Том 9, № 2 (2023)

Introduction: The JLE editors explore multilingual perspectives in language learning, education, and society, as compared with mono- and bilingual perspectives. The notion of a separate language system turned out to be far from today’s multilingual communications. The approaches to multiple language learning have dramatically changed towards multilingualism. The editorial review aims to consider the potential of the field for the JLE.

Basic Terminology and Definitions: the JLE editors dwell upon the key terms applicable to the field of multilingualism, including multilingualism on its own, plurilingualism, bilingualism, multilinguality, polylingualism, metrolingualism, heteroglossia, and linguistic repertoire.

Research on Multilingualism and beyond: in this section, the JLE readers can find a short review of the research publications on multilingualism, bilingualism, plurilingualism, and linguistic repertoire indexed in the Scopus database.

Conclusion: multilingualism as a research field has a perspective for the Journal of Language and Education. Multilingualism is a many-faceted field, developing rather fast. Research on multilingualism may enrich the scope of the JLE and attract new readers.

Introduction: Although extensive studies have been carried out on the rhetorical structure of research article introduction (RAI), centrality as a promotional strategy has received very little attention.

Purpose: To address this lacuna in research literature, this study investigates centrality claims and how the appeals are realized strategically and linguistically.

Materials and Methods: 60 RAIs from three-corpora, i.e., 20 English L1 corpus (written by native authors in English), 20 English FL Corpus (written by Indonesian authors in English), and 20 Indonesian L1 corpus (written by Indonesian authors in Indonesian Language), in the field of applied linguistics (AL) were analyzed. The analysis started from the step of claiming centrality found in the authors’ RAIs using the Swales’ (1990) framework. Wang and Yang’s (2015) framework was used to identify the types of appeals in the claiming centrality.

Results: This study indicates that the three groups of authors use four types of appeals, namely the appeal to salience, magnitude, topicality, and problematicity. The appeals appear in varied ways, i.e., referring to the research world and the real world. Although application of each appeal in the step of claiming centrality is relatively different in the three groups, some share similarities in using the appeals in terms of referring to the research world and the real world.

Conclusion: This study provides pedagogical implications for teaching academic writing, particularly in writing research articles for publication.   

Introduction. The education sector has been severely affected by the pandemic caused by the sudden outbreak of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), despite the preventive measures taken and innovations brought to mitigate its effects.

Purpose. This study investigated the impact of alienation experienced by EFL teachers as a result of obligatory social distancing that has become the new normal because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Further, it was determined whether gender, educational level, institution type, and years of experience in the profession were among the active determinants of work alienation.

Methods. A mixed-method approach was adopted for this study. Quantitative data were collected using the Work Alienation scale, completed by 160 EFL teachers working at public and private schools in Mersin, Turkey. Qualitative data were gathered from the responses of 18 teachers within the survey group. The data collected from the scale were analysed, and the data from the open-ended survey were coded and classified into three themes.

Results. The findings indicated that EFL teachers experienced low levels of work alienation during the pandemic, and the survey data provided thought-provoking examples of the damage caused by the pandemic. Although no significant differences were identified in alienation based on gender, institution type, and educational level, significant differences based on the years of experience were found in the powerlessness, meaninglessness, and isolation subscales, whereby teachers with 1–5 years of experience endured a higher level of work alienation than those with more experience.

Conclusion. The findings of the study not only raise awareness regarding the importance of providing guidance to EFL teachers during the pandemic but also raise concerns about their wellbeing and digital literacy.

Background. Language learning is a long and tedious process and some students may lose their initial interest, so their learning achievement might in turn decrease. Student engagement and self-regulation can be seen as influential in helping them to restore their enthusiasm and motivation. Engagement can assist students to be actively involved in their school work in order to become more motivated and interested in language learning. Further, self-regulation also seems to contribute to have students regulate their learning behavior and engagement, which could possibly play a role in their learning outcomes.

Purpose. The purpose of this study was thus to investigate the relationships of self-regulation and student engagement with learning outcomes.

Method. The participants, selected through convenience sampling, included 146 language learners learning English at the Iran Language Institute (ILI) Gorgan, Iran. They were given two questionnaires and a language proficiency test.

Results. The obtained data were analyzed by using SPSS, version 26. The results of Spearman’s rho correlation tests indicated that there were statistically significant relationships of self-regulation and student engagement with learning outcomes, with student engagement having a stronger association with learning outcomes. Moreover, student engagement as a global construct was a better predictor of learning outcomes.

Conclusion. Since student engagement is comparatively new in the realm of language education, the findings can contribute to our understanding of its role in learning outcomes. Besides, the results have pedagogical implications for language learners and language teachers alike.

Research Background: In addition to mastering writing skills, students must also be able to develop critical and creative thinking skills. These two skills play an important role so that students can survive and compete in the world of work in the era of the industrial revolution 4.0.

The gap in Knowledge and Purpose of the Study: Although there have been many experimental studies using problem-based learning in learning to write, the existing research is still inadequate in exploring the impact of this model on writing performance and critical and creative thinking skills.

Method: This study uses a sequential mix-method design that combines quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis techniques. The participants of this study were students from the Islamic Banking Study Program at UIN Sultan Maulana Hasanuddin Banten, as many as 61 people. Data were collected using questionnaires, essay writing tests, assessment rubrics, and interviews. Quantitative data were analyzed using SPSS 25.00 by running paired sample t-tests and one-way ANCOVA. In addition, data from semi-structured interviews were analyzed qualitatively using thematic analysis techniques.

Findings and Value Added: research findings state that PBL positively influences writing performance and critical and creative thinking skills. The interviews showed that the students had positive attitudes and perceptions towards using the PBL method in learning to write to improve these three skills. The findings of this study are expected to increase knowledge about how students can improve writing performance, critical thinking, and creative thinking. In addition, it is also hoped that these findings can be an alternative in choosing writing learning methods.

Background. Academic vocabulary is considered an essential component in the English language courses in higher education establishments. A number of studies have illustrated that the use of academic words in students’ work alone cannot always promise high grades, since students’ opinion about the importance of academic words can also have an influence on their knowledge and use.

Purpose. The research aims to determine the relationship between the vocabulary level of learners and their beliefs about the importance of academic words at the tertiary level.

Methods. For this study, the first and third-year students (N=440) in two Uzbek universities completed a beliefs questionnaire to rate their perceptions of the significance of academic words in improving reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills in academia. The participants were also administered a vocabulary knowledge test to estimate their receptive dimension.

Results. The findings demonstrate that EMI students scored higher on the vocabulary test than EFL students and show that students’ perceptions of the significance of academic words changed in all four skills from the first to third year of study.

Conclusion. The article explores trends that emerged in the data and raises awareness for EAP teachers concerning the assumptions about students’ needs for vocabulary development based on learners’ perceptions and knowledge.

Background: Positive psychology in the field of applied linguistics has recently shifted its focus from L2 learners to L2 teachers as teachers have been revealed to be a pivotal external affordance for the emergence of learners’ positive emotions such as enjoyment. Exploring the link between teacher-related constructs can provide deep insights into L2 teachers’ emotional agency within L2 classroom context.

Purpose: The current study seeks to examine the association between English as a foreign language (EFL) instructors’ enjoyment of foreign language teaching (i.e., personal enjoyment, student appreciation, and social enjoyment) and humor styles (i.e., self-enhancing, affiliative, aggressive, and self-defeating humor styles).

Materials and Methods: In order to examine this association, 244 (151 males and 93 females) Turkish EFL instructors voluntarily completed self-report scales measuring their foreign language teaching enjoyment and humor styles.

Results: Results of the structural equation modeling (SEM) indicated that higher levels of student appreciation and social enjoyment are correlated with higher levels of affiliative and self-enhancing humor. In addition, greater degrees of personal enjoyment, student appreciation, and social enjoyment are correlated with lower levels of aggressive humor, while self-defeating humor was unrelated to any of the enjoyment indices. There was also no significant gender difference for any humor styles.

Conclusion: The findings are discussed in view of implications for teacher well-being.