An investigation into EFL learners’ reflection in writing and the inhibitors to their reflection

Avarzamani, Farnaz; Farahian, Majid

doi:10.1080/23311908.2019.1690817

Cited by 16 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…Considering authorities' views as more trustworthy was rated as the third challenge. The finding is not surprising since “ in a top-down system of education, the absence of questioning, challenging work conditions, lack of pedagogical knowledge, and the degree of support in favor of the reflective practice are abundant” (Avarzamani and Farahian, 2019, p. 3). Accordingly, “knowledge is perceived as simple and certain rather than complex and uncertain” (Chittooran, 2015, p. 79).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Knowledge sharing through WhatsApp: does it promote EFL teachers' reflective practice?

Farahian

Parhamnia

2021

JARHE

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PurposeReflective practice can greatly improve teachers' professional development, and various studies have demonstrated that teachers' knowledge sharing has a positive impact on their reflection. Accordingly, the present study was conducted to examine the effect of knowledge sharing in a popular online forum – WhatsApp – on English as foreign language (EFL) teachers' reflective practice. It was also aimed to probe the challenges the teachers faced to share information in their daily practice.Design/methodology/approachThe experimental study was pretest and posttest. To do so, 60 available EFL teachers were chosen as the participants. They were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. Both groups received the English language teaching (ELT) reflection inventory as the pretest and posttest. In addition, to find the difficulties EFL teachers encounter to share information in their daily practice, a week after the treatment, a semi-structured interview with 21 volunteer EFL teachers from the experimental group was carried out. As the treatment, the online discussion among the teachers regarding their daily practice took around 1 h and lasted two weeks.FindingsThe result of the posttest revealed that the experimental group outperformed the control group in their reflective practice. The results of the interview revealed that among other factors, the EFL teachers' lack of awareness regarding the importance of knowledge sharing, sticking to conventional methods of teaching and considering authorities' views as more trustworthy were the barriers which impede their knowledge sharing.Social implicationsThe findings could inspire reconsideration of the role social media plays in Iranian EFL teacher education and its role in contributing to teachers' professional development as well as their social interaction with colleagues. The results also call for taking measures to eliminate barriers to EFL teachers' knowledge sharing, which are partly rooted in the socio-educational context.Originality/valueSome studies have argued that knowledge sharing may contribute to the promotion of EFL teachers' reflectivity. There are also studies that have reported that teachers' involvement in sharing of knowledge does not have a significant effect on their reflective practice. Accordingly, contradictory results have been reported regarding the effectiveness of knowledge sharing in promoting teachers' reflection. In addition, exploring the impact of knowledge sharing on EFL teachers' reflectivity via WhatsApp deserves more attention.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Knowledge sharing through WhatsApp: does it promote EFL teachers' reflective practice?

Farahian

Parhamnia

2021

JARHE

Self Cite

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“…Similar concerns about language learners’ grammar are common in the Iranian language learning classes. Avarzamani and Farahian (2019) believe that the Iranian instructional system somehow follows the traditional approach of product-oriented writing. They argue that many teachers in the existing system think grammar and vocabulary training would be enough for writing instructions.…”

Section: What Is a Reflective Journal?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Similarly, AR will not answer all concerns about how students learn or what educators may do to improve practice, but it is carried out in a particular place where there are concerns to bridge the distance between theory and practice and give students more prominent roles ( Ferrance, 2000 ; Zulfikar and Mujiburrahman, 2018 ). In the Iranian educational settings, teachers are almost expected to teach book contents and implement predetermined syllabus and materials ( Avarzamani and Farahian, 2019 ); hence, AR, as well as reflective practices, can effectively raise the teachers’ and learners’ understanding about the process of teaching and learning and possibly provide a more intimate context for language classes. In this study, we hypothesized that if teachers are involved in the stages of making plans for actions and implementing planned actions, they can have an impact on the learning and teaching process.…”

Section: Action Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Combination of Action Research and Reflective Journal Writing in an English as a Foreign Language Class: Learners’ Psychological Point of Views and Their Grammar Use in Writing

2022

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Action research (AR) and reflective thinking (RT) can enhance learning since both processes provide students with the opportunities to step back and think about how they actually solve problems. While there is a robust academic inquiry on reflection practices and AR in the educational setting, investigating learners’ reflections through AR practices can shed more light on related research. This study implemented reflective journal writing through AR and aimed to investigate (1) the participants’ views about reflective journal writing, (2) the effects of journal writing on RT development, and (3) the learners’ grammar use in writing. Eighty language learners formed the two experimental and control groups of the study. The possible relationship between the RT level and participants’ final exam was checked. Analyses of the participants’ journals, the semi-structured interview, the questionnaires’ results, and the final exam scores were considered. The findings showed that the participants had positive views about journal writing, and they could enhance their level of RT as well as their grammar use in writing; nevertheless, no relationship between the RT level and final exam scores of the participants was found. The methodology and the results of the study could be conducive to welcoming alternative methods of teaching and assessment that encourage the learners’ reflective practices and active engagements in language classes.

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“…Lin (2016) states that in English writing and teaching, EFL students continue to focus on the deconstruction of the model text and the relationship between reading and writing. According to Avarzamani & Farahian (2019), EFL writers have a distinct lack of higherorder thought skills when writing, and are more involved in lower stages of reflection, such as repetitive actions and comprehension. Writing is an important medium for communicating and sharing feelings, thoughts, and ideas, regardless of certain challenges.…”

Section: Academic Writingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring Cohesions in EFL Academic Writing: A State of the Art on the Study of Cohesions

Uru¹,

Sudirman²,

Nugroho³

2021

Elsya

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Cohesion has become a crucial component of academic writing that promotes the semantic connection within phrases and sentences. The objectives of this literature review research are to identify different forms of cohesions and the most common form of cohesion in articles on EFL academic writing. This study extracted records from Google Scholar and Scopus databases and selected 20 studies in the last five years out of 700 on the use of cohesions in the writing of EFL students. The data was gathered by sorting similar messages, finding cohesions, clarifying cohesions, and counting the cohesions with the highest percentage. The research results show that the published articles containing cohesions represent the reference (35%), paired conjunctions (15%), reiteration (40%), and collocation (10%). The most common type of cohesion is reiteration, which is essential for comprehending what the authors mean in their published works. Cohesions in theoretical and practical grounds contribute to the explicitness of semantic components of words or phrases to generate the messages conveyed to readers.

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An investigation into EFL learners’ reflection in writing and the inhibitors to their reflection

Cited by 16 publications

References 22 publications

Knowledge sharing through WhatsApp: does it promote EFL teachers' reflective practice?

Knowledge sharing through WhatsApp: does it promote EFL teachers' reflective practice?

A Combination of Action Research and Reflective Journal Writing in an English as a Foreign Language Class: Learners’ Psychological Point of Views and Their Grammar Use in Writing

Exploring Cohesions in EFL Academic Writing: A State of the Art on the Study of Cohesions

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