The purpose of this study is to explore the nature of attitudes held by parents of Jewish Hebrew students at a Boston area Sunday school. Five parents of diverse backgrounds were interviewed in-depth to discuss the nature of their attitudes. Three common themes emerged related to the reasons for their high levels of involvement with the Sunday…

This paper argues for the expansion of the knowledge base of TESOL teacher education to integrate greater awareness of the sociocultural and political context of teaching English to speakers of other languages. It is argued that the changing roles of teachers, insights gained from classroom research and recent developments in critical applied…

This paper discusses Cantonese ESL learners' pronunciation of English final singleton consonants. Twelve learners at the intermediate and advanced levels participated in a recent research study, which included four different tasks: the reading of a word list of about 150 words, the description of about 100 pictures, the reading of three passages…

This paper argues that the manner in which culture is taught to English learners needs to be rethought in light of the globalisation of the English language. It is maintained that change is needed in at least three areas. First, English teaching professionals should discard the notion that the US and Great Britain represent the sole "target…

Although Scots is listed by the European Bureau for Lesser Used Languages as one of the UK's minority languages, its historical development and its contemporary standing have been significantly affected by a perception that it is a non-standard dialect of English, to which it is closely related, rather than a language in its own right. By…

This paper reports on the implementation of an ambitious bilingual instructional programme in the P'urhepecha-speaking region of Michoacan state in Mexico, the Meseta Tarasca. A curriculum of indigenous language preservation and cultural affirmation, overturning the previous Spanish-only programme, has been developed by a group of indigenous…

This paper explores issues of teaching and learning Chinese as a heritage language in a Chinese heritage language school, the Zhonguo Saturday School, in Montreal, Quebec. With a student population of more than 1000, this school is the largest of the eight Chinese Heritage Language schools in Montreal. Students participating in this study were…

Communicative techniques in English Language Teaching (ELT) have their origins in Western English-speaking contexts and have been transplanted into EFL environments. This has occurred without a great deal of research about how they work in these new situations. Group work is one well known technique of communicative language teaching now commonly…

Indigenous-language education is critical in the rural and small-town communities with mixed native and non-native populations that constitute the headwaters of many dying tongues. Emerging from interviews conducted in 2002 and 2003 on the Flathead Indian Reservation with 89 study participants holding diverse perspectives is the need for a…

In this study, the author examines the results of questionnaire given to 92 teachers in community-based Chinese schools (CCSs) in Southern California. Information was sought from the teachers on their academic background and aspirations, the reasons for them to choose to teach in the CCSs, and their views on the quality of the education provided…

This paper reports an empirical study of the psychological and sociocultural adjustments of two cohorts of Chinese students taking a foundation course in English language at a British university. Using Zung's (1965) Self-Rating Depression Scale and a modification of Ward and Kennedy's (1999) Sociocultural Adaptation Scale, quantitative data were…

Characterisations of "the Chinese learner" in education and applied linguistics have frequently taken a "large culture" approach, which involves describing the values, attitudes and learning practices of individuals in terms of fixed, homogeneous, reified national cultures. A shared Confucian cultural heritage is offered by way of explanation for…

From a comparative perspective, this paper analyses Chinese learners' intercultural experiences in Chinese and British educational contexts. In the Chinese context, interview and questionnaire research was carried out in 24 universities that hosted the British Council's English teaching development programmes. The research uncovered perspectives…

This paper examines the widespread practice of Chinese learners choosing (and sometimes refusing) to adopt English and Anglicised names. Data collected from questionnaires and interviews with both students and teachers are analysed in order to arrive at an understanding of why such a practice has arisen and continues to be perpetuated throughout…

Research conducted in the context of the IELTS Research Program indicates that there are recurrent features in the writing under test conditions of candidates from Chinese language backgrounds, particularly in terms of interpersonal tenor. These include a high level of interpersonal reference, combined with a heavily dialogic and hortatory style.…