l2 research has shown that instruction in l2 pragmatics is necessary. the current study evaluated the impact of explicit instruction on efl learner's awareness and production of three speech acts of request, apology, and complaint. it also probed whether learners’ language proficiency plays any role in incorporating pragmatic instruction into the l2 classroom. iranian undergraduate students maj...

This study investigates L1-L2 interactions in relatively young Mandarin (L1)-English (L2) bilingual children through comparing their static and dynamic vowel acoustic features with those of age-matched corresponding monolingual children. Two groups of sequential bilingual children aged 5-6 years (one with low proficiency in English and the other with high proficiency in English) were recorded p...

The current pretest-posttest quasi-experimental study sought, firstly, to examine the effect of employing flipped language teaching techniques on EFL learners' text comprehension and, secondly, to explore whether there was any significant interaction between the flipped classroom approach and EFL learners’ proficiency level. To this end, 65 male and female EFL learners were conveniently selecte...

OBJECTIVE To examine differences in the characteristics of adverse events between English speaking patients and patients with limited English proficiency in US hospitals. SETTING Six Joint Commission accredited hospitals in the USA. METHOD Adverse event data on English speaking patients and patients with limited English proficiency were collected from six hospitals over 7 months in 2005 and...

The aim of the present study is threefold. The first is that whether there is any difference betweendifferent proficiency level language learners 'use of spatial prepositions. The Second aim is toreveal that if the native language of the participants has any effect on applying the appropriateprepositions and also to find which spatial preposition is difficult to acquire. The present paperexamin...

Backgound: Having been influenced by the trend of internationalization of higher education, most universities in Taiwan have implemented an English benchmark requirement for graduation, which requires students to demonstrate their English ability at a specified Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) level through taking a standardized English language test (e.g., GEPT, IELT...

This study examined the interrelationships of first language (L1) literacy, second language (L2) proficiency, and L2 reading comprehension with 246 Chinese college students learning English. L1 literacy and L2 proficiency were measured with college admission exams in Chinese and English. L2 reading comprehension was measured with the reading comprehension section of a TOEFL and a researcher-dev...

Previous studies have found quantity of exposure, i.e., frequency of exposure (Horst et al., 1998; Webb, 2008; Pellicer-Sánchez and Schmitt, 2010), is important for second language (L2) contextual word learning. Besides this factor, context constraint and L2 proficiency level have also been found to affect contextual word learning (Pulido, 2003; Tekmen and Daloglu, 2006; Elgort et al., 2015; Ma...

In recent years a great number of books have appeared in various fields of ESP, and the number is increasing every year. These books are specially prepared and adapted for foreign students possessing varying degrees of language skills. Experts believe that the production of ESP books is a vital task that requires several stages and procedures. To produce these materials, special attention shou...