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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

摘要：Autonomy is an important educational goal in international universities in countries with Confucian heritage cultures, such as Vietnam. However, approaches taken to support autonomy can sometimes be limited by over-generalizations about culture, dependence on pre-packaged materials, and a focus on technical practice. This can result in the slow development of learner autonomy. We report on an attempt to stimulate autonomous practices among EAP learners in Vietnam. This collaborative action research first focused on discovering how learners perceived and experienced autonomy, with data collected through questionnaire and focus groups. Data were analysed and discussed with teachers, autonomy levels identified, and strong autonomy-supporting strategies selected for use. Priorities included developing goal setting and self-reflection. An independent learning journal that included focused autonomy-supporting tasks was developed, trialled, and evaluated. Although this was a small-scale intervention, it provided evidence that socially mediated support for autonomy can help Vietnamese university learners take greater control over their own learning. Adapted from the source document

摘要：This article is part of a longitudinal study of American college students studying Mandarin in China. Its main data are drawn from monthly speaking events (four sessions with each student) conducted in Chinese with each of 29 participants in a study-abroad program in China. The study yielded these results: (a) Students made significant progress in their fluency development, especially during the first month; (b) speaking Chinese both inside and outside of class helped fluency; (c) students who consistently spoke Chinese in class and out of class made more progress than those who did not; and (d) time on task, the amount of time that students spent using Chinese, was the most important factor in determining fluency development. The quantitative analysis that is the focus of this article is supplemented by qualitative data from individual students, reflecting the position that only a combination of quantitative and qualitative data can reveal a complete picture of the nature of language acquisition during study abroad. The article concludes with implications for the design and conduct of programs in China.

摘要：In this study a self-paced instructional method based on the use of Apple's iPod Touch personal mobile devices to deliver content was compared with a group-oriented instructional method of content delivery in terms of learner acquisition of course material. One hundred and twenty-two first-year Japanese university students in four classes were used in the study. The subjects were placed in two experimental groups and two control groups, and each researcher taught one control and one experimental group. An independent samples t-test performed on the groups' placement scores on the university's English entrance examination showed no significant difference between the two groups in terms of general English ability at the outset of the experiment. During the treatment sessions the control groups studied in a group-oriented classroom environment while the experimental groups studied the same course material but did so with a self-paced method that used Apple's iPod Touch personal mobile devices. As such, the subjects in the experimental group were allowed to study at a rate they chose rather than having the timing of the language input controlled by the teacher. The curriculum for both the control and experimental groups was based on the course textbook (Science English: Communication skills for scientists and engineers, Daniels, 2007, Tokyo: Thomson). The same standardized tests were given to all students involved in the study and the scores of the control and experimental groups were analysed using independent samples t-tests supported by Mann-Whitney tests. The post-treatment data showed a significant difference emerge between the groups, while the experimental group scored consistently higher than the control group. Results of a post-treatment survey given to the experimental group also indicated very positive learner attitudes towards the self-study iPod Touch-based instructional method.

摘要：This quasi-experimental study is aimed at (a) teaching learners how to provide corrective feedback (CF) during peer interaction and (b) assessing the effects of peer interaction and CF on second language (L2) development. Four university-level English classes in Japan participated (N = 167), each assigned to one of four treatment conditions. Of the two CF groups, one was taught to provide prompts and the other to provide recasts. A third group participated in only peer-interaction activities, and a fourth served as the control group. After one semester of intervention, the two CF groups improved in both overall accuracy and fluency, measured as unpruned and pruned speech rates, whereas the peer-interaction-only group outperformed the control group only on fluency measures. This study draws on monitoring in speech-production theory and the declarative-procedural model of skill-acquisition theory to interpret these results, thus contributing a new theoretical approach to CF research in the context of peer interaction in which learners can be providers of CF. It is concluded that whereas peer interaction offered opportunities for repeated production practice, facilitating proceduralization, CF sharpened learners' ability to monitor both their own language production and that of their interlocutors. Adapted from the source document

摘要：This study focused on the interface between classroom assessment and learning motivation, in particular, whether and how classroom tests and grades motivated student effort. In a university in Taiwan, six English as a Foreign Language teacher interviews were conducted, and 744 student surveys, accompanied by 289 more detailed written opinions, were gathered and analyzed. It was found that teacher considerations in designing classroom tests and assigning nontest grades were associated with intentions to ensure student efforts. Students were generally alert to grade-related requirements but reacted differently. Many indicated the effectiveness of tests in inducing student effort but felt ambivalent about being pushed to study by tests and grades. Teachers should avoid actually demotivating students when their original aim was to motivate. Adapted from the source document

摘要：Feedback to the test taker is a defining characteristic of diagnostic language testing (Alderson, 2005). This article reports on a study that investigated how much and in what ways students at a Taiwan university perceived the feedback to be useful on an online multiple-choice diagnostic English grammar test, both in general and by students of higher and lower language proficiency. Stage 1 involved questionnaire data from 68 students who rated each item's feedback according to usefulness, and Stage 2 involved interviews with five students as they read the feedback after taking the test. The data from these two stages showed students' overall positive attitude toward the feedback and students' preferences for particular feedback characteristics. The study also found that although higher proficiency test takers found the feedback to be more useful than lower proficiency test-takers, views about the characteristics of good feedback were similar regardless of level. Recommendations for improving diagnostic language test construction and validation are discussed based upon the findings. Adapted from the source document

摘要：Although the influence of learner beliefs on performance and satisfaction in particular instructional contexts is uncontested, empirical studies have so far concentrated on students in various geographical rather than discipline-specific settings. Starting from the premise that tertiary sector ESP students may have more in common than their choice of discipline, this study uses interviews and questionnaires to investigate first and fourth year business students' beliefs about effective language learning. The influence of students' conceptions of learning on their use of strategies is explored, and then juxtaposed with their evaluation of the reality of the business English classes. [Copyright The American University; published by Elsevier Ltd.]

摘要：English for academic purposes (EAP) has established itself as a considerable part of English as a foreign language (EFL) instruction in Iranian universities. Considering the Internet as a major educational source in EAP reading courses, it is highly important that the stakeholders have positive attitudes toward it and be aware of promises and challenges. This study was conducted to investigate the participants' attitudes toward the Internet in EAP courses for undergraduate students of civil engineering (CE) in Iran. To this end, 723 undergraduate students, 67 EAP instructors and 105 CE instructors participated in the study. Instrumentation included a questionnaire, semi-structured interviews and non-participant observation. Our analysis of the data revealed that the majority of EAP instructors, CE instructors and undergraduate students have positive attitudes toward the Internet. However, the results showed that EAP instructors do not make use of any types of Internet-based activities in their classes. Moreover, the majority of limitations in using the Internet in EAP courses were identified. It is concluded that undergraduate students of CE need training in various Internet-based skills. The findings promise implications for renewing the EAP programs. Adapted from the source document

摘要：OpenCourseWare (OCW) has received increasing attention over the past few years in higher education. These courses provide appealing opportunities to view classes taught in well-established universities worldwide. The current study aims to examine how OCW lectures can serve as authentic learning materials to facilitate vocabulary acquisition for learners learning English as a foreign language (EFL). It further investigates factors that influence the effectiveness of vocabulary acquisition via OCW lectures. Three open-course lectures from MIT and Yale University, on psychology, physics, and music, were selected. Sixty-five Taiwanese college students participated in the study. The results of pre- and post-testing indicate that learners were able to gain L2 vocabulary knowledge by simply viewing an OCW lecture once. Level of vocabulary (academic vocabulary, technical vocabulary and low-frequency vocabulary) was found to be the most influential factor affecting vocabulary acquisition through OCW lectures. In addition, learners improved more on technical words than on academic ones. Verbal elaboration was also an important factor affecting vocabulary acquisition; the more explicit the elaboration is the greater the vocabulary gain. Frequency of occurrence, on the other hand, had positive but relatively small effects on learners' vocabulary gain. Adapted from the source document

摘要：This paper reports a project in which researchers at universities in Japan explored the use of Mobile Assisted Language Learning (MALL) practices by developing a learning module intended to help improve students' scores on the TOEIC Listening and Reading Tests. MALL practices are currently being developed at universities in Japan because almost all students have mobile phones, many of them have had informal learning experiences with mobile devices, and students are integrating the communication and information gathering capabilities of mobile technology into their own lifestyles. The private nature of mobile phone communication may create barriers when students are asked to use personal mobile phones for school-centered learning activities. In this study a Nintendo DS mobile was used because it was affordable and students were familiar with this device for game playing and learning activities. In addition, because this device does not have the same telephone, messaging, and Internet functions that have made mobile phones an integral part of students' private lives, a device such as the Nintendo DS may be a neutral mobile platform for the development of MALL activities which could later be adapted and transferred for use on private mobile phones. The primary aim of this study was to discover whether certain MALL practices would foster an advanced form of self-study, self-regulated learning (SRL). In SRL students take responsibility for arousing and sustaining their own motivation in order to make, carry out, and evaluate strategic learning plans. It was concluded that the use of the MALL learning module encouraged study without teacher intervention, i.e., self study, in terms of time spent on learning tasks, levels of satisfaction derived from the tasks, and self-measured achievement. Furthermore, SRL was observed in terms of the specificity of the goals, the customized creation of learning tasks and their in-class applications. Adapted from the source document

摘要：This study concerns the development of autonomy in adult learners working on an online learning platform as part of a professional master's degree programme in "French as a Foreign Language". Our goal was to identify the influence of reflective and collaborative dimensions on the construction of autonomy for online learners in this programme. The material used was 27 self-analysis papers in response to an assignment which asked students to review their distance learning experience (reflective dimension) and to highlight the role of others, if any, in their learning (collaborative dimension). In addition to these two major points, the analysis by category of the body of results shows principally that in qualitative terms, the factors of autonomisation for online learning are interconnected and include: the difficulties related to distance learning and the strategies that learners develop to face those difficulties, the importance of interpersonal relationships in social and emotional terms in overcoming those difficulties, the specific modes of sociability developed for distance learning and the related development of a new type of autonomy that is both individual and collective. The discussion examines the creation, over the course of time, of a new "distance learning culture" that is nonetheless never easy to create and share. Adapted from the source document

摘要：French learners at university meet difficulties in the comprehension of oral English. Being in a formal context of language learning, they need to develop language awareness to compensate for insufficient exposure to the English language. To meet the students' needs, data was collected in order to pinpoint the main errors made by French learners in listening tasks. The errors were then analyzed and put into perspective with the system of oral English; a connection clearly appeared between the errors and what is barely heard or cannot be heard in reference to written English, hinting at what could cause poor oral comprehension. Three areas of knowledge appeared to be missing in the students' background: the links between morpho-syntax and phonology, the mastery of phonological data found in dictionaries and the possible recourse to strategies in order to compensate for what has not been heard properly. These issues were addressed in an on-line program designed for non-beginners of English at university. This paper deals with the assessment of the progress made by users of the program in a formal learning situation. Two groups of learners were considered: students whose major is English, and students for whom the study of English is optional. Two series of tests were implemented, before and after the use of the program. The tests focused on the ability of learners to read IPA transcription, to count syllables in oral English, and to pronounce auxiliaries and prepositions in different contexts. The results to be discussed establish that the two groups of learners significantly improved their knowledge of oral English. Of particular interest is the fact that, even if the two groups had significantly different knowledge of oral English before using the program, with non-specialists of English having poorer knowledge, the two groups obtain similar results on the post-test, showing greater progress on the part of the non-specialists. All learners appear to improve dramatically their knowledge of IPA and their ability to use it. The progress measured by the tests was corroborated by other modes of assessment: a survey on the students' judgment as regards the usefulness of the program, and individual interviews focusing on what the students recall from the content of the program. In the latter, the students used relevant meta-linguistic and meta-cognitive expressions, showing their ability for further progress in developing listening abilities in English as a Second Language (ESL). Adapted from the source document

摘要：Oral communication ability has become increasingly important to many EFL students. Several commercial software programs based on automatic speech recognition (ASR) technologies are available but their prices are not affordable for many students. This paper will demonstrate how the Microsoft Speech Application Software Development Kit (SASDK), a free but powerful tool, can be used to develop an oral skills training website for EFL students. This ASR-based website offers six different types of online exercises which allow students to practise their oral skills and obtain immediate feedback on their performance. A group of 25 college students and a group of 35 pre-service English teachers were invited to use the website. Two surveys were conducted to investigate the students' and the pre-service teachers' perceptions of this site. The results indicated that most teachers and students enjoyed using this website, which they felt could help improve their English oral skills. They also pointed out that the main strength of the ASR-based learning system is that it offers several different types of exercises which can encourage learners to produce more output in a low-anxiety environment. The major limitations of the website are the insufficient feedback and the challenging standards one must meet in order to achieve a pass mark. These findings can be useful for teachers who are interested in using ASR in teaching and for CALL researchers who aim to develop better ASR-based systems for language learning. Adapted from the source document

摘要：Pseudowords, or non-real words, were introduced to the Yes/No (YN) vocabulary test format to provide a means of checking for overestimation of word knowledge by test takers. The purpose of this study is to assess the assumption that more pseudoword checks (false alarms) indicate more instances of overestimation of word knowledge in YN tests. Thirty English classes in five different Japanese universities with TOEIC(TM) scores ranging from 230 to 730 participated (n = 490). YN test results were compared with a multiple-choice test of the same 96 real words to provide a way to check directly for instances of underestimation and overestimation of word knowledge on the YN tests. Results showed that students from the higher proficiency universities had a slightly higher pseudoword false alarm rate than students from the lower ability universities (4.28% and 3.96%, respectively). However, overestimation rates were considerably lower for these same students from the higher proficiency universities (3.24% and 5.67%, respectively). This discrepancy between false alarm rates and overestimation rates questions the value of pseudowords for measuring overestimation in YN vocabulary tests when student ability levels differ significantly. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications, Ltd., copyright holder.]

摘要：This study examined the relationship between scores on the TOEFL Internet-Based Test (TOEFL iBT(TM)) and academic performance in higher education, defined here in terms of grade point average (GPA). The academic records for 2594 undergraduate and graduate students were collected from 10 universities in the United States. The data consisted of students' GPA, detailed course information, and admissions-related test scores including TOEFL iBT, GRE, GMAT, and SAT scores. Correlation-based analyses were conducted for subgroups by academic status and disciplines. Expectancy graphs were also used to complement the correlation-based analyses by presenting the predictive validity in terms of individuals in one of the TOEFL iBT score subgroups belonging to one of the GPA subgroups. The predictive validity expressed in terms of correlation did not appear to be strong. Nevertheless, the general pattern shown in the expectancy graphs indicated that students with higher TOEFL iBT scores tended to earn higher GPAs and that the TOEFL iBT provided information about the future academic performance of non-native English speaking students beyond that provided by other admissions tests. These observations led us to conclude that even a small correlation might indicate a meaningful relationship between TOEFL iBT scores and GPA. Limitations and implications are discussed. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications, Ltd., copyright holder.]

摘要：This study investigates the effects of topical knowledge on ESL (English as a Second Language) writing performance in the English Language Proficiency Index (LPI), a standardized English proficiency test used by many post-secondary institutions in western Canada. The participants were 50 students with different levels of English proficiency (basic, intermediate, and advanced) attending a Canadian college. Each student wrote two timed-impromptu essays: one responding to a prompt requiring general knowledge about university studies and the other pertaining to specific knowledge about federal politics. Results showed that students across three proficiency levels performed significantly better on the general topic than they did on the specific topic. The specific topic produced lower scores on content due to poor quality and development of ideas, implicit position taking, and a weak conclusion. Students also scored lower on organization and language on the knowledge-specific task because of weaker coherence and cohesion, shorter essays, more language errors, and less frequent use of academic words. Post-test interviews confirmed that participating students were challenged by the prompt that required specific topical knowledge. The study draws attention to the importance of developing appropriate prompts for ESL writing tests. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications, Ltd., copyright holder.]

摘要：This investigation intends to assess the effectiveness of a lexical recognition test (Meara & Buxton, 1987) as a placement tool that distinguishes among levels of two groups of students: Spanish heritage language learners (HLL) and second language learners (SLL). Three hundred and thirty university students from four different levels completed a 10-minute/200-word task based on Davies' (2006) Spanish frequency corpora. The results were compared to those from a control group of bilingual graduate students. As comparison measures, about half of the students completed a Cloze Test while the rest were asked to carry out a Multiple-task Test. The results of the study suggest that for SLL, and HLL at the lower levels of language ability, a lexical test based on the 5000 most frequent words in Spanish is a valid and practical testing tool that correlates with other measures of language proficiency. For more advanced levels of HLL, a wider range of words is necessary to avoid the ceiling effect. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications, Ltd., copyright holder.]

摘要：This study examined two types of classroom assessment events, the more closed convergent assessments (CA) versus the more open-ended divergent assessments (DA), to see if they influence learners differently in terms of motivation and learning strategies. Participants were 105 college freshmen in Taiwan with the same instructor placed under one listening and two speaking classes. In these intact groups, each student experienced two types of assessment, a more traditional test (the CA) and a group performance assessment (the DA). Immediately after they experienced each assessment event, participants reported on their task-specific motivation and learning strategies. Results indicated that CAs were better received by high self-efficacious students and DAs by low scorers. After controlling for self-efficacy, a comparison revealed that students reacted differently in the listening and speaking classes. More specifically, in speaking student motivation and strategy were higher for the DA than for the CA, whereas in the listening class the pattern was reversed. Local educational culture and the nature of assessment events are then discussed. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications, Ltd., copyright holder.]

摘要：The Test for English Majors (TEM), which aims to measure the English proficiency of Chinese undergraduates, determining whether they have the required language abilities as specified by the National College English Teaching Syllabus for English majors, is highlighted. Adapted from the source document