New demands of the Common Core State Standards imply instructional transformations for all classrooms in the United States, but teachers of students designated as English language learners (ELLs) are among those most likely to feel the impact in their daily professional lives. Language is an integral part of classroom learning in all subject…

Teachers of English language learners (ELLs), expected to address grade-level standards and prepare ELLs for standardized assessments, have the difficult task of designing instruction that meets the range of needs in their classrooms. When these learners have experienced limited or interrupted education, the challenges intensify. Whereas…

From the perspective of World Englishes (i.e., varieties of English in different regions of the world), mutual intelligibility is a key issue for both listeners and speakers. Nevertheless, learners often have an idealized notion of native-speaker spoken norms and may be in favor of more prestigious inner circle models than others. This study…

This study investigates vocabulary learning strategy (VLS) preferences of lower and higher proficiency Japanese university science students studying English as a foreign language. The study was conducted over a 9-week period as the participants received supplemental explicit VLS instruction on six strategies. The 38 participants (14 males and 24…

In both second language (L2) research and pedagogy, individual words have been considered the basic lexical unit; this is not surprising, because individual words are convenient to identify, teach, and work with (Schmitt, 2010). However, there is a growing awareness that language users do not always process language word by word, but also make use…

This article outlines findings from a study of student perceptions of team teaching. The researcher surveyed students at different times during their first term of study at a private college in Japan where team teaching is applied across the curriculum. Responses were content-analysed and six major categories emerged. Team teaching was seen to…

In this self-study, the author reflects on her implementation of empathetic, critical integrations of multiple perspectives (ECI), which she designed to afford preservice teachers the opportunity to discuss and collectively reflect upon the oft-diverging multiple perspectives, values, and practices they experience during their practicum (Daniel,…

Calls to integrate media literacy into K-12 language classrooms appear to have gone largely unheeded. However, media literacy skills are seen as crucial for 21st-century learners. This article answers the calls for a focus on media literacy in the language classroom by addressing both why and how systematic attention might be brought to this issue…

The purposes of this study were to investigate the overall effectiveness of extensive reading, whether learners' age impacts learning, and whether the length of time second language learners engage in extensive reading influences test scores. The author conducted a meta-analysis to answer research questions and to identify future research…

The effect of planning on second language (L2) learners' oral performance is a hotly debated topic in the field of second language acquisition. However, studies on the effect of different amounts of planning time have been quite limited, especially in a testing context. The present study investigated the effects of different lengths of…

Critical thinking is believed to be an essential skill for 21st century survival and therefore has been widely promoted in education. In Hong Kong, critical thinking is one of nine generic skills to be developed across all subjects, including English. How students do critical thinking in ESL, which is seldom used outside school and yet holds high…

With a substantial increase in the numbers of English language learners in schools, particularly in countries where English is the primary use first language, it is vital that educators are able to meet the needs of ethnically and linguistically changing and challenging classrooms. However, despite the recognition of the importance of effective…

Incidental grammar acquisition involves learners "picking up" a grammatical feature while their primary focus is on some other aspect of language--either message content or another language feature that is taught directly. This article reports a study of children's incidental grammar acquisition of two grammatical features--plural…

This study investigated the relationship between second language (L2) listening and a range of task and listener characteristics. More specifically, for a group of 93 nonnative English speakers, the researchers examined the extent to which linguistic complexity of the listening task input and response, and speed and explicitness of the input, were…

The Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP) is increasingly used as an instructional framework to help elementary and secondary teachers support English language learners (ELLs). This useful tool has helped teachers gain the knowledge, skills, and dispositions they need to support ELLs learn subject-area content and skills while learning…