Learners' and teachers' evaluation of what constitutes useful, appropriate, and goal-relevant English may well shift in view of the globalization of English and its dominance in non-native contexts, business, and new media. Against this background, this study explores the extent to which a specific Business English university programme meets…

This study explores the way in which the European Language Portfolio (ELP) is used for teaching English as a foreign language to young learners with the aim of enhancing their involvement in the language learning process. The data for the study were collected through observations in a fourth-grade and a fifth-grade classroom (students' ages varied…

Educationalist Fred Korthagen elaborated a model in the 1980s for the relationship between the teacher educator and the teacher which embraces reflective practice as its guiding principle. In the present study, research was carried out into teacher development among a small group of language teachers working in continuing education in France.…

Motivation is a well-researched construct; however, few studies have investigated how teachers perceive and make sense of situations in which learners are not motivated to learn. Thirty-two EFL teachers working in Japanese universities were surveyed and interviews with three of these teachers were conducted to reveal their perceptions of student…

Research engagement is an important means for teachers to develop their professional competence. This paper reports on an enquiry into the research engagement of a group of primary school English language teachers in Guangdong province on the Chinese mainland. Drawing on questionnaire data and teachers' interview narratives, the paper examines how…

Peer observation of teaching often occurs at a local level or national level, seldom internationally. Victoria University, Australia, and Chinese institutions Henan University and Central University of Finance and Economics have a transnational partnership involving local students studying courses originating in Australia and Chinese students who…

This article begins with a brief overview of some of the salient issues that have impacted on teaching practice in recent years. In order to canvass teacher concerns regarding these issues, a questionnaire was given to a class of practising teachers studying for a Masters degree in ELT at a Turkish university asking them to rate a number of key…

Feedback in writing has in recent years attracted the attention of an increasing number of writing researchers. While much feedback research focuses on the act of feedback per se, little attention has been paid to the issue of teacher readiness to implement change in feedback. Using data gathered from Hong Kong secondary teachers attending a…

This article looks at issues surrounding learner self-assessment and studies into teacher beliefs. It then goes on to present the findings of a study designed to explore teacher attitudes, beliefs, and behaviour with regard to learner self-assessment during the implementation of a revision of assessment procedures for teens aged 14-16 years.…

Learner attributions, perceived causes of success and failure, have received little attention in EFL research. Attributions are categorized as either internal (for example effort) or external (for example luck) and may affect how students learn about and impose order on their world. We investigated the attributions of 505 university students in…

We conducted an action research study with a group of EFL teachers in our local area in order to establish the grounds for the use of the European Language Portfolio (ELP) and the Common European Framework of Reference in local state schools. This paper reports on the way we conducted this study and the cycles we went through, specifically…

While research on portfolio assessment (PA) has focused largely on the summative aspects of writing assessment, not much has been done to find out its formative potential. Drawing upon student questionnaires and student and teacher interview data, this paper aims to explore the formative functions of PA and, specifically, how the formative…

With an increasing emphasis on creativity in education and language teaching, it is important for teachers and students to examine their own views on and perceptions of creativity. What is regarded as creativity may vary from one context to another. This paper examines the perceptions of creativity reflected in the evaluation of creative poems by…

English language teachers' opinions on the pedagogic relevance of spoken grammar are beginning to be reported, yet the voices of teachers in East Asia are rarely heard. In this article, the views of teachers from China and Singapore expressed in an online discussion are compared. The discussion, which was part of a taught postgraduate course,…

"Process-oriented pedagogy: facilitation, empowerment, or control?" claims that process-oriented pedagogy (POP) represents the methodological perspective of most practising teachers and that outcomes-based education (OBE) poses a real and present danger to stakeholder autonomy. Whereas POP may characterize methodological practices in the inner…