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This research is situated in the context of English Medium Instruction (EMI) teaching in higher education. The importance of lecturers' skilled implementation of engagement strategies to enhance students' learning is acknowledged. However, literature identifies a need for theoretically informed professional development (PD) programs to improve EMI lecturers' pedagogical engagement. In light of the identified concerns and issues, an intervention, drawing on a pedagogical engagement framework informed by positive psychology, was implemented and reported in this paper. The intention of the study was to contribute to the development of Chinese EMI lecturers' engagement portfolios. A group of twenty-five EMI lecturers in a South China university participated in the study. Through analysing their pre- and post-intervention teaching data and a focus group discussion, it was found that the quality of their cognitive engagement, and the quality of their emotional and behavioral engagement episodes in practice were noticeably improved. It can be concluded that an intensive intervention through a theoretically informed engagement framework contributes to EMI lecturers' pedagogical commitment to students' cognitive learning, and psychological investment in learners’ well-being. However, cultural and institutional factors somewhat constrained the participants from fully embracing the workshops, impacting their perception and post-intervention practice.

This study reported the design and implementation of a 16-week graduate seminar on second language (L2) pragmatics offered for 14 graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) who were teaching various target languages as teachers of record at a US public university. Grounded in the explicit awareness-raising approach, the seminar was designed to increase the GTAs' pragmatic knowledge, promote their cross-cultural pragmatic awareness, and facilitate their teaching and researching of pragmatics. Specifically, the training comprised four modules: key concepts in pragmatics, cross-cultural pragmatics, L2 pragmatics, and instructional pragmatics. With the recent advances in technology, the guidelines and practices for effectively designing web-based pragmatic materials were also incorporated. One of the GTAs, who was a native speaker of Mandarin Chinese and taught the language in the program, was observed as a focal participant to track the development of her pragmatic knowledge and application. Overall, the participants' positive evaluation ratings and comments on the seminar, as well as the focal Chinese GTA's demonstrated knowledge and application in pragmatics over time, suggest that the pragmatics-focused training is beneficial to cultivate the GTAs' professional knowledge and qualities in delivering pragmatics instruction.

This paper presents the first empirical attempt to understand language learner well-being in the context of heritage language (HL) learning. Adopting a positive psychology perspective, the research investigates the well-being experiences of Chinese heritage language (CHL) children to explore what flourishing means in HL learning. Data were collected from multimodal focus groups with 40 young CHL learners in the UK, involving a well-being exercise, a drawing activity, and semi-structured discussions. Following an appreciative inquiry approach, the findings indicate that HL learners' well-being revolves around “feeling good,” “doing well,” and “being connected,” including six essential components: positive emotions, affirmative self, perceived competence, active engagement, supportive relations, and diasporic connections. By centring young learners’ perspectives, we propose a multidimensional framework representing different aspects of their flourishing in the journey of HL development, which informs further theorisation of HL learner well-being as multifaceted, interconnected, and contextual. By shifting the emphasis from linguistic achievement to a more holistic approach that prioritises the socio-emotional wellness of HL learners, we also seek to instigate a “positive” turn in HL education which provides an intellectual basis for the design, implementation, and evaluation of future HL interventions with significant policy implications.

This paper examined the effects of scaffolding strategies instruction on EFL students' writing achievement, and its consistency in writing sub-skills. The study followed a pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design, and data were collected from 48 students in each comparison and experimental group. Results from paired-samples t-test confirmed a significant writing achievement score difference between the pretest and posttest for the experimental group (p = .001), but an insignificant difference for the comparison group (p = .426). Independent-sample t-test of post-test yielded a significant difference between the two groups favoring the experimental class (p = .001). The findings verified scaffolding teaching's feasibility for improving students' writing. Results from MANOVA proved writing sub-skills content, vocabulary, grammar, mechanics and organization jointly account for significant variance between comparison and experimental groups writing. Separate results of the variables revealed composing relevant content as the stronger predictor (F (1, 94) = 35.08, p = .001), but no mechanics' use disparity between the two groups, F (1, 94) = .42, p = .520. The findings verified the scaffolding strategies' substantial role in enhancing learners' overall writing achievement and all writing sub-skills except for mechanics. Results from the questionnaire showed participants' positive perceptions about scaffolding strategies instruction. Based on the findings, we recommend scaffolding strategies teaching for EFL students' writing improvements.

Smart classrooms have become increasingly prevalent in the domain of foreign language education. However, students' EFL learning in smart classrooms, especially their self-regulated learning (SRL) strategies, self-efficacy, and learning engagement during the process, remains understudied. Given the significant impact of these factors on students' academic achievement, this study applied a quantitative method to first clarify their respective factor structures, on the basis of which the links between the three were examined via structural equation modeling (SEM). Participants were 1107 undergraduates from different universities in China who had engaged in EFL learning in smart classrooms. The factor analysis revealed a two-facet structure of students’ SRL strategies (goal-planning strategies and help-seeking and self-evaluation strategies), a similar dual-component structure of their self-efficacy (self-efficacy of communicating with instructors and self-efficacy of task completion), and a four-dimensional structure of their engagement (cognitive engagement, behavioral engagement, social engagement, and emotional engagement) during EFL learning in smart classrooms. Moreover, the SEM results showed that SRL strategies did not directly predict learning engagement, while self-efficacy fully mediated the relationship between SRL strategies and learning engagement. The implications and limitations of these findings were also discussed.

Complex noun phrases (CNPs) are a major vehicle of academic written discourse. However, despite posing significant challenges to English language learners (ELLs), they are rarely taught in post-secondary English for Academic Purposes (EAP) programs. This article reports on a quasi-experimental study on the usefulness of explicit teaching of the structure and use of CNPs in Canadian post-secondary EAP programs for the purposes of reading comprehension. Specially designed modules on CNP structure and use were integrated into advanced reading and writing EAP courses taught to 96 first-year college and university ELLs over the course of a semester. 102 ELLs in different sections of the same courses had regular instruction without the CNP modules. Pre- and post-test scores were analyzed using a generalized linear mixed model (GLMM), and the teaching intervention was found to have a significant effect on the post-test scores in the experimental group. The relative success of the intervention is analyzed in relation to the literature on form-focused teaching interventions in reading courses. The article concludes by discussing opportunities for further integration of CNP instruction in EAP curricula.

This study investigates the perception-practice gap among English teachers in China concerning the integration of social media into teaching, blending the Language Teacher Cognition (LTC) framework with the Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) model. A mixed methods approach, including the adoption of online questionnaires, instructional documents and semi-structured interviews was utilised to investigate these research questions from different perspectives. We collected 119 valid questionnaires. From these, we selected seven volunteers—those who provided their contact information and represented a range of demographic profiles—for further study. Seven instructional documents were gathered from these volunteers. Subsequently, follow-up interviews were conducted with these selected participants to gain deeper insights into their experiences and perspectives. The study revealed a significant discrepancy between moderately high perceptions and relatively low practices. This dynamic and bi-directional gap is influenced by microscopic factors like schooling and affective issues, as well as macroscopic factors such as institutional and societal influences. These factors constitute a layered system. The findings illuminate the complexities underlying the perception-practice gap in English teaching with social media integration, offering theoretical, methodological, and practical implications.

This study, involving 100 Kazakhstani secondary school English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers selected through convenience sampling, aims to explore their attitudes towards incorporating learners' first language (L1) and translation in English teaching. The results of a 5-point Likert scale questionnaire unveil a mixed attitude among teachers. They acknowledge the efficacy of integrating L1 and translation as pedagogical tools in language teaching while strongly favouring English-only instruction. This preference is influenced by institutional factors such as curricula, the opinions of colleagues, and textbooks, all of which actively promote English-only instruction. Additionally, the analysis of contextual variables, such as teaching experience, academic level, school type, class size, and language proficiency, suggests that the extent of L1 and translation use also depends on teachers' and learners' English language proficiency, school type, and class size. This research provides empirical insights into the use of L1 and translation in EFL classrooms and contributes to the broader discourse on language pedagogy and translation in language teaching (TILT). The findings suggest important implications for teachers, school administrators, textbook writers, and researchers, calling for a critical re-evaluation of current educational policies and tasks in English textbooks.