacher feedback helped learners become more self-regulated. However, self-assessment reduced maladaptive behaviours more than indirect teacher feedback. This study concludes that self-assessment is an effective instructional practice that promotes SRL in terms of goal setting, strategy planning, strategy use, attribution and adaptive behaviour. It is recommended that self-assessment be part of an instructional practice rather than an alternative strategy in the writing class.