The Journal of Language Teaching and Learning

1-23

Authors: Parviz Alavinia, Sahar Zarza

Once regarded as the author’s passive message produced to be decoded by the readers, the written text is now viewed as a dynamic entity through which the notion of interactivity between the writer and the readers is thought to be made feasible. Based on the argument that metadiscourse markers help transform a dry and tortuous piece of text into coherent and reader-friendly prose, the researchers in the current study attempted to investigate the effect different metadiscourse markers might have on Iranian EFL learners’ perception of written texts. To this end, 120 undergraduate English students were given three different texts chosen from the most common textbooks in BA (in TEFL), along with their doctored versions (all MD-removed, interactive-removed, and interactional-removed). Each text duo was then accompanied by an 8-item questionnaire adopted from Ifantido (2005). The statistical analysis of the data pointed toward the positive role of metadiscourse markers in bringing about ameliorated text perception on the part of EFL learners. Furthermore, the comparison of the results gained in each separate phase of the study, processed through the application of ANOVA and LSD tests, revealed that texts with both interactive and interactional resources had more effect on learners’ perception of written texts. Moreover, it was found that interactive and interactional resources had more or less the same effect on learners’ reactions to texts. To summarize, in line with the findings of the present study further evidence is gathered in favor of the argument holding that metadiscourse markers bring about an increased amount of coherence and reader-friendliness in texts. Keywords: Interactional markers, interactive markers, MD markers, perception

38-50

Authors: Kenan Dikilitaş, Savaş Geylanioğlu

Pronunciation of certain English words by Turkish English learners is a challenging task. The difficulty posed by pronunciation is closely related to little exposure to interaction with native speakers, distinctive phonological system of L1 as in Turkish, a shallow orthographic language. In the literature, it is claimed that most of the pronunciation problems stem not from physical articulatory but from cognitive causes. In other words, the problem is not that the person cannot physically make the individual sounds, but that they do not conceptualize the sounds appropriately or discriminate them, organize them in their minds and manipulate them as required for the sound system of English (Fraser, 2001). This study attempts to examine oft-cited sounds such as Schwa (Ə), Voiced and voiceless Th (/ð/-/θ/) and ng (/ŋ/) sound. The data were collected from 24 adult EFL students. Each student was given 10 words from schwa, th and ng sounds respectively. Their pronunciations were recorded and transcribed through IPA alphabet and compared with the phonetic transcription in Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary 3rd Edition. It was found that Turkish foreign language learners of English have serious difficulties in pronouncing schwa, th and ng sounds. The study suggests that, in order to facilitate the pronunciation of these sounds, the students could be trained through conceptualization methodology, which helps learners to form an idea or principle about what is to be learnt. Keywords: Conceptualization, phonetic awareness, EFL pronunciation problems

75-88

Authors: Uğur Recep Çetinavcı, Birsen Tütüniş

This study was motivated by the fact that there is a tendency to see poetry as being remote from language teaching contexts. Thinking that this is partly because of the lack of training in teaching literature given to English language teacher trainees, an experimental group of 3rd year Uludag University English Language Teaching (ELT) Department students taking the “Poetry Analysis and Teaching” course were taught about new poetry-centered techniques and activities compiled from the related literature and they were asked to design a lesson using them. The control group continued to take the course without any changes. At the end of the term, both groups were given a questionnaire on their attitudes towards the use of poetry in EFL and statistically significant differences were found between the groups showing that the experimental group favored poetry more trongly as a multi-purpose and multi-functional tool to teach a foreign language. Key Words: poetry, language teaching, EFL, poetry analysis, teacher training, poems