Virtual exchanges provide language learners with a unique opportunity to develop their target language skills, support inter-cultural exchange, and afford teacher candidates space to hone their teaching craft. The research presented in this volume investigates the role of virtual exchanges as both a teaching tool to support second language acquisition and a space for second language development. Practitioners obtain guidance on the different types of exchanges that currently exist and on the outcome of those exchanges so that they can make informed decisions on whether to include this type of program in their language teaching and learning classrooms. To this end, this edited volume contains chapters that describe individual virtual exchanges along with results of research done on each exchange to show how the exchange supported specific second language teaching and learning goals.

"Tasks in Second Language Learning" aims to bring more fully into debate the holistic nature of language learning, which tasks are one way of achieving, and to outline the research implications of this perspective. It sets language learning tasks within a broad educational and social science perspective, with a consistent focus on the principles and practices of their use in the language classroom.

Using case study data, illustrative materials, transcript data, and close analyses of published research studies, it provides ample and lively illustration of the contributions of a range of specialists in research, teaching methodology and materials development, and of the authors' own argument.

The last two decades have alerted applied linguists and their bureaucratic counterparts--those who make or advise government on language policy--to the issue of dealing with language problems in an accountable fashion. Why do these problems seem so intractable? How is it that these problems have not yet satisfactorily been solved? What is it that continues to drive the interest in this? To the scholars from many parts of the world who have been invited to discuss this anew in the proposed volume, it was evident that language planners, policy makers and language managers do not know just how much work there is for language teachers to do if all of the academically desirable arrangements or policies proposed are to be implemented successfully. Indeed, the challenge to implement these at times ambitious plans of language policy makers is normally much bigger than the policy makers estimate.

This collection of original essays brings together contributors from both sides of the Atlantic to discuss the implications of the new media for the creation, delivery and assessment of English studies. Strategies by which digital technologies can serve professional, scholarly and pedagogical needs in a completely new way are explored in the context of the role and mission of humanities in the electronic age, student learning from a distance, teaching e-lit, electronic tutorials and interdisciplinarity and collaboration in a virtual environment. Including a useful Glossary of Terms and lists of Further Reading and Key Individuals in the field, this will be an essential volume for all teachers of English Studies.

Few matters induce more dialogue among foreign language educators than the problem of students' transition between levels of language study. Secondary school teachers worry about how best to prepare their students for the demands of postsecondary language study. College instructors struggle with how to integrate a diversely prepared freshman population into their curriculum.

The mission of this volume has been to assemble the theory, research, and vision of leaders in the field of foreign language articulation into a single volume which will benefit foreign language educators, students, program administrators, and researchers by presenting models of the most recent articulation efforts in the United States. Readers are provided with practical suggestions for facilitating placement at the local level, and offered theoretical direction for the future. The scope of this work is broad enough to reflect the experience and observations of most educators grappling with placement issues, while chapter themes offer concrete and theoretical insight into many individual facets of articulation.

This bibliography is a compilation of 15 short bibliographies published in an issue of the Journal of Second Language Writing from January 1993 to September 1997. The work focuses on theoretically grounded research reports and essays addressing issues in second and foreign language writing and writing instruction, containing 676 entries, each including a 50] word summary intended to be non-evaluative in nature. The editors hope that this work will be a useful tool for developing theory, research, and instruction in second language writing.

One of the most civilized nations in history, China has a long-standing writing tradition and many Chinese texts have become world treasures. However, the way the Chinese teach writing in various countries in contemporary times is little known to the outside world, especially in Western countries. Undoubtedly, the Chinese have had an established traditional method of writing instruction. However, recent social and political developments have created the perception amongst both practitioners and researchers of a need for change. Whilst certain socio-political changes, both in Mainland China and in the territories, acted as agents for reform of the teaching of composition, the shape these reforms are taking has been due to many different influences, coming both from inside the countries themselves and from foreign sources. Mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore have each developed their own approach to the teaching of composition.

This is the first volume to focus on the assessment of second language writing. The collection as a whole provides coverage of all issues in second language writing assessment, starting from the context in which and for which assessment must occur, moving through the aspects of decision-making and design in a writing assessment program, and then considering how the need to evaluate any program on assessment can be carried out. After a discussion of issues of public reporting, an area which will receive increasing attention in the next few years, the volume closes with a discussion of what new issues and answers the future may bring. The book reflects the current belief in direct writing assessment in second language writing assessment. While it is often expected that those working with ESL students will focus on language error, throughout the book themes of needs, attitudes, ideas and content dominate. For second language writers the use of written language to learn, to create knowledge and to share ideas and beliefs are vitally important. Additionally, issues of cross-cultural academic literacy, practical information on criteria and scoring models for use with ESL writers, and research on the efficacy and effects of various assessment models are provided. The book blends theory and practice in a way which offers all those who are concerned with the writing skills of nonnative users of English an invaluable resource.

The book addresses the issue of native-speakerism, an ideology based on the assumption that 'native speakers' of English have a special claim to the language itself, through critical qualitative studies of the lived experiences of practising teachers and students in a range of scenarios.

This book seeks to help teachers teach listening in a more principled way by presenting what is known from research, exploring teachers' beliefs and practices, examining textbook materials, and offering practical activities for improving second language listening.

A book that develops an understanding of practices at the very centre of language education - the classroom. It is written for postgraduate students in Applied Linguistics and Education, and practitioners, whether in TESOL or other language teaching, In Part 1 the author explores key concepts in unpacking the complexity of classroom life. In Part 2 existing research and practice are examined through a series of research case studies. Part 3 provides a template for research activity and suggestions for projects and methodologies, and Part 4 collects resources for readers keen to follow up the themes developed in the book .

The papers published in this volume were originally presented at the Sixth International Conference on Teaching and Language Corpora (4-7 July 2004 Granada, Spain) and reflect the latest developments that have taken place in the field of the teaching applications of text corpora, with a special emphasis on their use in the foreign language classroom. The book is divided into three main sections. The first section sets the scene for what this collection of essays aims to be. It deals with the issue of what corpus linguistics can do not only for the understanding of the nature of language itself but also for so fundamental and miraculous a matter such as language learning and language acquisition. The second section tackles the issues of corpus design and corpus exploitation and provides the reader with a great variety of evidence in favour of corpora exploitation for the building of a successful teaching environment. The final section deals with practical applications of corpora in the foreign language classroom. Although each of the papers here reports particular experiences in very different teaching and learning contexts, as a whole they show that corpora can be used on the spot in a language teaching context by teachers and learners without extensive training in computational tools, and studies of linguistics features can be tailored to specific pedagogic context and learning requirements. The book represents a solid contribution to linguistic studies and language teaching and it is a good example of the diversity of the scientific lines in which corpus linguistics is involved at the present moment.

Realizing Autonomy: Practice and Reflection in Language Education Contexts presents critical practitioner research into innovative approaches to language learner autonomy. Writing about experiences in a range of widely differing contexts, the authors offer fresh insights and perspectives on the challenges and contradictions of learner autonomy.

This book presents theoretical considerations and the results of empirical research on pronunciation learning strategies (PLS) deployed by pre-service trainee teachers majoring in English as a foreign language who experienced different levels of language anxiety (LA). The theoretical part focuses on the concepts of pronunciation learning, pronunciation-learning strategies and language anxiety and includes an overview of recent empirical research dealing with various related issues. The empirical section of the book presents the findings of a research project that investigated the interplay between PLS and LA, in which both quantitative and qualitative data were collected. Based on the findings, the author proposes two profiles of anxious and non-anxious EFL trainee teachers who support their pronunciation learning with an array of pronunciation learning strategies and tactics.

The challenge to improve second language acquisition efficiency has always been at the heart of education because a good command of a language provides new opportunities to manipulate information and apply acquired knowledge and skills to novel problems in new situations. Thus, there is a necessity for creating an alternative to either task-based or form-focused methods commonly employed in today's instruction. An Invariant-Based Approach to Second Language Acquisition: Emerging Research and Opportunities is an essential reference source that elaborates on traditional 2L concepts and terms and provides new practical tools and mechanisms for developing student communicative competencies. Featuring research on topics such as syllabus design, language interpretation, and speech types, this book is ideally designed for educators, administrators, researchers, and academicians.

Beginning with a thorough survey of approaches to communicative syllabus design, Melrose deals with the early 1970s functional approach and subsequent criticism of it as well as the contemporary search for a process approach to language learning. It proposes a meaning negation model, which draws upon the seminal work of Halliday, Martin, Fawcett and Lemke, and is illustrated through their analysis of a unit from a communicative course book. Its topical-interactional approach is placed within the context of the current debate on language teaching and learning.

Understanding metaphor raises key questions about the relationship between language and meaning, and between language and mind. This book explores how this understanding can impact upon the theory and practice of language teaching. After summarising the cognitive basis of metaphor and other figures of speech, it looks at how this knowledge can inform classroom practice. Finally, it sets out how we can use these insights to re appraise language learning theory in a way that treats it as consonant with the cognitive nature of language. MARKET 1: Academic libraries and departments of English as a Second Language, Modern Languages, Linguistics, especially Applied Linguistics and Language Learning Theory, and Cognitive Linguistics MARKET 2: English language teachers

Bringing together multiple sources of data and combining existing theories across language teacher cognition, teacher education, second language motivation and psychology, this empirically-grounded analysis of teacher development in action offers new insights into the complex and dynamic nature of language teachers' conceptual change.

Reading ability and vocabulary knowledge are two of the most important components of performance in a second language, especially in academic settings. Each depend on the other, as vocabulary knowledge is the single most important factor in reading comprehension, while reading is the single most important means by which intermediate and advanced learners acquire new words. This symbiotic relationship is the subject of this volume. The authors argue that building vocabulary through reading is a fruitful but complex activity that needs better understanding and more careful guidance. This book is unique in its emphases on original research. Eight of the 14 chapters are empirical studies published for the first time, including classroom-based case studies, experimental research, and think-aloud protocol analysis. In every chapter, consideration is given to the pedagogical implications and possible applications of the research findings. Lengthy editorial comments at the end of each chapter reinforce this practical concern.

This book updates the latest research in the field of 'English pronunciation', providing readers with a number of original contributions that represent trends in the field. Topics include sociophonetic or sound-symbolic aspects of pronunciation English pronunciation teaching and learning.

"Managing Evaluation and Innovation in Language Teaching" focuses on the connections to be made between evaluation and change in language education with a specific focus on English Language Teaching. The book demonstrates the central importance of evaluation in relation to language projects and programmes, the management of change and innovation, and in improving language teacher development.
The introductory chapter provides an overview of the present trends in evaluation as well as offering examples of recent evaluation projects. Subsequent chapters identify contemporary issues in evaluation and their relevance to language teaching, covering a number of cultural and ethnographic studies in evaluation management in different world-wide contexts, as well as drawing insights from other related disciplines. The editors seek to draw attention to the possibilities of inter-disciplinary exchange to inform the reader of current practice, and highlight emerging issues in the expanding field of evaluation in language teaching, especially in ELT.
The contemporary nature of the studies presented here will be relevant to both post graduate students following language education programmes as well as to professionals involved in language teaching. It will be of particular interest to those involved in the management of innovation and the evaluation of projects and programmes, such as curriculum developers, Director of Studies, and professionals with a special responsibility for bringing about change in language teaching contexts.

Addressed to researchers in Applied Linguistics, and to professional teachers working in, or studying teaching and learning processes in, multilingual classrooms, "Critical Reading in Language Education" offers a distinctive contribution to the question of how foreign language learners can be helped to acquire effective literacy in English. At the heart of the book is first-hand classroom research by the author as both teacher and researcher, demonstrating an innovative research methodology and empirical evidence to support a critical reading pedagogy.

It is commonly believed that foreign language skills improve through social interaction with speakers of the language. However, there is little research addressing the issue of access to such interaction. This book explores this issue, examining longitudinal case studies of interaction between language learners and speakers of the target language within their informal social networks. It looks at the complex social and personal factors that influence language choice. Kurata reveals that even for motivated learners opportunities to use the target language are limited, and suggests factors that promote language use and opportunities for learning.She proposes ways around obstacles to opportunities for second language use and second language learning and sets out important implications for language learning in and outside classrooms.