The study investigates the vocabulary profile of a set of English textbooks "New Senior English for China," which is widely used for senior secondary education in China. It examines how the words required by the 2017 National English Curriculum Standard for General Senior Secondary Education in China are covered, repeated and distributed…

With the UK entering its fourth decade of this crisis with no end in sight, it is timely to ask how current policy directions for language learning beyond the compulsory phase (currently age 14 in all 4 UK nations) align with learners' psychological needs in relation to language learning. After a review of these psychological needs within…

The study examined the factors that influence the performance of students in selected public junior high schools in Ghana using English Language, Mathematics and Science as cases and also to determine whether these observed performances support the continued implementation of the national policy on progression. In all, 98 teachers and 982 Junior…

This article assesses the impact over nine years of the "Mother Tongue Other Tongue" multilingual schools' poetry competition led by Carol Ann Duffy from Manchester Metropolitan University, in which over 35,000 pupils from 77 schools have participated to date. It reviews evidence from a 2019 evaluation of the project and from a project…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the continuity of reading passages of Korean high school English textbooks with the 2015 Revised National Curriculum using CohMetrix, a software that analyzes English texts in a range of linguistic features. Twentyone English textbooks were analyzed: 11 High School English, five High School English I,…

Taiwan's National Development Council recently announced plans for the country to become bilingual by the year 2030. However, the Council did not lay out a clear road map for how this major accomplishment is to be achieved, and the curriculum presently in place does not seem to meet the challenge. This article will review the current status of…

Common approaches to language teaching in many New Zealand schools typically show a lack of attention to students' own language-learning strategies. This article argues that the success or otherwise of language immersion programmes, in particular within Maori-medium educational settings, depend as much on the skills and strategies of the student…

This study aims to investigate whether there is a discrepancy between local coursebooks and international coursebooks in terms of the extent to which they comply with the model of communicative competence depicted in the Turkish foreign language curriculum. Speaking activities in two selected 9th grade English language coursebooks were classified…

The need to address culture in the language learning process has been emphasized as a means to promote both intercultural awareness and communicative language curricula. In countries such as Turkey, this has been an ongoing concern in the context of English as a foreign language (EFL) education. Thus, attempts have been made to enhance the…

This article will investigate the place of language learning in the new Curriculum for Wales and the value of a multilingual approach and ethos. The article will begin by setting out the historical context for modern foreign language teaching in the United Kingdom. It will then discuss the context for language learning in Wales, focusing on the…

The paper evaluates the ELT textbook "English for Today" (Classes Nine--Ten) which is used as a dominant instructional material in secondary level schools and madrasahs in Bangladesh. The National Curriculum and Textbook Board (NCTB) of Bangladesh published the revised edition of the textbook series "English for Today" in the…

This qualitative research study sought to understand teachers' resistance to English language educational change in Kyrgyzstan. The participants were six English teachers working in both rural and urban public schools in Kyrgyzstan. Analysis of non-participant observation and post-observation interviews revealed that, despite changes in English…

China's impressive growth over the last three decades warrants the need to re-evaluate the position and positioning of English in the country's educational system. For long, English has been taught and learned compulsorily alongside Chinese and maths in primary and secondary schools in the mainland of China. It was not until recent years that the…

The government funded two-year project, "Stepping Up in Modern Foreign Languages" (MFL), sought to align MFL teaching across the transition between primary and secondary schools. This paper describes the results of the project evaluation that was conducted using Cultural-historical Activity Theory as its research approach. This approach…

Although use of high-stakes tests is common across developing societies, very little is known about how these tests are designed, what principles and criteria guide test construction, and what factors influence this process. The present study investigates the development of the English Paper-1 test for the Higher Secondary Certificate examination…