A Neglected Practice in Iran: EFL Teachers’ Differentiation for Gifted Students in Rural Schools

Abstract

This qualitative study delved into 15 Iranian middle school English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers’ perceptions, practices, and challenges of differentiation for gifted students. To this end, a set of data sources including interviews, observation notes, and documents were used. Results of interview transcriptions exhibited that the rural EFL teachers primarily held negative or indifferent views of differentiating instruction for gifted students, and that their actual differentiation practices for gifted students left far more to be desired. In addition, a host of barriers to differentiation practices were cited by the teachers, including time, energy, and class size as the most impactful.

Rural students’ achievement goal orientation choices: A qualitative analysis of the influential individuals and factors

“…That is, rural students may seek help (even for motivation) from their own family or community members (especially siblings) more than professional counselors. Or, it might be that the rural school counselors were not sufficiently familiar with the rural culture or sufficiently experienced, an assumption that is somewhat supported by a previous study in Iran (Sajedifard & Shahgoli, 2020).…”

“…Thirty two (16 male and 16 female) students were selected from six rural public schools for voluntary participation through purposive sampling. Purposive sampling was adopted because of the qualitative nature of the study (Sajedifard & Shahgoli, 2020). All participants were high school students studying in grades 10, 11 and 12, and were between the ages of 16 and 19 years.…”

“…Another conspicuous gap relates to rural contexts, which have often been overlooked in educational studies in many international contexts, with the exception of countries like the US and Australia (Sajedifard & Shahgoli, 2020). In relation to goal orientations, Freeman and Anderman (2005) admit that even in international contexts, studies on rural students’ goal orientations have been negligible in comparison to those on urban students’ goal orientations.…”

“…In relation to goal orientations, Freeman and Anderman (2005) admit that even in international contexts, studies on rural students’ goal orientations have been negligible in comparison to those on urban students’ goal orientations. This situation is worse in the Iranian context where rural students’ educational issues are typically neglected by researchers (Sajedifard & Shahgoli, 2020). In this study, the researchers believe in the uniqueness of rural settings (Howley et al, 2005; Sajedifard & Shahgoli, 2020), and the fact that rural students encounter many (typically rural specific) issues such a lack of experienced teachers (Sajedifard & Shahgoli, 2020) or the prevalence of socio-economic problems (Hardré, 2011; Hines, 2002; Khattri et al, 1997) which may affect their motivation differently than their urban counterparts’.…”

“…This situation is worse in the Iranian context where rural students’ educational issues are typically neglected by researchers (Sajedifard & Shahgoli, 2020). In this study, the researchers believe in the uniqueness of rural settings (Howley et al, 2005; Sajedifard & Shahgoli, 2020), and the fact that rural students encounter many (typically rural specific) issues such a lack of experienced teachers (Sajedifard & Shahgoli, 2020) or the prevalence of socio-economic problems (Hardré, 2011; Hines, 2002; Khattri et al, 1997) which may affect their motivation differently than their urban counterparts’. Given such issues, the researchers assumed that rural students’ motivation (and more specifically goal orientation) deserves a special qualitative analysis.…”