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摘要：This article begins by defining World Englishes (WEs) and the related paradigm of inner-, outer-, and expanding-circle English(es). The discussion then turns to the central concerns of the WEs and language testing (LT) communities with regard to how English tests can best be constructed to include various WEs by discussing (a) what language testers need to understand about WEs (i.e., that the English native speaker norm is no longer sacred and that three different perspectives on English diversity may prove useful in LT) and (b) what language testers need to convey to WEs advocates (i.e., that LT is already contributing to the understanding of linguistic variation, that LT is not ignoring WEs issues, and that LT is much more than the standardized international tests). The article ends with seven recommendations that should make the intersection of WEs and LT more productive. Adapted from the source document

摘要：Professor J. Charles Alderson is interviewed. Adapted from the source document

摘要：Despite the popularity of task-based language teaching (TBLT) in foreign language (FL) education at elementary school, it remains unclear how young learners' FL abilities can best be evaluated with tasks. The present study seeks to understand developmental differences in interactions among elementary-school students during task-based language assessment (TBLA) and aims to address the possibilities and limitations of introducing paired-TBLA among young FL learners. The participants were 32 fourth-grade students (ages 9-10) and 32 sixth-grade students (ages 11-12) and their teachers from a FL program where TBLT was mandated. The students were engaged in two sets of assessment tasks with their peers. It was found that the interaction patterns were different between the two grade levels. Compared with the sixth-grade dyads, the fourth-grade dyads showed less mutual topic development, used formulaic turn-taking more frequently, and had a harder time taking their partners' perspectives during the tasks. Consequently, a smaller variety of interactional functions were observed among the fourth graders. The potential for eliciting a wide range of interactional functions, which is a primary advantage of introducing paired assessment, may have limited application for younger dyads. The study also discusses the strategic roles that such interactional characteristics may play among younger learners. Adapted from the source document

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摘要：This article outlines the current state of and recent developments in the use of corpora for language assessment and considers future directions with a special focus on computational methodology. Because corpora began to make inroads into language assessment in the 1990s, test developers have increasingly used them as a reference resource to become well versed in terms of the linguistic characteristics of expert and novice speakers' usage and identify the test construct. In regard to developing and validating language tests, large representative corpora, learner corpora, and specialized corpora have been actively used, as these corpora have made it possible to systematically compare the linguistic features associated with expert users with those found in learner language. Recent advances in computational approaches to assessment can facilitate this comparison to a great extent using technologies in automated essay scoring and learner language analysis. As an emerging area in the field of language assessment, corpus-based research should extend to less explored areas including compilation and longitudinal analysis of developmental corpora, fine-grained microanalysis of learner's development, and assessment attuned to individual learners who use different linguistic varieties. Adapted from the source document

摘要：This study investigates the relationships between test takers' metacognitive and cognitive strategy use through a questionnaire and their test performance on an English as a Foreign Language reading test. A total of 593 Chinese college test takers responded to a 38-item metacognitive and cognitive strategy questionnaire and a 50-item reading test. The data were randomly split into two samples (N = 296 and N = 297). Based on relevant literature, three models (i.e., unitary, higher order, and correlated) of strategy use and test performance were hypothesized and tested to identify the baseline model. Further, cross-validation analyses were conducted. The results supported the invariance of factor loadings, measurement error variances, structural regression coefficients, and factor variances for the unitary model. It was found that college test takers' strategy use affected their lexico-grammatical reading ability significantly. Findings from this study provide empirical and validating evidence for Bachman and Palmer's (2010) model of strategic competence. Adapted from the source document

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摘要：This paper aims to reveal the rhetorical structure and the linguistic features of persuasive language in online advertisements of electronic products. Nowadays, the bulk of e-commerce is carried out in English, and it is often the case that non-native speakers are required to write different text types for various professional purposes, including promotional texts. This need has prompted the present study and the results have been used to build software to help native speakers of Spanish when writing promotional texts in English. The analysis reveals that these texts typically have two main rhetorical moves: one for identifying the product and another one for describing it. The latter move is further divided into two steps: one including objective features (size, weight, etc.) and the other focusing on persuading the potential customer. This is mainly achieved with the use of a relatively informal style (imperatives, contractions, clipping, subject/auxiliary omissions, etc.) and lexico-grammatical elements conveying positive evaluation (multiple modification, multal quantifying expressions, etc.). The findings show that online advertisements of electronic products may be regarded as a specific subgenre with particular macro- and microlinguistic characteristics, which have been identified in this paper for technical writing assistance. [Copyright The American University; published by Elsevier Ltd.]

摘要：The workplace has become increasingly volatile, intercultural and multilingual in the Information Age, presenting greater than ever communication challenges to employees. Accordingly, education reforms which recognise the growing significance of workplace communication competence have been put in place. In Hong Kong, an application-oriented elective module known as 'Learning English through workplace communication' has been introduced to the senior secondary English language curriculum. This article surveys and evaluates a number of teaching and learning resources specially designed by relevant government bodies and commercial publishers for this module. Specifically, the professional genres which are covered in such resources are studied in detail, both qualitatively and quantitatively, to investigate the extent to which they parallel the professional discourses in the actual workplace, based on a comparison with findings from relevant research. Some discrepancies are found regarding the most frequently occurring genres and their linguistic realisations in the professional context and the teaching materials. Implications from the study and suggestions for pedagogical improvements are made not only with special reference to the local context, but also to the broader educational domain where workplace communication has increasingly become a key component in the language learning syllabus. [Copyright The American University; published by Elsevier Ltd.]

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摘要：In spite of extensive research on reading comprehension in EAP, the literature on how it is conceptualized and taught by teachers is still scanty. Moreover, in some contexts, EAP reading comprehension courses are taught by two groups of teachers with different specializations, that is, ELT instructors and subject teachers, which, in turn, may render the gap in teachers' understanding of EAP reading comprehension instruction wider. In this study, we explored the actual classroom practices and cognitions within and across these two groups of teachers teaching EAP reading comprehension in Iran. Three ELT instructors and three subject teachers teaching discipline-based EAP courses at a university of medical sciences were observed for eight sessions. In addition to carrying out observations and taking field-notes, we conducted semi-structured interviews with the teachers in order to probe their underlying cognitions. The findings indicated considerable inconsistencies among the subject teachers compared with the ELT instructors as well as noticeable discrepancies across the two groups of teachers with respect to their practices and cognitions in EAP reading comprehension instruction. The findings point to some new ideas, issues, and options for reflection in EAP reading comprehension instruction and promise implications for EAP teacher education programs. [Copyright The American University; published by Elsevier Ltd.]

摘要：Language-focused materials for teaching professional legal writing to second language writers of English in U.S. law schools have been dominated by a set of 'Plain English' recommendations, particularly avoidance of the passive voice and nominalizations. At the same time, little to no research has addressed whether these recommendations actually reflect expert use or whether they are indicative of more or less skilled novice performance. To investigate the use of these features in expert and learner texts, two corpora were examined. The expert corpus was composed of 10 published pedagogical sample memos used in legal writing instruction. The learner corpus was composed of 13 low-rated student memos and 13 high-rated student memos. Although an initial chi-square comparison of learner and expert corpora suggests that the experts use both the passive voice and nominalizations significantly less frequently than learners, further analysis suggests that the usage of these features does not clearly distinguish more skilled novices from those who are less skilled. A closer look at the expert corpus also suggests that the use of these features is highly variable across individual samples. Implications for pedagogy are discussed. [Copyright The American University; published by Elsevier Ltd.]

摘要：The purpose of this research was twofold: to examine the vocabulary demands of English-medium engineering textbooks and to create an Engineering English Word List (EEWL) to cover EFL students' lexical shortage. The researcher compiled a corpus containing 4.57 million running words of 100 college textbooks across 20 engineering subject areas from e-book databases as the source of analysis. The results demonstrate that knowing the most frequent 5000 word families plus proper nouns, apparent compounds and abbreviations would command 95% lexical coverage of an engineering textbook to ensure adequate comprehension. Civil engineering and mechanical engineering, involving 3500 word families necessary for minimally acceptable comprehension, were the least lexically demanding, while marine engineering and biochemical engineering were the most demanding in lexis, stretching to a threshold of 8500 word families. Beyond the first 2000 words, 729 of the most frequently-occurring word families in the corpus were ultimately chosen, and these covered 14.3% of the total words in the engineering textbooks. The present EEWL may provide a window to the engineering register for matriculating engineering students and may be helpful for English for science and technology teachers when preparing Engineering English teaching materials for reading and vocabulary development. [Copyright The American University; published by Elsevier Ltd.]

摘要：As part of the English-language proficiency requirements for pilots and air traffic controllers, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) published a rating scale designed to assess pilots' and air traffic controllers' aviation English proficiency. However, it is not clear how this scale was developed. As part of an attempt to address the need for validation, this paper presents a study involving focus group interviews with pilots. Ten pilots listened to performances of test takers taking a variety of aviation English tests. The pilots were asked to rate the acceptability of the pilot's language for (a) communicating with other pilots and (b) radiotelephony communications with air traffic control. The focus groups had two aims: (1) to establish the 'indigenous' assessment criteria pilots use when assessing the language ability of peers and (2) to establish what level is sufficient as the operational level. The results showed that the pilots focused on some but not all of the criteria on the ICAO scale. Whilst listening to the performances, they also often focused on the speakers' technical knowledge. The paper proposes a model of how industry professionals can be involved in the validation of an LSP rating scales. [Copyright The American University; published by Elsevier Ltd.]

摘要：Program evaluation, a crucial process in ESP, ensures adequate planning, implementation, and continuous improvement of the program. Despite its importance, the literature related to ESP program evaluation is still scarce and somewhat dated. The present paper describes a combined, updated model for ESP program evaluation and reports on how the model worked when it was applied to evaluate an ESP program in a university in Taiwan. To update the model for higher education ESP program evaluation, this research combined Hutchinson and Waters' 1987 model and the comprehensive framework for foreign language (FL) program evaluation developed by Watanabe, Norris, and Gonzalez-Lloret (2009), while also incorporating recent findings from emerging research on ESP learning and teaching that include topics such as authenticity, learner autonomy and learning transfer. When the model was applied to evaluate a university ESP program, the findings enabled the researchers to identify strengths and weaknesses of the updated model. It is the researchers' hope that the discussions of both the updated model and the evaluation process provide valuable insights into the design and implementation of ESP program evaluation. [Copyright The American University; published by Elsevier Ltd.]

摘要：With internationalization and globalization, English has proliferated in urban spaces around the world. This creates new opportunities for EFL learning and teaching. An English literacy walk is one activity that can be used productively to capitalize on this potential. The activity has roots in long-established approaches to emergent literacy education for young children and pedagogic projects inspired by recent research on linguistic landscapes. Drawing on these traditions, teachers can target reading outcomes involving code, semantic, pragmatic, and critical knowledge and skills. We use the four resources model of literate practices to systematically map some of the potential of literacy walks in multilingual, multimodal linguistic landscapes. We suggest tasks and teacher questions that might be used for the explicit teaching of reading during and after literacy walks. Although grounded in Taipei, our ideas might be of interest to EFL teachers in other globalized cities around the world. Adapted from the source document

摘要：The term 'authenticity' has been variously interpreted by second language acquisition and ESL scholars. It has been taken to refer to the materials used in class, such as texts, but also to the type of tasks the students are assigned, or even to the type of classroom interaction. Our contribution is concerned with the first of these interpretations. We focus on the authenticity of what are purported to be 'real' texts included in textbooks for advanced students of English at B2 and C1 levels, according to the Common European Framework of Reference. This empirical study is based on a series of parameters that have been established in order to examine the extent to which the authenticity of real texts has been preserved and to establish other related changes that such texts are subjected to when included in textbooks. Adapted from the source document

摘要：EAP tutors are increasingly aware of the issue of reticence in the classroom, especially during small group discussions. They note students' reluctance to begin discussions in a quiet environment and observe short student contributions in group work. This study captured the perspectives of international postgraduate students studying on pre-sessional EAP programmes before pursuing Masters level studies in TESOL or Applied Linguistics, focusing on small group discussions and the use of background music during lessons, especially during those discussions. The findings indicated positive attitudes towards using background music in these settings, with more than half saying that it should or could be used during group discussions and almost two-thirds saying that they would adopt background music in future in their own language teaching classrooms. The findings of this exploratory study are useful for language teachers as well as tutors in other disciplines and with other age groups. Further research is required in order to consider tutors' viewpoints and to study the actual effects of background music on group interaction during discussions in classrooms. Adapted from the source document

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