Browsing by Subject "EFL"
Results Per Page
Sort Options
-
ItemApplying Active Listening Strategies in EFL: An Integrated Skill Approach( 2016) Sureepong PhothongsunanThis paper addresses some active listening strategies which EFL learners can employ to facilitate, monitor and evaluate their own English listening skills. Listening today is classified as an interpretive process. The role of the listener as an active partaker in the listening process is thus emphasized. The paper sheds light on the impact that active listening may have on students’ overall language output, academic success, and enhanced performance on listening assessments with relevant, practical examples.
-
Item
-
Item
-
Item
-
Item
-
ItemFactors that motivate Chinese tour guides and Thai tour guides when learning the english languageMotivation has long been recognized as one of the determinant and exuberant factors in FL (foreign language) learning process and achievement. English, for its wide use across various walks, has long been inexorably viewed as the global language and becomes a basic educational skill required alongside “literacy and numeracy” all over the world. As a result, the major line of research in the field of FL learning and teaching has been prominently focusing on English. To keep in line with the trend that EFL (English as a foreign language) learner is often the focus of FL motivation research, this study aims to provide insights to FL motivation research by offering both quantitative and qualitative observation of a specific occupational group in a cross-cultural context. A mixed-method approach was employed, administering and collecting 68 self-report questionnaires and conducting 10 semi-structured interviews. The findings showed that all the four motivational factors’ levels studied were rated by “high” both groups, ranking from the highest “instrumental”, to “the need for achievement”, “self-confidence” and “integrative” respectively. Despite that the instrumentality of both groups’ motivation at the beginning is approximately the same, the component “self-efficacy” - such as persistence and the confidence in self to master a foreign language - plays a bigger role in Thai tour guides’ learning outcomes while Chinese tour guides is more driven and sustained by their enjoyment and the sense of achievement in their enjoyment. Pedagogical recommendations for motivational teaching of the English language can also be drawn from the findings, in relation to EFL learning environment with reflective learning experiences guided by corresponding monitoring and instruction along the process.
-
Item
-
ItemPerceiving native English speaking teachers: EFL university students’ perspectives( 2017) Sureepong PhothongsunanTo allude to the ‘native speaker’ concept and investigate the native speaker effects, this research looks into the perceptions of 25 Thai EFL university students towards native English speaking teachers. How native English speaking teachers influence the participants’ learning behaviours and motivation to learn English are also perceptually reported. Two research instruments, the survey questionnaire and the semi-structured interview, are employed for this study. The findings indicate overall positive perceptions towards native English speaking teachers, pointing that their classes are mostly fun, interactive and motivating. The flexible and interactive teaching methods and styles used by native English speaking teachers are found to be most favoured, followed by their approachable personality traits and the students’ vast opportunity to practice oral and written English. Most participants, if given an option to choose a teacher, have a salient preference to study with native English speaking teachers in which case neither teachers’ age nor gender matters. There seems to be a strong relationship between studying with native English speaking teachers and the participants’ learning behaviours and motivation to learn English.
-
ItemThe use of English as a lingua franca in translation( 2016) Foley, J. A. ; Deocampo, M. F.In translation, not only two languages but two cultures come into contact which means that translators must consider who wrote the text, when, why, for whom and who is now reading it and for what purpose. In the wake of rapid technological advances and the need to spread information quickly and efficiently, translation has grown in importance in the globalized world. So has its reliance on English in its role as a global lingua franca. English is often being used for ‘interculturalizing’ native languages but it is also true that English texts are written by speakers who use English as a lingua franca (ELF) with the additional consequence of local languages being incorporated into the texts. This is the linguistic hybridity used in constructing a wider view of the world. However, the prime aim of any lingua franca communication is mutual intelligibility. Saussure wrote about the contrasting principles of provincialism (ésprit de clocher) and what he termed intercourse: the need for broader communication. We can see Saussure’s principles as two imperatives: the cooperative and territorial imperatives. That is to say that language change is brought about by the ‘cooperative imperative’ as we need to continually modify our language in order to communicate with other people. At the same time, there is the ‘territorial imperative’ to secure and protect our own space and sustain our separate social and individual identity. In this study, the translation of linguistic units can only be understood when considered together with the cultural contexts in which they arise, and in which they are used. Blogging in Singapore and the Philippines is part of the ‘cooperative and territorial imperatives’ where the use of English as a lingua franca is intertwined with translanguaging.