Canadian Modern Language Review/ La Revue canadienne des langues vivantes
Volume 72, Number 1, February 2016
OBITUARY / NÉCROLOGIE
Laurens (Larry) Vandergrift
Tracey Derwing and Laura Collins
Nécrologie : Laurens (Larry) Vandergrift
Tracey Derwing and Laura Collins
ARTICLES
Project-Based Learning through the Eyes of Teachers and Students in Adult ESL Classrooms
Cristina Petersen and Hossein Nassaji
The use of projects and project-based learning has recently received much attention as a way of promoting meaning-focused communication and integrating different language skills into second and foreign language classrooms. However, perspectives on the effective implementation of projects have not been fully explored. This study examines and compares ESL teachers’ and learners’ beliefs and attitudes toward project-based learning, as well as the extent and manner of project implementation in L2 classrooms. Data were collected from 118 participants (88 students and 30 teachers) through parallel written questionnaires in closed and open-ended sections, and through individual interviews. In addition to expressing positive attitudes toward projects in language classrooms, both teachers and students highlighted several advantages this approach has over traditional approaches to language teaching. However, they also expressed differing opinions on how projects should be implemented and what aspects of project-based learning should be emphasized. The implications of the findings for the effective use of projects in L2 teaching are discussed.
How Does Studying Abroad Change Chinese Students’ Choices of Reading Strategies
Jie Liu
This study explores how a change of learning environment from China to the United Kingdom affects Chinese international master’s students’ use of strategies in academic reading. Think aloud was used at two time points in one academic year among 15 participants. To capture the complexity of the academic reading, reading strategies were categorized into textbase processing, situation-model construction, and comprehension monitoring. Quantitative analysis suggests that there were no significant changes in these students’ overall strategy use over time, nor in their deployment of individual strategies. Furthermore, analysis of their parsing strategies indicates a dominant combination of textbase and comprehension monitoring strategies, and this combination was mainly triggered by their decoding difficulties. The findings of the study suggest that the participants’ textbase-dominated processing largely contributed to the static development of their strategy use during their master’s study. http://bit.ly/cmlr721d
The Effectiveness of Study-Abroad on Second Language Learning: A Meta-Analysis
Jin-Suk Yang
This study synthesizes the methods and findings of published research investigating second language (L2) learners’ linguistic development in study-abroad (SA) contexts. Some studies have demonstrated that SA participation is beneficial to learners’ L2 development, whereas others have not supported such a relationship. The first phase of this meta-analysis analyzed the methodological features of 66 studies, while the second synthesized 11 quantitative studies comparing L2 linguistic gains between SA and at home (AH) learners. Results from the comparisons indicate that SA learners outperform AH learners and that short-term SA is more effective than long-term SA in terms of L2 linguistic development. Along with outlining potential concerns about conducting meta-analyses on SA research, I conclude this article with suggestions for future research directions. http://bit.ly/cmlr721e
L2 Academic Discourse Socialization through Oral Presentations: An Undergraduate Student’s Learning Trajectory in Study Abroad
Masaki Kobayashi
The present study provides an in-depth, longitudinal account of an undergraduate student’s L2 discourse socialization in an academic exchange program in Canada. By invoking Rogoff’s (1995) notion of participatory appropriation, this qualitative case study examined an L2 student’s task-related strategies and performance as they evolved over time in a study-abroad context. Thus, it revealed the cumulative effects of her participation in the development of knowledge and skills required to accomplish her academic presentation tasks at an appropriate level of sophistication. Data, collected over an entire academic year, included audio-recorded observations, in-depth interviews, and relevant written products. The findings indicate that the focal student’s academic discourse socialization was a dynamic, intertextual process of acting continuously on the challenges and opportunities that her previous experiences afforded her. Her participation was both guided by different co-participants and contingent upon the series of agentive choices that she made about her tasks. http://bit.ly/cmlr721f
Accent, Identity, and a Fear of Loss? ESL Students’ Perspectives
Shannon McCrocklin and Stephanie Link
Because many theorists propose a connection between accent and identity, some theorists have justifiably been concerned about the ethical ramifications of L2 pronunciation teaching. However, English-as-a-second-language (ESL) students often state a desire to sound like native speakers. With little research into ESL students’ perceptions of links between their accents and identities, including whether students fear loss of identity from L2-pronunciation learning, it is difficult to understand how these links affect language learning goals. In this mixed-methods study, ESL university students (N = 78) took a survey of 23 Likert-scale questions, with selected individuals participating in a semi-structured interview. Results show that participants desired a native accent, attributing benefits and positive emotions toward developing a native accent. Further, students did not recognize any fear of loss of identity due to their achieving a native accent. http://bit.ly/cmlr721g
BOOK AND SOFTWARE REVIEWS / CRITIQUES DE LIVRES ET DE LOGICIELS
Bilingual Being: My Life as a Hyphen by Kathleen Saint Onge
Julie S. Byrd Clark
Multimodal Teaching and Learning: The Rhetorics of the Science Classroom by G. Kress, C. Jewitt, J. Ogborn, & C. Tsatsarelis
Shawn Bullock
Musique en formation linguistique professionnelle : une approche innovante par Pascal Archiméde
Valerie Peters
Canadian Modern Language Review online at:
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Project MUSE - http://bit.ly/cmlr_pm
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