A content analysis of graduate research on English preparatory programs at universities

Abstract

This study examines master’s and doctoral theses on English preparatory classes at tertiary level in Turkey in terms of completion year, thesis type, subject areas, data types, research design, sample groups, problem statements and recommendations. This study is a systematic review of literature and the data was collected through document analysis technique. Content analysis was carried out on the theses selected through criterion sampling method. A total of 82 theses, which were completed by July 2017, were included in the analysis based on inclusion criteria. The analysis reveals significant results as to theses on English preparatory classes at universities. The most frequent subject areas in the theses were identified as learning styles/strategies, motivation/attitude/belief, program evaluation, increasing vocabulary knowledge, reading skills and foreign language anxiety respectively. The majority of the theses rest on quantitative data and employ descriptive research designs. Samples in the theses mostly consist of students while few of them address instructors. The most frequent themes in problem statements include inadequacy, importance and failure while the most frequent recommendations are about motivation and anxiety, and in-service training. This study has the potential to guide future research by putting forth research trends in graduate research on English preparatory classes at tertiary level.

İstanbul Medeniyet Üniversitesi İngilizce Hazırlık Programının Değerlendirilmesi

“…Similarly, Koçyiğit and Erdem (2018) undertook a study to review English preparation classes in higher education considering the graduate research. Their study found that these studies usually employed a quantitative research design and they generally focused on students' perspective.…”

A content analysis on articles related to English (L2) pronunciation teaching

“…The observed problem that makes the researcher conduct this study is that there are some studies focusing on the content analysis of the articles related to (a) foreign language education in Turkey in general (Alptekin & Tatar, 2011;Solak, 2014;Yağız, Aydın & Akdemir, 2016), (b) English language teacher education (Avalos, 2011;Demir & Koçyiğit, 2018;Kleinsasser, 2013;Vélez-Rendón, 2002), (c) strategy training in L2 learning (Mutlu, 2015), (d) graduate research on ELT in Turkey (İnal, Özdemir, Kıray & Oral, 2016;Koçyiğit & Erdem, 2018;Özmen, Cephe, & Kınık, 2016), (e) teaching English with technology (Hussein, 2015), (f) using flipped classroom in foreign language education (Ahmed & Asiksoy, 2018;Filiz & Benzet, 2018), (g) assessment and evaluation in foreign language teaching in Turkey (Arslan & Kartal, 2018), (h) teaching L2 listening (Dewitt-Brinks & Rhodes, 1992) and (i) teaching L2 reading (Akaydın & Cecen, 2015;Parsons & Gallagher, 2016) in the literature. However, there are no research studies regarding the content analysis of the articles related to teaching L2 pronunciation.…”