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1
McMurry, Alison Irvine. "Preparing Students for Peer Review." BYU ScholarsArchive, 2005. https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/etd/276.
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In order to enhance the effective use of peer review, I have developed materials to assist teachers in compliance with the standards for Masters' projects enacted by the Department of Linguistics and English Language. Published literature shows that as peer review grows in popularity in both L1 and L2 English writing classes, many researchers and teachers are trying to increase its effectiveness. In some cases it is very effective, while in others it is marginally effective. This has led researchers to ask why. The difference between helpful and less helpful peer review seems to be in the preparation. In studies where students were specifically and extensively prepared to do peer review, the benefits to the students, the class, and the effect on the revision process were significant. This indicates that peer review can be an effective tool when students are adequately prepared for the task. After synthesizing research, I determined that there are eight basic, useable concepts that need to be accomplished when preparing students for peer review; they are:
1. Knowing each other
2. Knowing what to look for
3. Knowing why to give advice
4. Know how to give advice
5. Knowing how to use advice
6. Practicing peer review
7. Following up weekly
8. Reviewing at midsemester
I developed a curriculum component addressing these eight concepts that augments theory with application, such as materials and lesson plans, and implemented and tested them at the English Language Center at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. Based on feedback from the teachers involved in the pilot study, I determined that preparing students for peer review has a positive effect on the students, their writing, and on the class as a whole Furthermore, the most important outcome of the pilot studies was the fact that students prefer reader response peer review activities rather than criterion critique.
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Gregory, Debra Jane. "The Preferred Learning Styles of Greek EFL Students and Greek EFL Teachers." PDXScholar, 1994. https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/open_access_etds/4836.
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The purpose of this study was to identify the preferred learning styles of Greek EFL students and teachers in Greece. The learning styles examined were visual, auditory, kinesthetic, tactile, group and individual. The study was conducted at a private English language school in Piraeus, Greece. Ninety-two Greek EFL students (33 male and 59 female) ranging in age from 13 to 22, and 11 Greek EFL teachers (3 male and 8 female) ranging in age from 22 to 52 constitute the sample. The study used the self-reporting learning style questionnaire that Reid (1987) developed to measure the preferred learning style preferences of ESL students in the U.S., and is a partial replication of Reid's study. The instrument was used to determine the major, minor and negligible preferred learning styles of Greek EFL students and teachers. Data from the learning style questionnaires were analyzed using paired t-tests, unpaired t-tests, single-factor and two-factor ANOVAs. Statistical analysis indicated kinesthetic learning as a major learning style for students, and visual, kinesthetic and tactile learning as major learning style preferences for teachers. No negligible learning styles were reported for either group. Students tended to prefer teacher-centered learning styles (visual, auditory and individual learning) slightly more than student-centered learning styles (kinesthetic, tactile and group learning). Furthermore, teachers tended to prefer student-centered learning styles slightly more than teacher-centered learning styles. Data from both groups (teachers and students) suggested interaction effects for age and gender. The results of this study raise questions concerning the reliability of Reid's instrument. Neither subject groups in this study, nor subjects in Hoffner's (1991) or Pia's (1989~ studies, identify negligible learning styles on the part of the subjects. This raises questions related to the reliability of Reid's instrument. It suggests that further study needs to be conducted in measuring learning style preferences in culture specific studies.
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Johnston, Nicole R. "Understanding the information literacy experiences of EFL (English as a Foreign Language) students." Thesis, Queensland University of Technology, 2014. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/71386/3/Nicole_Johnston_Thesis.pdf.
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This thesis investigated the information literacy experiences of EFL (English as a Foreign Language) students in a higher education institution in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Phenomenography was used to investigate how EFL students' 'used information to learn' (ie. information literacy). The study revealed that EFL students' experienced information literacy across four categories and had varying experiences of information and learning. The research also showed that EFL students' faced a number of challenges and barriers due to language that impacted on their experiences of reading, understanding, accessing and translating information.
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Yasar, Engin. "University Preparatory Class Efl Students'." Master's thesis, METU, 2005. http://etd.lib.metu.edu.tr/upload/2/12606818/index.pdf.
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This study aims to investigate university preparatory class students&rsquoattitudes towards the assessment system by which they are evaluated and alternative assessment before and after the implementation of the electronic portfolio, their attitudes towards the electronic portfolio before and after keeping it for two months, their suggestions about improving the electronic portfolio and how keeping the electronic portfolio affects their computer literacy. For this purpose, 19 intermediate level EFL students in the Department of Basic English, METU were chosen as subjects. For this study, data were collected by administering two questionnaires before and after the implementation, conducting informal interviews with the students and keeping a diary in order to record teacher reflection. Then, the data collected through these data collection tools have been analysed. Finally, the results are discussed in order to interpret students&rsquo
attitudes towards the current assessment system at DBE, alternative assessment tools and the electronic portfolio. The findings of this study indicated that although the students are not completely dissatisfied with the current assessment used at DBE, their attitude towards alternative assessment tools, portfolio, and electronic portfolio was also positive before the implementation and keeping the electronic portfolio for two months made their attitudes towards these assessment tools even more positive. In addition, some of the students indicated that using both traditional and alternative assessment tools may reflect better assessment of their performance.
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Gramegna, Lorenza. "Problems of coherence in EFL students' compositions." Normal, Ill. : Illinois State University, 2007. http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=0&did=1432770671&SrchMode=2&sid=2&Fmt=2&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=PQD&TS=1216228802&clientId=43838.
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Thesis (Ph. D.)--Illinois State University, 2007.Title from title page screen, viewed on July 16, 2008. Dissertation Committee: K. Aaron Smith, Janice Neuleib, Ronald Strickland. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 253-265) and abstract. Also available in print.
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Almohawis, Khaled. "Graduate Saudi ESL Students’ Perceptions of Writing Pedagogies in EFL Versus ESL Contexts: An Approach Toward Understanding Students’ Writing Difficulties." OpenSIUC, 2020. https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/dissertations/1866.
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This phenomenological study examines Saudi students’ perceptions of writing difficulties in U.S. universities as they have experiencing EFL and ESL contexts. The reason for focusing on Saudi students as participants is to limit linguistic, educational, cultural, and social factors that may affect the findings. The participants are seven Saudi graduate students at Southern Illinois University Carbondale (SIUC). Interview is used as a research instrument to provide a space for each participant to recall as many memories and perceptions as possible in order to manifest comprehensive presentations of their experiences in the Saudi and U.S. contexts. The two research goals are: (1) exploring the similarities and differences between the two contexts based on the participants’ perceptions; and (2) identifying potential effects of these similarities and differences on the participants’ writing during graduate studies in the U.S. Participants’ perceptions focus on the differences between the Saudi and U.S. contexts, rather than similarities, and their comparisons of the two contexts are discussed based on eight key factors: student’s role, students’ expectations, teacher’s role, relationship with instructors, writing process, feedback and grading, off-campus social life, and educational policies. The potential effects of these differences on Saudi students’ writing in the U.S. context are classified into three domains: educational procedures and academic standards; pedagogies; and writing processes. I conclude this study by offering recommendations for U.S. professors and instructors who may teach Saudi students and future Saudi students who plan to come to the U.S. universities.
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Mantina, A. Y. "To the problem engineering students' intercultural EFL communication." Thesis, Sumy State University, 2015. http://essuir.sumdu.edu.ua/handle/123456789/40611.
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Cultural features of different nations make more urgent the problem of cultural identity and cultural differences. The cultural diversity of modern humanity is increased and nations try to preserve and develop their cultural identity.
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Johansson, Jonna, and Marie Nilsson. "Feedback as Formative Assessment on EFL Students’ Writing." Thesis, Malmö högskola, Fakulteten för lärande och samhälle (LS), 2017. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:mau:diva-35605.
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Providing feedback on students’ written tasks is a common aspect in today’s classrooms. Feedback affects students’ written language learning by either enhancing it or hindering it, depending on what, how and when it is given. The purpose of this degree project is to research how teachers perceive students’ writing process, how they give feedback on students’ written tasks in a primary EFL classroom, and the reasons behind their chosen strategies. Semi-structured interviews with two English teachers teaching years 4-6 were used as a method for this study. To support and analyse the data from the interviews, this project contains an overview of the fields of written language learning, formative assessment, effective formative feedback and writing as a process using literature and previous research. The literature and research show that teaching writing in a foreign language should focus on enhancing students’ interest in writing by supporting their curiosity and willingness to become writers. This can be done by focusing on content of a text instead of grammar or spelling, as this does not support young learners in their writing process. Teachers therefore need to provide feedback on aspects such as content, coherence and structure and give students information on how they can proceed in and improve a task. That is when the feedback will have the most positive effect on students’ learning. Further, the process-based approach of writing is argued to be beneficial for students’ learning as it encourages students to take an active part in their writing process. The major conclusions of this study are that the two teachers prefer to give informal and oral selective feedback on students’ writing tasks during the task. They give feedback once or twice on a task and often in the middle, to scaffold a progression. However, this is not in alignment with process-based writing. The study also shows that the two teachers are not aware of the theories underpinning writing as a process. Instead, they are well trained in ways of formative assessment and scaffolding language learning, but not the process-based approach of writing.
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Lucena, Maria Inez Probst. "Processing input : an investigation into brazilian efl students." reponame:Repositório Institucional da UFSC, 1998. http://repositorio.ufsc.br/xmlui/handle/123456789/77783.
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Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Comunicação e ExpressãoMade available in DSpace on 2012-10-17T07:28:02Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0Bitstream added on 2016-01-09T01:07:44Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 149134.pdf: 5190658 bytes, checksum: 97a216e695858d9dcc4d7231a494f0c6 (MD5)
Baseados na psicologia e na perspectiva de processamento de input, pesquisadores têm tentado obter informações sobre a relação que existe entre o input e os processos cognitivos dos aprendizes. A principal afirmação dentro dessa perspectiva é que, uma vez que o ser humano não tem uma capacidade ilimitada de atenção, é dificil atender a todo o input ao mesmo tempo. Van Patten (1990) investigou a divisão da atenção do aprendiz entre conteúdo e aspectos formais da língua e verificou que a atenção ao primeiro compete com a atenção ao segundo. O presente estudo teve como objetivo investigar, através da replicação do estudo de Van Patten (1990), se alunos brasileiros de inglês como língua estrangeira apresentavam um desempenho diferente do constatado no experimento original. Os resultados fornecem evidência de que atender ao conteúdo e às formas gramaticais foi mais dificil do que atender somente ao conteúdo ou ao conteúdo e a um item lexical e que somente os alunos em níveis mais avançados puderam atender mais facilmente à forma sem afetar a compreensão do conteúdo. Abstract : Much research in second/ foreign language (L2) acquisition field has been carried out on the way learners process input in an attempt to determine how second/ foreign languages are best learned. Based on cognitive psychology and within an input processing perspective, researchers have been seeking to obtain information about the relationship between input and learners' cognitive processes. The main claim within this perspective is that since humans do not have unlin-úted supplies of attention, it is difficult to attend to everything in the input at the same time. Van Patten (1990) investigated the relationship between learners' attention to the meaning and to the formal features of the language input and found that focusing on meaning competes with focusing on form, and that only when comprehension as a skill is automatized can learners simultaneously attend to form without loss of information. The purpose of the present study was to investigate, through the replication of Van Patten's (1990) study, whether Brazilian EFL students at the secondary school levei perform in different ways when they are asked to attend to both form and meaning in listening tasks. The participants in this study were 71 Brazilian secondary school students enrolled in EFL classes at Colégio de Aplicação, a public high-school linked to the Federal University of Santa Catarina. The experiment followed the same general procederes used by Van Patten. Students at three different levels of competence listened to recorded passages. At each levei students were divided into four different groups and each group was expected to carry out a slightly different task. Thus, in each task learners were expected to pay attention to different things: In Task I, only to the content; in Task II, to the content and to the key lexical item Einstein; in Task III, to the content and to the definite article the, and in Task IV, to the content and to the past verb morpheme -ed. Subjects were to demonstrate their attention to target items by placing an X on their papers every time they heard an occurrence. They were asked to write freely in Portuguese, everything they remembered from the passages and their performance in each task was assessed in terms of the number of idea units recalled. Results provided evidence that attention to content and grammatical forms was more difficult than attention to only content or content plus a lexical item, and only the more advanced learners showed that they could more easily focus on form without affecting comprehension. The results of the present study reinforce Van Patten's claims that learners' attention during input processing is focused first on meaning and that only when comprehension as a skill becomes automatic, learners' are more able to detect grammatical items while detecting information without negatively affecting comprehension.
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Pereira, Claudia Maria. "Acquisition of morphological rules by EFL brazilian students." reponame:Repositório Institucional da UFSC, 1994. https://repositorio.ufsc.br/handle/123456789/111357.
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Barlow, Lisa. "The effect of non-native speaker accent on EFL students' listening comprehension." Thesis, University of Exeter, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/10036/92399.
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With the increasing demand for English language proficiency in today’s global environment, comes a need for trained English as a Second or Foreign Language (ESL/EFL) teachers. Many countries such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE) are establishing bachelor and master degree programs in the field of Teaching English to Speakers of other Languages (TESOL). The majority of students in these programs are nonnative speakers of English. While these new graduates should be able to fill the growing demands for English teachers in tertiary and non-tertiary institutions within the UAE, they and other experienced nonnative English speaking teachers (NNEST) are often not hired. Most often this is due to a nonnative speaker bias, the view that only native English speaking teachers are better suited to teach English. This bias extends particularly to the teaching of oral and aural skills. There is a belief that accented English is difficult for students to comprehend especially in academic listening which implies that nonnative teacher accent can hinder ESL/EFL student listening success. However, current research has not provided empirical evidence to verify or disprove this opinion. Current research on nonnative speakers and listening comprehension has been based on teacher and student self-perceptions and attitudes towards nonnative speaking teachers (Butler, 2007; Flowerdew, 1994; Friedrich 2000; Huang, 2004; Major et al., 2002; McKenzie, 2008; Moussu, 2002). However, there is little quantitative data to support if and how these attitudes and perceptions may or may not correlate to EFL student listening performance. This thesis will attempt to resolve this deficiency. Another issue this thesis will undertake which has not been examined widely is the effect of nonnative speaker accent on academic listening. Various studies have been conducted on student difficulty in comprehending academic lectures from native and nonnative speakers (Ferris & Tagg, 1996; Flowerdew & Miller, 2005; Huang, 2004; Lynch, 1994; Powers, 1985; Richards, 1983; Vogely, 1995). Yet, currently, the literature is sparse on the influence of nonnative speaker accent as a factor, or effect, in the listening comprehension of L2 students’ understanding of academic lectures. Further, existing research in NNESTs is also missing empirical or quantitative evidence which proves or disproves the prevailing theory that native inner circle English accents are significantly better for EFL student academic listening comprehension. Thus, another goal of this thesis is to provide evidence to disprove this assumption. Finally, this research will provide qualitative data to understand how students view accent as it relates to their academic achievement and prospective careers. This thesis will propose new empirical data relating to nonnative speaker accent and listening comprehension in ESL/EFL. It will provide evidence that there is no significant effect of accent on academic listening test scores for EFL students enrolled in a university foundations program at UAE University. In this research, six EFL professionals (from China, Egypt and the USA) and 108 EFL students participated in the study. The female students were between 18-20 years old, from the UAE, and studying at the Under Graduate Requirements Unit at UAE University in Al Ain, UAE. All students responded to a pre-test questionnaire in a Likert scale format. A week later, the students listened to one recording, took a corresponding exam, and answered a post-test survey. Two to three days later, 18 randomly selected students were interviewed. The interviews consisted of open-ended questions. The data were analyzed both quantitatively and qualitatively. Analysis of the quantitative data shows that the majority of participants considered native speakers of English easier to understand, specifically in terms of pronunciation and understandability, but had no opinion as to whether a non-native speaker was easier to understand than a native speaker. As per the listening test scores, there were no significant differences between the six groups of students who had listened to six different speaker accents. Analysis of the interviews shows that students have no bias against nonnative English teachers. In fact, several students favored Arab nonnative English speaking teachers to translate vocabulary and complex ideas from English to Arabic. These students also demonstrated an unrealistic grasp of their need to understand the varieties of English they will encounter in their future workplaces.
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Liang, Mei-Ya. "Interaction in EFL online classes how Web-facilitated instruction influences EFL university students' reading and learning /." [Bloomington, Ind.] : Indiana University, 2006. http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&res_dat=xri:pqdiss&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:3215226.
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Thesis (Ph.D.)--Indiana University, Dept. of Language Education, 2006.Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 67-04, Section: A, page: 1257. Advisers: Larry Mikulecky; Curtis J. Bonk. "Title from dissertation home page (viewed June 19, 2007)."
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Azuma, Masumi. "Metaphorical competence in an EFL context : the mental lexicon and metaphorical competence of Japanese EFL students." Thesis, University of Nottingham, 2004. http://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/11894/.
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This thesis on metaphor and metaphor study covers theoretical and practical issues in the past and the present both in the occidental and oriental worlds. Metaphor in rhetoric, cognitive and applied linguistics is described briefly, mostly as a theoretical issue. It states that metaphor was treated as part of rhetoric in the past, however, recently it has developed more broadly into a facet of human cognition. As a practical issue, professional studies assessing metaphorical competence are highlighted, which inform the measurement of metaphorical competence of Japanese learners of English (Japanese EFL students, hereafter). The author developed her original measurement instruments (tests and evaluations of metaphorical competence) to assess the receptive and productive metaphorical abilities of Japanese EFL students. The tests aims to measure Japanese EFL students' metaphorical competence and discover the answers to what factors affect their comprehension and use of English metaphorical expressions and what kinds of metaphorical expressions are salient or opaque for them. This study showed that the Japanese EFL students' receptive ability was better than their productive ability. It further indicated that the size of their mental lexicons, the elasticity of their linguistic ability, the degree of semantic expansion, and their cognitive flexibility (e.g. analogical reasoning, mapping and networking) were important factors affecting their ability to handle metaphorical expressions. Another important discovery was that L1 transfer might play an ambivalent role. As for the salience and opacity of metaphorical expressions, the degree of clarity of expressions was an important element. For example, the expressions with images easy to visualise were the easiest for the Japanese EFL students to understand and use metaphorically. The highly conventional idioms involving metaphorical meanings were problematic for them to understand and especially to use.
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Hirose, Koji. "Effects of text structure instruction on Japanese EFL students." Thesis, University of Leicester, 2014. http://hdl.handle.net/2381/28619.
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An instructional approach to replace the traditional Yakudoku method is required for the instruction of text comprehension. The traditional Yakudoku method focuses on the translation of English into Japanese in a single sentence, which disturbs the flow of text comprehension and results in a loss of meaning. One way to resolve this may direct students’ attention to the whole text through the learning of text structure. While the effect of text structure instruction has been exhibited in the L1 context, little empirical research has examined the effectiveness of the teaching of text structure for the Japanese students. The present study investigated the effects of the teaching of text structure. A mixed methods design was employed with an emphasis on a quantitative approach. Instruction was given to college students over a total of seven lessons. Reading comprehension tests, recall tests, and questionnaires were used as data collection methods, complemented by interviews. The results showed that the intervention could strongly improve the participants’ reading comprehension. Especially, the lower group benefited greatly from the intervention. Recall data collected from all the participants did not indicate a significant increase in the comparison organisation although the extracted participants significantly increased the amount of information. No significant increase was produced in the problem/solution organisation while the lower experimental participants produced a light increase. The intervention modestly altered students’ identification of the two types of the comparison and problem/solution organisation, especially for the lower experimental participants. The results also indicated that at the onset, more than half of the participants lacked the knowledge of text structure. Through the intervention, the number of experimental participants who could identify the rhetorical organisation rose. These results suggest that the teaching of text structure is effective for students with low reading ability to read expository text.
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Nikonova, E., А. Pronina, and J. Muzzarelli. "The problem of understanding written texts (EFL engineering students)." Thesis, Sumy State University, 2015. http://essuir.sumdu.edu.ua/handle/123456789/39134.
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Красуля, Алла Вікторівна, Алла Викторовна Красуля, and Alla Viktorivna Krasulia. "Developing EFL Students’ Speaking Skills: 21-Day Vlog Challenge." Thesis, National Technical University of Ukraine “Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute” FL, 2021. https://essuir.sumdu.edu.ua/handle/123456789/83724.
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The EFL classroom has been changing over time. Technologies are transforming the way we teach and learn. Meaningful use of EdTech is essential in the times of the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic worldwide that is causing a big transition from face-to-face on-campus teaching to online classes. The present study aimed to replicate an authentic real-life experience, foster students’ creativity, and self-regulation, and increase their desire to speak and communicate.
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Ahlner, Boel, and Thorsén Emma Henriksson. "Students’ acceptance to teacher interventions in the EFL classroom." Thesis, Malmö högskola, Lärarutbildningen (LUT), 2013. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:mau:diva-31836.
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The aim of this paper is to investigate EFL (English as a Foreign Language) students’ acceptance of teacher interventions to disruptive behavior in the classroom. As a method, qualitative research was conducted, including a collection of qualitative and quantitative data through a questionnaire, as well as a qualitative analysis. The respondents to the questionnaire were grade 7-9 students, located in the southern part of Sweden. The results indicate that the two interventions which both research and the study’s participants accepted, were Shorter recess and Quiet reprimand. Further, the interventions which research and the respondents somewhat agreed on, were Ignore, Stare, Approach and Parents/principal. Lastly, the two interventions which research and the participants disagreed on, were Stop it and Other room. There is a need for more research on students’ acceptance of interventions; therefore, we recommend future researchers to investigate it further.
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Johansson, Therese. "Teaching material in the EFL classroom : teachers' and students' perspectives." Thesis, Växjö University, School of Humanities, 2006. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:vxu:diva-764.
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The principal aim of this essay was to study why some teachers at upper secondary school choose to work with alternative material in the English classroom, whereas others choose a combination of alternative material and coursebooks. The investigation further deals with how alternative material is used. What students think about various kinds of material and whether they are encouraged to influence the choice of material has been considered as well. The method used was interviews with three teachers and six students.
The results of the study showed that all three teachers agreed that coursebooks should not be the only teaching material used in the classroom; they believed that the use of course-books alone would be boring and not very stimulating for the students. Coursebooks combined with alternative material were considered to work very well as teachers and students benefit from the advantages of both. Furthermore, alternative material would be used more if it were not such a time-consuming business for the teachers. Concerning how the three teachers made alternative material, practise varied. One teacher for who mainly used alternative material and also made it herself, had many different sources, whereas the other two teachers mostly used books and movies. Regarding the students, their requests of teaching material varied. The majority however preferred either alternative material or a combination with coursebooks. They also declared that they are encouraged to influence the choice of material.
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Alsamadani, Hashem A. "The Relationship between Saudi EFL College-Level Students' Use of Reading Strategies and Their EFL Reading Comprehension." Ohio University / OhioLINK, 2008. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ohiou1224685570.
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Capelo, Carla. "WHEN WRITING BECOMES NIGHTMARE: HELPING STUDENTS PINPOINT WRITING TOPICS." CSUSB ScholarWorks, 2018. https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/etd/626.
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When deciding on topics for academic research papers, many students face difficulties that vary from choosing themes whose scope is too extensive to be satisfactorily analyzed in the given task, to selecting topics that are too limited, to not being able to make a decision on a topic at all. Such struggles seem to manifest themselves in both native and non-native speakers of English. Despite extensive research on the writing process and its strategies, be it for academic writing or other genres, and even research focused on writers’ difficulties, previous research has found little about the troubles students must overcome when deciding on a research topic, and how to overcome them.
This study employed a qualitative case study design with two graduate students in a master’s program in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages, who were enrolled in two sections of a course on research, to investigate these students’ writing processes as they defined a topic for their literature review research paper. Through an in-depth analysis of samples of their writing in combination with their verbal reports, collected during individual semi-structured interviews, this case study examined how two graduate students successfully calibrated their topics, which strategies they employed to that end, and how their instructors’ actions helped them in the process. Consequently, the findings shed light on instructional practices, and their implications for teachers’ training programs.
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He, Ya-Nan. "Motivational Strategies: Teachers' and Students' Perspectives." [Kent, Ohio] : Kent State University, 2009. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc%5Fnum=kent1255706519.
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Thesis (M.A.)--Kent State University, 2009.Title from PDF t.p. (viewed April 9, 2010). Advisor: Kristen Precht. Keywords: Motivation; motivational strategy; ESL; EFL; TESL; Taiwanese; English learners. Includes bibliographical references (p. 50-57)
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Wisaijorn, Patareeya, and n/a. "Teaching reading comprehension to Thai EFL students: Reciprocal Teaching Procedure." University of Canberra. Professional Communication, 2003. http://erl.canberra.edu.au./public/adt-AUC20050802.140230.
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The main purpose of this study was to examine the effects of strategy training
in small group work on the reading comprehension of academic
texts in English by Thai English as a Foreign Language (EFL) students.
The strategy-training used was the Reciprocal Teaching Procedure (RTF)
which focused on the four reading comprehension strategies: predicting,
clarifying, questioning and summarizing.
The research study was an experimental one using a single group design.
The participants were thirty-four first year students enrolled in the English
for Academic Purposes (EAP) program at a tertiary institution in the
northeastern part of Thailand. Both quantitative and qualitative research
methods were used. The pre-, post- and follow-up reading tests were
employed for quantitative analysis. The students' performances were
analyzed for statistically significant differences immediately at the end of
the ten-week training and in the follow-up test eight weeks after the
training. Qualitative data were collected from students' pre-, post- and
follow-up questionnaires, checklists and journals, teacher's checklists and
journal, and independent observer's checklists and field notes.
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Al-Harbi, Bader Ibrahim. "An investigation into dictionary use by Saudi tertiary EFL students." Thesis, University of Exeter, 2012. http://hdl.handle.net/10036/4278.
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The main purpose of this study was to investigate empirically the impacts of dictionary strategy instruction and exposure on the dictionary performance, perceptions of and attitudes towards dictionary use, and knowledge of dictionary strategy and use by tertiary students of English in Saudi Arabia. Data were collected by means of questionnaires, interviews, observation and students interview feedback. The study was carried out in two phases; phase I, in which 14 participants were chosen to carry out the interviews, and in which the questionnaire was conducted on 77 male students in the preparatory year at the College of Applied Health Science of Qassim University in Saudi Arabia; and phase II where four participants were chosen to carry out the training in dictionary use through a one-to-one tutorial mode. The data in the second phase were collected through observation and students interview feedback. The findings from phase I of the study indicated that the Saudi students did not have appropriate knowledge of their own dictionary. It revealed some instances of failing to take advantage of the potential of dictionary use for language learning and identified factors behind this ineffective use. It demonstrated how the teacher’s role was essential in this respect and could directly influence the process of dictionary implementation inside the classroom The results of phase II demonstrated that strategy training was effective in disseminating the knowledge and skills required of students in using their dictionaries to solve linguistic problems. More importantly, the results showed that the strategy training approach holds great potential for developing students' independence and that it moves them towards greater autonomy. Thus, it is recommended that training be provided to English language learners to optimise their use of this important tool. Finally, specific implications for both teaching and future research are identified.
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Vazquez, Alberto Mora. "EFL students' constructions of morality in a Mexican language centre." Thesis, University of Exeter, 2008. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.489240.
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The overall purpose of this thesis is to explore the students' constructions of morality in a language centre of a Mexican state university. In particular, this study seeks to explore the connections between school administration to the academic and non-academic needs of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) students. The thesis emphasises the importance of incorporating students' voices when constructing moral leadership practices in language school settings.
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Perche, Michelle. "Students' needs and attitudes: EFL education in Japanese high schools." Thesis, Edith Cowan University, Research Online, Perth, Western Australia, 2002. https://ro.ecu.edu.au/theses/747.
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Much of the literature on EFL education in Japan describes a system that is fraught with problems. Over the last decade the Japanese Education Ministry (Monbusho) has introduced a number of reforms and introduced some new EFL courses into Japanese schools. The stated aim of the new courses has been to focus on the development of students' communicative abilities in English. However, the effectiveness of these reforms has been questioned particularly at the senior high school level. According to a number of commentators, difficulties occur because of a back wash effect of the university entrance examinations. Others criticise the teachers for continuing to use traditional teaching methods that may no longer satisfy the needs of present generation students.
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Cao, Ngoc Lam Vien. "EFFECTS OF SPEAKER'S ACCENT IN A MULTIMEDIA TUTORIAL ON NON-NATIVE STUDENTS' LEARNING AND ATTITUDES." OpenSIUC, 2014. https://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/dissertations/803.
Full textAbstract:
Research in the field of multimedia has yielded principles for the design of effective multimedia instructional messages including Mayer's principles regarding voice. According to the voice principle, students learn more deeply when the narration in a multimedia lesson is spoken by a native voice rather than a non-native voice. The generalizability of the voice principle has been demonstrated when applied to multimedia users who are native speakers of the language used in narration. However, three out of four English users are non-native speakers of English, and the vast majority of verbal exchanges in English do not involve any native speakers of the language at all. By focusing on non-native users, the results of this study should clarify the applicability of the voice principle to a broader target audience. The study investigated whether the accent of the narrator in a multimedia tutorial affected participants' learning and attitudes toward the narrator. The independent variable of the study was narrator's accent with two levels: native accent and non-native shared accent. The dependent variables of the study were participants' learning and their attitudes toward the narrators. Sixty-five Chinese participants at a Midwestern university in the United States were randomly assigned to one of two groups in this experimental design. Data to test the dependent variables were collected through a learning achievement test and an attitude survey. Data analyses revealed that there was no significant difference in overall learning and recall level learning between the two accent groups. However, the group who heard the narration spoken with the native American English accent had significantly more positive attitudes toward their respective narrator than the group who heard the narration spoken with a non-native shared Chinese accent. The study qualifies the voice principle by establishing the limits of its generalizability to non-native English speakers. The study suggests to instructional designers that the use of a non-native shared accent should not affect students' learning negatively although it may affect their attitudes toward the speakers. In addition, the study helps assure non-native instructors that they can record their own voices to use in multimedia instruction as their non-native students will learn as effectively as with a native English accent.
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Rosenkvist, Lina, and Nathalie Bencic. "Students’ perception on role-play in EFL/ESL-classrooms in relation to their speaking ability." Thesis, Malmö universitet, Fakulteten för lärande och samhälle (LS), 2020. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:mau:diva-30573.
Full textAbstract:
This research paper examines students’ perception of how role-play could affect their confidence in accordance with their speaking ability in EFL/ESL- classrooms. It has tried to respond to the research question “To what extent do Swedish EFL/ESL- students find role-play helpful for their confidence in their speaking ability?.” In addition, an analysis of relevant research supported the theoretical background on the subjects of Second language acquisition (SLA), Communicative language teaching (CLT), the Sociocultural perspective and the steering documents from Skolverket. Moreover, the research used a qualitative method through interviews. The interviews were performed with eight students from 7th-9th grade. To complement the study a questionnaire was conducted to show the distribution of students confidence on a scale from 1-5. The collected data was from a role-play activity that was tested similarly in six EFL/ESL-classes. At the end of the classes, they were evaluated in a Google Formula. Then, it was possible to see connections between the level of confidence and how helpful role-play was for the students. In the result, the interviewees all agreed on the role-play possibly being a helpful tool to improve the speaking ability. In addition, the questionnaire showed that 64% of the participants thought that role-play helped them to speak more confidently in English. Also, it was shown that students in the middle of the scale were the ones that found role-play most beneficial. At last, the factors that seemed to develop students’ confidence the most from the role-play were the structure of a group, the chosen themes, and the support students received from the framework.
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Chubko, Nadezhda. "Digital storytelling as an astronomy disciplinary literacy enhancement approach for adolescent Kyrgyzstani EFL students." Thesis, Edith Cowan University, Research Online, Perth, Western Australia, 2020. https://ro.ecu.edu.au/theses/2306.
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This research explored the impact of a digital storytelling (DST) video-making intervention in an astronomy course (STEM-A) on EFL students’ STEM-A disciplinary literacy acquisition in English. The research was motivated by the increased significance of English as an international language of STEM instruction and addressed the transition between discourses encountered by students learning STEM in a foreign language.
The study was designed and implemented as a mixed methods four-cycle action research with multiple Case Study, multiple-probe quasi-experimental design. In the first cycle, the researcher transitioned from a teacher of English to speakers of other languages (TESOL) to a teacher of astronomy in English in a non-English speaking country and developed the STEM-A course. In cycle two, the STEM-A course was piloted and refined based on the learning outcomes of non-native English speakers (EFL) and an analysis of the interactive patterns amongst students who completed the course. In cycle three, the course sequence was further refined to support development of disciplinary literacy for EFL students. In the fourth and final cycle, the most profound course sequence was implemented in a different school context to explore transferability and the potential for the course to support learning in a community of practice.
Cycle one was documented after the researcher reflected on her observations of the participants, based on analysis of the video recordings of lessons and the course programs designed for the study. In cycles two, three and four, data were collected from written responses to pre- and post-Astronomy Diagnostic Tests (ADT), coded against SOLO taxonomy (Biggs & Collis, 1982), and analysed using repeated measures ANOVA. Discourse analysis was used to identify communicative functions used by students in the course to qualitatively analyse their growth in disciplinary literacy.
Overall, this research contributed to the body of knowledge on integrating technology in STEM education by exemplifying the process of STEM-A course design and refinement. The results indicated a positive effect of the DST intervention on EFL students’ STEM-A disciplinary literacy acquisition in English. Additionally, the study revealed classroom interaction patterns that enhanced EFL students’ disciplinary literacy development, as the DST teaching approach established a collaborative learning environment that led to shared knowledge construction and students’ engagement in authentic learning inquiry. This approach allowed to bridge the gap between EFL and non- EFL students’ disciplinary literacy in STEM subjects.
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Johnsson, Michelle. "Ugh, do we have to? : An experimental study investigating students' attitudes towards English and their results in a reading comprehension test." Thesis, Mälardalens högskola, Akademin för utbildning, kultur och kommunikation, 2021. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:mdh:diva-53215.
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The aim of this study is to investigate 1) students’ attitudes towards English, 2) students’ attitudes towards reading in English and 3) if there is a correlation between students’ attitudes and their results in a reading comprehension test. In total, 39 students from three different classes volunteered for this study. The data were collected by using a questionnaire regarding students’ attitudes towards English and reading in English as well as by letting the participants take part in a reading comprehension test. The results show that students’ attitudes towards English does not necessarily play a part in how well they perform in a reading comprehension test.
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Ito, Noriko. "Exploring the Nature of Language Anxiety: Experiences of NonNative EnglishSpeaking College Students in the United States." ScholarWorks@UNO, 2008. http://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/821.
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The thought of learning another language makes some people cringe, while others display neutral to positive reactions. To understand the complex experiences of students learning a new language, this study investigated the affective psychological development encompassing language anxiety (LA) among nonnative Englishspeaking college students in the United States (US). The purpose of this study was to identify LA, while keeping in mind that some of the LA experiences may be moderate to none, and to explore the nature of this phenomenon. Ten university students from nine different countries were interviewed concerning their experiences learning and functioning in English in the US. While only a few studies have reviewed the nature of LA encompassing the possible existence of facilitating LA, this study investigated both the positive and negative effects of anxiety on second language learning. The answer to the research question, "How do college students in the US whose native languages are not English experience LA" was pursued by using qualitative analyses. The results indicated a new construct of LA, identity frustration, and its relationships to the other LA constructs already specified in the literature. The study also suggested the timing when students cease to translate between the two languages to be the point where they experience a lower level of LA. In addition, four other themes emerged. They are culturerelated LA; the recursive nature of LA; relationships among selfexpectation, selfconfidence, and LA; and facilitating LA, termed euphoric language tension.
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Lan, Rae L. "Language learning strategies profiles of EFL elementary school students in Taiwan." College Park, MD : University of Maryland, 2005. http://hdl.handle.net/1903/2480.
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Thesis (Ph. D.) -- University of Maryland, College Park, 2005.Thesis research directed by: Curriculum and Instruction. Title from t.p. of PDF. Includes bibliographical references. Published by UMI Dissertation Services, Ann Arbor, Mich. Also available in paper.
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Parviainen, Jennie. "Oral or Written? : The feedback most preferred by students of EFL." Thesis, Karlstad University, Faculty of Arts and Education, 2008. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:kau:diva-3257.
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The aim of this investigation was to find out how students react to and make use of oral and written feedback given to them in class. Another aim was to find out if they preferred one form over the other and whether they make more use of that form. The investigation was conducted at a Swedish upper secondary school and consisted of a questionnaire survey and interviews with groups of students and with their teachers. The interviews with the students focused on clarifying some of the results from the questionnaire. The teacher interviews gave the teachers a chance to give their version of what they thought worked better and why they chose to work that way.
The results showed that students welcome feedback, especially positive feedback used for encouragement. However, they also thought that there was a higher limit to the amount of feedback they could benefit from. Too much of one sort could be ignored or perceived as discouraging. The feedback mostly used in class was oral feedback. This was also what the students thought they benefited from the most since it invited to discussion about their work. Most of the students thought the feedback should be delivered in private because it could be embarrassing to receive feedback in front of their peers. Nevertheless, feedback on pronunciation and smaller errors that could be of use for their peers as well was acceptable in front of the class.
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Doe, Timothy Jonathan. "ORAL FLUENCY DEVELOPMENT ACTIVITIES: A ONE-SEMESTER STUDY OF EFL STUDENTS." Diss., Temple University Libraries, 2017. http://cdm16002.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p245801coll10/id/475911.
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Teaching & LearningEd.D.
The development of speaking fluency is a major goal for many EFL language learners and several researchers have proposed frameworks for fluency instruction based on theories of cognitive science. It is unclear however, whether EFL students with restricted opportunities to use English outside of language classrooms can benefit from fluency development activities. This main purpose of this study was to determine whether EFL students’ speaking fluency improved whilst participating in theoretically grounded fluency development activities. In addition, student use of formulaic language, participation in classroom activities, and repetition of previously used lexical items was examined in order to determine its relation to development in speaking fluency. 32 first-year Japanese university students from four intact discussion skills classes took part in the study, which was conducted over a period of 12 weeks. Data were collected by recording student performances in a variety of fluency development activities and interactive communicative tasks. There were four main questions investigated in this study. The first research question was focused on long-term fluency development by using multi-level modeling to determine whether gains were made in fluency measures in four 2-minute speaking monologue tests that were conducted at regular periods throughout the semester. Three in-class performance variables - the amount of repeated words, the amount of tokens spoken, and the amount of formulaic language spoken, and three individual difference variables—willingness to communicate, extraversion, and first language fluency were also examined to determine if they were related to any growth observed. The second research question looked at short-term fluency development across a time-pressured speaking activity and similarly used multi-level modeling with the same predictor variables. The third research question concerned the relationship of complexity and accuracy to the fluency measures derived from the monologue speaking tests. Finally, the fourth research question was an investigation of the relationship between the objective fluency measurements and subjective expert ratings. The results indicated that the participants made very small, but significant gains on their mean length of pause across the monologue speaking tests. While none of the predictor variables had a strong relationship with this development, post-hoc analyses suggested that other fluency measures and oral proficiency level could have covaried with this growth. There was also a small but significant improvement in the phonation/time ratio, however, none of the predictor variables appeared to covary with this development. No other significant relationships were found in the long-term fluency measures. For the short-term fluency measures, significant growth was seen across the three deliveries of the speaking activity. While several of the predictor variables, most prominently repetition and the number of tokens spoken, had a significant relationship with this growth, a closer examination revealed that the degree of covariance was extremely slight. The relationship among complexity, accuracy, and fluency also became more significantly correlated over time, suggesting that learners produced higher quality samples of language as the study progressed. Finally, the expert ratings had significant correlations with three of the five fluency measures, indicating that human raters were able to detect small differences in spoken fluency. The findings of this study show that fluency can develop in instructed foreign language settings, however, the role of practice and repetition might be more complex than has been suggested in the research literature. This study provides some insight into that complexity and suggests a number of directions that can be followed to understand more about fluency development.
Temple University--Theses
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Ibrahim, Mona Kamal. "Challenges of teaching EFL to students with visual impairment in Egypt." Thesis, University of Manchester, 2003. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.488030.
Full textAbstract:
In an attempt to improve English language teaching to students with visual impairment in Egypt, this study explores the provision of EFL to students with visual impairment in Egypt in order to establish whether it is adequate to enable these students to meet the communicative aims and goals of the English syllabus as stated by the Ministry of Education, which has a policy of equal access to education for students with disability. A secondary aim is the collection of views on inclusive education, which is a relatively new educational concept in Egypt. The research investigates the perspectives of 198 students with visual impairment in both preparatory and secondary stages in six schools serving two areas in Egypt, one of which is a school for partially sighted students, whereas the remaining five schools are for students with visual impairment (blind). The views of all 23 EFL teachers in these schools are also analysed. The study adopts a qualitative approach employing the following methods of data collection: classroom observation including videotaping, semi-structured interviews with teachers and students and incidental data collection. Three of the schools, two for students with visual impairment and one for partially sighted students, are described in case studies. The data from all six schools is then comprehensively analysed in order to extract common themes across all schools in the sample to complement the case studies. Provision of educational services to students with visual impairment was found to be inadequate in various respects. In addition, unequal conditions existed between different schools for students with visual impairment and also within the schools. The major problem was the lack of specialist training received by the teachers either for teaching EFL or for teaching students with visual impairment. This omission was particularly serious in the case of teachers with visual impairment. The inadequacy of training existed at both pre- and in-service levels. This led most importantly to the omission of the listening and speaking practice so central to a communicative approach to language learning and so essential for students with visual impairment. Physical conditions in schools were not always appropriate. Essential material resources e. g. Braille machines, tape recorders were scarce and unevenly distributed. Supplementary language practice materials, available to fully sighted students, were not available for these students. Inclusion was not rejected as a policy, but there was a common concern among teachers and students about the response of the larger society. The following conclusions are drawn: there is a need for awareness raising about people with disabilities in society in general and in the educational world more particularly. It is suggested that specialised pre-service training to student teachers in the Special Education Section as well as compulsory refresher courses to all in-service teachers would increase EFL teaching effectiveness to students with visual impairment. Consideration is given to the content and organisation of such courses. Recommendations are made for collaborative efforts on the part of concerned ministries to raise community awareness towards persons with disabilities and introduce special education to all student teachers in order to pave the way to successful inclusive educational, and rehabilitation efforts
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Gray, Heather Ann. "EFL traveler." 2000. http://pages.emerson.edu/students/heather_gray/efltraveler/index.html.
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Chen, Mei-lien, and 陳美璉. "Interlanguage Phonology of EFL Students." Thesis, 1999. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/51585840795286415353.
Full textAbstract:
碩士國立高雄師範大學
英語學系
87
This thesis is concerned with the description and interpretation of second language speech produced by second-grade junior high school students in learning English. The description of their production is surveyed in terms of phonetic aspect, phonological rules, consonant clusters, and prosodic features (stress and intonation). What is more important, the attempt to discover and explain the characteristics of their second language speech are approached from a number of different perspectives: transfer from L1, developmental processes of the target language (English), and markedness relation from universal implication. Besides, the interaction of these factors with learners' interlanguage is also the major concern in this study The results of this study are investigated in the light of the segmental aspects, consonant cluster, and the prosodic aspect. In terms of segmental aspects, we conclude that the production of the subjects can be examined with reference to L1 transfer, English developmental sequences, sound misperception and the lack of English phonological knowledge. This indicates an important fact that L1 transfer is by no means the only factors operative in the learning of English. Besides, the interaction of L1 transfer and English developmental processes with the participants' interlanguage is also explored in this study. L1 transfer best predicts the difficulty of segment, while English developmental processes best account for the sound substitution for these difficult sounds. For example, L1 transfer is successful in predicting the participants' difficulty with the segment /T/, /Z/, and /D/, since they are absent from Mandarin. However, L1 transfer fails to account for the systematic substitutions for these difficult sounds. For instance, the participants tend to replace /T/ with /s/, /f/ or /d/. In this respect, English developmental sequences provide an insight into sound substitutions for /T/ in that English-speaking children also show the tendency to mispronounce /T/ as /s/, /f/, or /d/. In addition, L1 transfer is more likely to occur when L1 and L2 are similar, whereas English developmental processes are liable to occur when L1 and L2 are different. For instance, English segments /S, tS, dZ/ have the counterparts in Mandarin /t, tt, tt'/. Their phonological similarity induces the participants to establish correspondences between the target sound and their Mandarin counterparts and thereby to acquire them faster. By contrast, the segments /T, D, Z/ absent from Mandarin are acquired slowly and the acquisition of these segments are somewhat similar to English phonological development, since their sound substitutions for these segments can be found in the production of English-speaking children. Concerning consonant clusters, there are three important findings worth noting. First, cluster reduction and vowel epenthesis are two common strategies employed by the participants in producing English consonant clusters. Besides, it is observed that the subjects prefer cluster reduction to vowel epenthesis. Second, final consonant clusters are more subject to reduction than medial and initial ones. Third, the reduction of consonant clusters is not random, but shows a predictable pattern: The deletion of liquids takes priority over the omission of other consonants in clusters, followed by the deletion of stops. The top priority of the deletion of the liquids in clusters is accounted for by English developmental sequences. The tendency to delete the liquid in clusters is well documented in the acquisition of first language phonology of English. (cf. Locke, 1983; Stoel-Grammons & Dunn, 1985; Vihmen, 1996). In addition, Clements' Sonority Theory (1990) provide an insight into the reason why the deletion of the stop in the final clusters is the second strategy used by the participants. Regarding the prosodic aspect, most of the participants have difficulty with English intonation and English stress. In terms of grammatical constructions, we observe that the subjects perform better on yes-no questions than the other sentence patterns. It appears that some of the subjects notice and pay attention to the rising contour at the end of yes-no questions.
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Lin, Wan-Ting, and 林琬婷. "Compliment Responses by EFL Graduate Students—A Case Study of EFL Graduate Students in Northern Taiwan." Thesis, 2011. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/h6bygc.
Full textAbstract:
碩士國立臺灣科技大學
應用外語系
99
The aim of the present study is to investigate the compliment response strategies used among EFL graduate students in northern Taiwan. It has four goals: (1) to ascertain the most common compliment response strategies employed by the EFL graduate student participants; (2) to search for any differences that may exist between male and female EFL graduate students when using compliment response strategies; (3) to reveal whether a relationship exists between topics and gender with varying compliment response strategies; and (4) to investigate the perceptions on the part of the participants in relation to the use of compliment and compliment response strategies. The participants were 20 graduate students, half male and half female, selected from a university of science and technology in northern Taiwan. Two instruments were employed to collect data for the present study, one of which was an Oral Discourse Completion Task (oral DCT) in which 9 scenario questions were divided into three categories, appearance, ability and possessions. For each of the compliment scenarios, participants would hear the same compliment address twice from two different speakers, one male and one female, then make their responses. The other instrument used to collect data was a semi-structured interview, which consisted of specific and substantial questions that were determined beforehand. The elicited data from the oral DCT were analyzed based on Herbert’s (1990) taxonomy of compliment responses. Results indicated that EFL graduate students in northern Taiwan tend to use responses in the super category of Agreement to weaken the threats to the compliment addressers’ positive face wants as described by Brown and Levinson (1978; 1987). Results showed no significant differences between male and female speakers’ preference of response strategies. However, female graduate students seem to agree with the compliment addressers more often than male graduate students. This supports Holmes’s (1988) claim that females treat compliments as ways to uphold and create solidarity whereas males view compliments as assertion of praise. Moreover, when being complimented on different topics, male graduate students preferred Question, whereas female graduate students favored utilizing Comment acceptance when responding to compliments on appearance. The findings of the current study revealed that both male and female participants prefer to use Comment history when responding to compliments on possessions. Additionally, it was found that male graduate students, when being complimented on ability, tend to use Comment acceptance, but female graduate students are prone to employ Comment history. Results also suggested that most of the participants felt that responding to compliments is a difficult matter; however, these EFL graduate students reported that it is much easier to respond to compliments in Chinese than in English.
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Tseng, Hsiao-Ting, and 曾筱婷. "Analysis of EFL college students' eye movements." Thesis, 2006. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/ep5p3b.
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碩士國立中央大學
學習與教學研究所
94
Given the fact that lexical ability and background knowledge play crucial roles in second language reading and yet less information is available for on-line reading processes, much empirical research is needed. In Study 1, 60 students of National Central University were tested in a read-aloud task. The results suggested that indices of both speed and accuracy significantly correlated with lexical ability, and accuracy could best represent for lexical ability. In Study 2, subjects' eye movements were monitored as they read scientific texts. The results indicated that lexical ability influenced the on-line reading processes, but background knowledge did not. Readers with higher lexical ability read faster, their forward and backward fixation duration was faster, and the regression rate was smaller. In addition, when subjects read twice, they had much reduced reading time, less fixations and longer forward saccade length in the second round. There was reading benefit. Overall, the eye movements of EFL college readers were quantitatively different from those of English native college readers.
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Luo, Ling Ti, and 羅令媞. "EFL university students' expectations and learning experiences." Thesis, 2010. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/05087738963178995573.
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碩士國立政治大學
英國語文學研究所
98
In the field of ESL and EFL, learners’ expectations play a significant role and affect learners’ perception toward upcoming learning tasks. With the advance of technology, the computer assisted language learning provides English learners with alternative learning context, influencing the learners’ expectations. However, low achievers’ expectations in the online remedial English program are rarely investigated. The present study aimed at exploring the pattern of low achievers’ expectations and presenting the experience and perception of low achievers learning online. Participants were 3 English low achievers in a university. All of them were female freshmen and attended the online remedial English course offered by the university. Questionnaires, proficiency tests, and semi-structured interviews were administered to select participants and collect data. Later, the elicited information will be analyzed in a qualitative ways to display the expectations towards the online remedial English course, expectation shift, perceptions and experiences of online learning. The results showed that different types of the self-expectation influenced the learning expectations toward online learning. The participants with self-enhancement tended to regulate herself and expect to improve English proficiency more; the one with self-derogation inclined to expect course design and peer learning more; the one with appropriate self-appraisement regulated herself well and accustomed herself to the alternative online learning context for better learning results. Moreover, some issues played an important role to the three participants, including face, anxiety, self-efficacy, and a sense of learning community. Based on the results of this study, four assertions were proposed. First, face issues were of high concerns of these online learners. Second, learners with different types of self-expectation may treat anxiety in diverse ways. Third, self-regulatory efficacy was important to online learning. Finally, developing a learning community might not be welcomed by all the online learners. To sum up, online learners’ internal factors and external learning behavior were interwoven. The online experiences and performances of the three participants were affected by their expectations. As language educators focus on the learning phenomena in the classroom, the socio-cultural factors are other significant issues needed to be taken into consideration.
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He, Xin-Yi, and 何欣怡. "EFL Students’ Acquisition of English Verbal Constructions." Thesis, 2007. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/38293081841270410822.
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碩士國立彰化師範大學
英語學系
95
English verbal constructions include infinitives, gerunds, and participles. Since the verbal constructions are lacking in Chinese, the Chinese learners of English cannot find equivalent structures in Chinese and are confused by different functions of these constructions. The present study aimed at exploring EFL students’ acquisition of various functions of English verbal constructions and finding out the difficulty levels of English verbal constructions to these learners. The subjects were 248 Chinese learners of English, including 82 third-grade junior high school students, 82 third-grade senior high school students, and 84 junior students from the universities. The instrumentation of this study consisted of a questionnaire and three different formats of tests, i.e. Multiple Choice Test, Fill-in Blank Test, and Chinese-English Guided Translation Test. Two-way ANOVA was used to analyze the data collected. The major findings were summarized as follows: Firstly, a similar sequence of English verbal acquisition was found among the three groups of subjects. The results showed that participles are the most difficult verbal construction for the learners to deal with, and gerunds are the easiest for learners to learn. The difficulty level of infinitives is between the other two verbal constructions. Secondly, the results revealed that there was an identifiable developmental order of the acquisition of English verbal functions by the Chinese learners of English. Moreover,the sequence of each verbal construction in the present study seemed to be consistent with that of previous study. Thirdly, the negative language transfer was found to appear in the students’ learning of English verbal constructions. Since the surface structures of the verbal constructions in Chinese were the same, the learners tended to apply their L1 rules into their learning of English verbal constructions. Based on the findings in the current study, several pedagogical implications are provided. Firstly, English teachers need to be aware that some verbal functions are more difficult for their students to learn at certain stage of their language learning. For instance, infinitives functioned as appositive and as object of a preposition are the most difficult for the students to learn. Second, local EFL teachers are suggested to take the acquisition sequence of English verbal constructions into consideration as they are designing their teaching syllabus. Finally, the teaching of English verbal constructions can be integrated into the contexts. Besides, the further studies are recommended to include students with different English proficiency and to employ alternative assessments, such as an oral test and an interview, to collect more data related to this issue.
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Chuang, Esther, and 莊主恩. "EFL Students’ Anxieties towards Paired-Oral Testing." Thesis, 2018. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/6m3qq9.
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碩士東海大學
外國語文學系
107
EFL Students’ Anxieties towards Paired-Oral Testing ABSTRACT The use of pair work has been commonly implemented in the EFL classroom. Most prior studies concluded that pair work was an effective strategy in EFL teaching. However, there is deficit in researching the problems that students may encounter within an oral paired test setting. Anxiety is often a negative attribute to EFL learners’ speaking abilities as their test taking abilities may deter them from doing their best performance on their oral tests. To better understand how anxiety is situated as an affected factor in EFL learners’ pair-work activities, this longitudinal study explored the causes and the types of anxiety which may occur during paired oral testing. The study observed English-majored EFL college freshmen’s anxieties towards paired-oral testing in an EFL Freshman English classroom at a Taiwanese University. Horwitz, Horwitz, and Cope’s language anxiety model was employed for the analysis of data. This study took a qualitative approach as well as, the data will be analyzed qualitatively. This one-semester-long observational study’s data was collected by classroom observations and conducting semi-structured interviews on the participants. The study (1) uncovers the kinds of anxieties that can be found on the participants in pair-work English oral tests, (2) the possible affective factors of the found anxieties in a paired English oral test setting, (3) the possible pedagogical implications for language teachers who plan to include paired oral tests in the assessment. Keywords: Anxiety, Pair work, Oral tests, Test design.
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Chen, Mei-Ying, and 陳梅影. "The Use of Discourse Markers by Taiwanese Students in ELF and EFL Contexts." Thesis, 2012. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/35325768419139626084.
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博士淡江大學
英文學系博士班
100
Abstract: This dissertation compared discourse markers used among 19 Taiwanese students in English as a lingua franca (ELF) context, 18 Taiwanese in English as a foreign language (EFL) context, and 7 native English (NS) speakers in a Taiwanese university. Fifty-four different discourse markers were identified from the data of 175 minutes recorded pair conversations. The results showed that discourse markers were an indispensible part of English conversations. The participants in three groups used discourse markers for a variety of pragmatic functions on interpersonal and textual levels. In particular, ELF speakers had the highest frequency of overall markers used across groups, and the mean difference between ELF and EFL speakers was significant. In addition, the results revealed that group differences affected the distributions of like, yeah, yes and you know, but did not affect the distributions of I think and so. In particular, ELF speakers had the highest frequencies of like, yeah and you know, and the mean differences of like and yeah between ELF and EFL were statistically significant. Conversely, EFL speakers used yes far more often than NS and ELF speakers did, and the mean difference between EFL and NS was statistical significant. These results might be an indication that L2 speakers acquired I think, so and yes first, but you know, yeah, and like at a later stage in the ELF context where ELF speakers were exposed to authentic language from their native speaking peers. Finally, due to the multifunctionality of discourse markers, students in both ELF and EFL context used you know, I think and so as delaying strategies which were not found in the NS data. This tendency might be an indication that students in both ELF and EFL context needed more time to process information in L2 interactions. Given the important role discourse markers play in interaction, the pedagogical implications were discussed.
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Yang, Ming Nuan, and 楊名暖. "Taiwanese Five-year Junior College EFL Students’ Beliefs." Thesis, 2007. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/95382690348439846544.
Full textAbstract:
博士國立政治大學
英國語文研究所
95
Despite the importance of studying listening in foreign language learning, we still have very limited understanding of learners’ listening beliefs, and a more comprehensive system of listening beliefs is still not in sight. Hence, this study investigated junior college students’ listening beliefs, their listening strategy use, the relationship between their listening beliefs and strategies and the possible effects of English listening proficiency on junior college students’ listening beliefs and listening strategy use. This study mainly employed a quantitative approach to understanding junior college students’ beliefs about English listening comprehension, their strategy use and the relationship between listening beliefs and strategies. The participants were 406 students from one junior college in northern Taiwan. The instruments of the study were the Learner Profile Questionnaire (LPQ), the Belief About English Listening Comprehension Questionnaire (BELCQ), and English Listening Strategy Questionnaire (ELSQ) and the listening comprehension test. The results of the study suggested that: (1) most learners endorsed the belief that listening plays an important role in their English learning process and may facilitate the development of other language skills, (2) learners showed a medium level use of listening strategies and used a wide variety of strategies including cognitive and metacognitive strategies, (3) learners’ listening beliefs were associated with their use of listening strategies, (4) compared with ineffective learners, effective learners tended to report positive beliefs about listening comprehension, and (5) effective learners used a wider variety of strategies than ineffective listeners. Results of this study regarding junior college students’ listening beliefs and listening strategy use may provide rich implications for English education in Taiwan. It is hoped that through this study, more attention will be drawn to listening instruction in junior college students. Understanding students’ beliefs about listening may help English teachers become more aware of students’ frustrations and difficulties in listening to English. Moreover, it might enable EFL teachers to help students develop effective learning strategies and ultimately improve students’ English listening abilities.
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Tsai, Ching-shun, and 蔡清順. "EFL Junior High School Students’ Learner Autonomy, English." Thesis, 2012. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/63160933325595151890.
Full textAbstract:
碩士國立彰化師範大學
英語學系
101
The current study aimed to explore the correlations between EFL junior high school students’ learner autonomy, English learning strategies, gender, and their academic achievement in English. A total of 453 seventh graders from a junior high school in central Taiwan participated in the current study. The questionnaire of learner autonomy was adapted from the Autonomy Level Questionnaire (Chang, 2007) and the Learner Autonomy Questionnaire (Deng, 2008). The Strategy Inventory for Language Learning questionnaire (SILL, EFL/ESL 7.0 version, Oxford, 1989) was utilized for data collection as well. English achievement was derived from calculations of scores of the three monthly English examinations during the first semester in 2012. The analysis of the study was computed by implementing the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) 13.0 for Windows. Independent-sample t-test was employed to explore if there were gender differences in language learning, and Pearson product-moment correlations was performed to examine whether there were significant correlations between the three variables. In addition, the method of standard score, t-score, was utilized to manipulate students’ English scores. Major findings of the study are summarized as follows. First of all, metacognitive strategy was the most frequently preferred strategy. Secondly, students’ autonomous learning could facilitate their use of language learning strategies and academic achievement in English. Thirdly, gender differences were statistically significant in students’ autonomous learning, the use of language learning strategies. Besides, females outperformed males in their language learning achievement. Finally, students’ learner autonomy, English learning strategies, and academic achievement in English were closely correlated with one another, and they were reported medium to high levels. Based on the findings of the study, some pedagogical implications are provided. English teachers are recommended to help students realize the essence of the language learning strategies and concurrently, teach students to use them in language learning. Moreover, students may need assistance from their English teachers so as to incrementally develop more autonomous learning and language learning strategy use.
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Abigail, Shelia Meilina, and Xu Xue Li. "An Investigation of EFL College Students’ Perceptions of TOEIC." Thesis, 2016. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/44811821018699283144.
Full textAbstract:
碩士國立臺灣科技大學
應用外語系
104
ABSTRACT This study attempts to explore the factors constituting motivation and attitudes in learning and taking TOEIC test among Taiwanese students. Also, the researcher compared the perceptions between the more proficient and less proficient students to see whether there are any significant differences between different proficient students. The data of this research was collected both in quantitative and qualitative ways. The researcher used 34-item questionnaires to collect the quantitative data. The participants of this study were 100 Taiwanese students from a public university of science and technology in Taiwan. Furthermore, the researcher also interviewed 8 participants to get qualitative data. The results of this study show that most of the less proficient students were motivated by extrinsic motivation such as the belief that English will be useful for their future, graduation requirements, or job demands. On the other hand, most of more proficient students are influenced by both extrinsic and intrinsic motivation. It seems to be true that most of them like and enjoy studying English, but it cannot be denied that they are also motivated by some extrinsic motivation, such as university requirements. It is found that attitudes and scores are positively correlated to each other. Most students prepare for taking TOEIC because they are extrinsically motivated. Also, intrinsic motivation seems to be supported by extrinsic motivation, in the case of more proficient students in the present study. Furthermore, the study result is somehow similar to Mori (2006), which indicated that stud was found to be the significant predictor of gain scores. In conclusion, it seems that there are many and strongest motivator is the usefulness of TOEIC and English for their future. It is hoped that this study can help EFL teachers understand how motivation plays role in language testing and also how to improve their students proficiency test scores. Keywords: EFL testing, learning motivation, TOEIC
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Pang, Li-chun, and 龎麗君. "EFFECTS OF CALL ON EFL TAIWANESE JUNIOR HIGH STUDENTS." Thesis, 2005. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/28903495637730989710.
Full textAbstract:
碩士國立高雄師範大學
英語學系
93
The study tried to investigate whether the aid of an interactive multimedia CD-ROM would help Taiwanese junior high students improve their vocabulary acquisition, reading comprehension, grammar knowledge, and listening comprehension respectively. In addition, it explored subjects’ learning attitudes and responses to English vocabulary, reading, grammar, and listening learning before and after the project. During an eighteen-week project of computer-assisted language learning, 142 eighth-graders in Chiao Hsi Junior High School in Yilan County were divided into two groups, CALL instruction group and the traditional instruction group. Two types questionnaires on attitudes were designed to collect related data on the study. Moreover, a comparison of English achievements of the students between the two different groups on vocabulary acquisition, reading comprehension, grammar knowledge, and listening comprehension was obtained after the project. Furthermore, through the questionnaires and the student English learning journals (SELJ), the subjects’ comments and suggestions on CALL instruction were sampled and translated from Chinese into English. Based on the data analyses, both quantitative and qualitative, the findings are summarized as follows: 1. There was no significant difference in vocabulary learning between the experimental group and the control group. The results also showed that the significant difference was not found between two different groups on the higher English achievers (HEA), but found on the lower English achievers (LEA). However, most students in the experimental group still addressed in their SELJ that CALL instruction inspired them to have more interest in learning English vocabulary. 2. There was a significant difference in the grades of the total students’ English reading comprehension test between the traditional instruction and CALL instruction group. At the same time, the significant difference was found between the two groups both on the LEA and the HEA. The findings indicated that CALL instruction had a better effect on students’ reading comprehension than the traditional instruction. 3. The experimental group performed significantly better than the control group in grammar knowledge tests on the instructional material. The results also showed that the significant difference was found between the two different groups on the HEA, but not found on the LEA. For most of the students, however, their English grammar abilities were significantly improved. Especially, the HEA addressed in their SELJ that they acquired the grammatical structures and knowledge with less effort but more fun in the application of CALL instruction. 4. The experimental group performed significantly better than the control group in listening comprehension tests on the instructional materials. Also, the findings of this present study clearly indicated that CALL was effective in teaching English listening aspect to the HEA. According to the student responses to this study, CALL motivated the HEA to improve English listening comprehension successfully. However, the significant difference was not found on the LEA between the two different instruction, but they were aware of an alternative way to improve their listening abilities. 5. The experimental group showed more positive attitudes and responses than the control group in English learning. After the researcher employed the two different instruction, there is a significant difference in the students’ English attitudes. Besides, from the statistical results of the SELJ entries, the effects of CALL on Taiwanese junior high school students could be identified and verified again. Based on the study findings, the researcher suggested that EFL teachers should apply CALL instruction to their teaching. Then, they could help their students improve English vocabulary acquisition, reading comprehension, grammar knowledge and listening comprehension in an easy and meaningful way.
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Liou, Ting-Ting, and 留婷婷. "Rhetorical Structure Analysis of EFL Graduate Students' Blog Writing." Thesis, 2014. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/7j62v9.
Full textAbstract:
碩士國立東華大學
英美語文學系
102
The limited English writing practice time and space is one main reason for the insufficient ability for English writing for learners in Taiwan. In order to improve this condition, the researcher adopted blog as writing platform to extend learners’ practice opportunities. Coherence is the most difficult and complex part in English writing. The purpose of this study was to examine coherence in learners’ writings. Both of rhetorical structure analysis and topical structure analysis are related to coherence in English writing. Hence, the researcher adopted these two methods as analyzing instruments. There were four research questions in this study. First of all, what rhetorical patters do learners adopt in their English writing? Secondly, what topical structures do learners use in their English writing? The third one is is there any difference in coherence between high- and low- English proficiency students? The last, what attitudes do participants hold toward using blogs as writing and interactional platform? The researcher adopted both of rhetorical structure analysis (RSA) and topical structure analysis (TSA) to examine coherence in learners’ writings. Rhetorical structure analysis puts emphasis on the coherence in organization of a text. It divides the basic elements of a paragraph into four parts- main idea sentence, main supporting sentences, supporting details, and concluding sentence. Topical structure analysis aimed at examining coherence in topics of sentences in a text. It focuses on analyzing the shifting of topics in sentences. Besides, in order to understand learners’ attitudes toward using blog as English writing platform, the researcher interviewed participants several times during the study. This study was a case study. There were three graduate students who majored in Department of English participated in this study, and they did the task-based writing activity once every two weeks. The total amount of task-based writing activity in this study was nine. This researcher found that learners composed the basic elements of English writing in their compositions such as main idea sentence, main supporting sentence, supporting details, and concluding sentence. However, because influenced by Chinese culture and rhetorical patterns, learners used to adopt Chinese qi-cheng-zhuan-he structure to organize their English writings. In topical structure, most of the writing samples included parallel progression, sequential progression, and extended parallel progression in the same writing. Learner with high English proficiency made more parallel progression and extended parallel progression but less sequential progression in writings. According to the results of this study, the researcher proposed two suggestions: first, both of rhetorical structure analysis and topical structure analysis can help teachers and students understand the use and changes of coherence in English writing. Hence, the researcher suggested that rhetorical structure analysis and topical structure analysis could be intergraded into English writing teaching curriculum. Students could improve coherence in English writing by use rhetorical structure analysis and topical structure analysis to do self-correction. Second, because participants in this study increased their usages of writing on blogs obviously, blogs as English writing platforms could rise learners’ writing motivations and interests. English instructors can take good advantage of using blog as writing medium to extend learners’ opportunities to practice writing performances and to trigger learners’ writing interests.
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Shen, Yu-Chang, and 沈昱璋. "Exploring EFL Elementary Students' Language Learning Experience on Livemocha." Thesis, 2015. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/a2s7tz.
Full textAbstract:
碩士國立雲林科技大學
應用外語系
103
The advent of social network sites which were designed for language learning launched a new trend of language learning－reciprocal learning between learners and native speakers of the target language. However, little is known about young learners’ experiences as well as their attitudes toward using social network sites for language learning. This study aims to explore EFL elementary students’ learning experiences and attitudes toward the largest social network site designed for language learning, Livemocha. Participants of this study were 40 EFL sixth-grade students recruited from an elementary school in central Taiwan. The data included the students’ action records, a questionnaire, and transcripts of the focus group interviews. Descriptive statistics and thematic analysis were used to analyze the data. The results indicated that the students had positive experiences and attitudes toward using Livemocha for language learning, while some designs in the system needed improving. The findings have implications for language instructors and learners.
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Lin, Wei-yu, and 林韋瑜. "Exploring EFL Graduate Students’ Perceptions of English Academic Writing." Thesis, 2013. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/54510535748802795784.
Full textAbstract:
碩士國立彰化師範大學
英語學系
101
Due to the trend of globalization, most universities in Taiwan have set the exit requirements of English proficiency for their students and the graduate students are required to get paper published in international journals to obtain the degrees. However, in Taiwan the English courses in the compulsory education and the freshman English courses in the tertiary education are, in general, oriented for general purposes (EGP); consequently, the English general skills students acquired appear to be insufficient when they need to use English for academic purposes (EAP), including writing theses and papers in English (Bitchener &; Basturkmen, 2006; Lin &; Hsu, 2005). Given that the English academic writing skills become increasingly important for the EFL students in Taiwan to obtain academic achievements and the previous studies mostly adopt the quantitative method of questionnaire (Dalsky &; Tajino, 2007; Elisha-Primo et. al., 2010; Fadda, 2012; Huang, 2010), the present study, thus, aims to investigate the EFL graduate students’ perceptions on needs and difficulties in English academic writing by means of interview. This study adopted purposive sampling; thirteen TESOL-majored graduate students who were taking the required EAP writing courses, the less-experienced EAP writers, and seven TESOL-majored graduate students who had taken the courses and had the experiences of writing research proposals, the more-experienced EAP writers, in the graduate program at a university in central Taiwan were recruited. The semi-structured interview was adopted to explore their perceptions of English academic writing and their needs and difficulties in performing EAP writing tasks. The results firstly revealed that limited writing experiences and knowledge of EAP writing were the mostly reported difficulties by the less-experienced writers. Most of the less-experienced writers laid the emphasis on the importance of self English proficiency, understanding of English academic writing structures, as well as searching and reading related literatures in English academic writing. On the other hand, writing chapters and sections and expressing ideas clearly and logically were the major difficulties encountered by the more-experienced writers, especially writing Introduction and Discussions. Moreover, lack of effective writing strategies also contributes to the EAP writers’ difficulties when performing EAP writing tasks. Last, based on the qualitative findings, the researcher discussed the less-experienced and the more-experienced student writers’ needs and expected to lend further insights to the EFL instructors’ understanding of their students’ needs in EAP writing and thus assist them design the EAP courses to better meet their students’ needs.
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Yeh, Chu-Hsiang, and 葉筑翔. "EFL Learning Strategy Use of Junior High School Students." Thesis, 2013. http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/86622520351743316423.
Full textAbstract:
碩士大葉大學
應用外語研究所
102
This study is aimed at investigating junior high school students’ English learning strategy use in an EFL learning environment and the relationship between students’ English learning strategy use and four factors – gender, year of study, fondness of English, previous ESL experience, and school location. Participants in this study were 240 first- year to third-year students from Shi Yuan Junior High School in Taichung City and Homei Junior High School in Changhua County. All the participants have once studied English curriculums at elementary school for at least two years before entering Junior High School. The instruments for this study included two sections. First section is personal background information with six items; second section is a Chinese questionnaire with fifty Likert-scale items mostly adapted from Oxford’s (1990) Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL) items. To collect data for the study, all the participants were asked to complete a copy of the junior high school students’ English Learning Strategy Use Questionnaire under the supervision of English teachers during class time. Before beginning to fill out the questionnaire, teachers briefly explained the purpose of the study to the participants by an oral approach and showed them how to respond to the items and mark their responses on the questionnaire. Every participant had approximately 3-5 minutes to complete the questionnaires In this study, 240 questionnaires in total were returned and identified as valid. The questionnaires were analyzed by using the Statistical Package for the Social Science (SPSS 12.0). Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the participants’ frequency and percentage on gender, year of study, fondness of English, previous ESL experience, and school location. The correlation between background variables and 50 items of SILL was analyzed by ANOVA and MANOVA. Significance at p< .05 is to be reported throughout this study. The major findings of the study are summarized as follows. First, junior high school students seldom use English learning strategies frequently. However, among the six categories of English learning strategies, compensation strategies are most-used, while affective strategies are least-used for participants in this study. Second, female students tend to have better language learning strategy use than male students. Third, second year students are likely to employ English learning strategies more frequently than third year students and first year students. Fourth, students who like English seem to employ learning strategies more frequently than those students who dislike English. Fifth, students who had previous ESL experience seem to use learning strategies more frequently than those students who had no previous ESL experience. Finally, students who study in Taichung City used learning strategies more frequently than those who study in Changhua County. The result found that four variables – year of study, fondness of English, previous ESL experience, and school location have significant differences on strategy use. In addition, the variable of gender has a significant interaction effect on the use of strategy categories as well.