Interest in the effect of positive and negative emotions in foreign language acquisition has soared recently because of the positive psychology movement (Dewaele & MacIntyre, 2014, 2016; MacIntyre, Gregersen & Mercer, 2016). No work so far has been carried out on the differential effect of positive and negative emotions on foreign language…

The new national educational policy was implemented at secondary schools in 2002 in Japan. The revised Course of Study for foreign language education corresponding to the national educational policy decreased the number of English lessons per week from four to three at the junior high school level, which resulted in a 25% decrease in English…

This study focuses on metalinguistic awareness (MLA) and its relation to academic achievement for mono-, bi- and multilingual adolescents in Denmark. While MLA is one of several cognitive measures positively related to bilingualism and bilingualism is associated with academic advantages, Danish bi-/multilingual pupils appear not to benefit from…

This article describes the theory-informed design of the "ELENA goes shopping" mobile game and reports on the evaluation of its effectiveness through a design research approach. The game aimed to foster young children's (aged 4-8) interest in a neighboring (geographically proximate) language and to familiarize them with its sounds,…

This paper examines the French achievement results of three groups of students: Canadian-born English/French bilingual, Canadian-born multilingual and immigrant multilingual Grade 6 French immersion students, by investigating how the variables of integrative and instrumental motivations, attitudes to the learning situation, French language…

This study investigates the use of pragmatic markers (PMs) by learners of English at varying proficiency levels. The study analyzes data from a university-level oral proficiency exam that categorized Chinese and Korean English-as-a-second-language (ESL) speakers into four proficiency levels and compares data with those of native speakers taking…

The "cloze" test is one possible investigative instrument for predicting text comprehensibility. Conceptual coding of student replacement of deleted words has been considered to be more valid than exact coding, partly because conceptual coding seemed fairer to poorer readers. This paper reports a quantitative study of 447 Australian…

The purpose of this study is to examine how 659 Hispanic students in dual language programs in segregated or predominantly Hispanic/low socio-economic status (SES) schools are performing on standardized tests compared to school and statewide comparison groups. Test results are presented from two separate studies of English language learner and…

This study investigated some issues regarding the validity of the Scholastic Achievement Test (SAT) Subject Test: Korean with Listening. The SAT Korean has been administered just once a year since its inception in 1997. As of March 2006, it had been administered nine times. However, SAT foreign language tests are not as rigorously researched as…

e mean length of utterance in the Sentence Repetition Task grew from approximately two to three words, and the number of omissions of articles, prepositions and modifiers significantly decreased. After 3;0 years old, omissions of free function words practically disappeared. The results of Study 2 showed that mean length of utterance, omission of…

Expanded version of a lecture given at a meeting of the Teachers of Modern Languages in Colleges of Education (Tagung der Fachdidaktiker fur neuere Sprachen an den Padagogischen Hochschulen), October 1, 1970 in Luneburg, West Germany. (RS)

The report gives the results of the 1974 joint student selection entrance test for English, administered simultaneously at the universities of Joensuu, Jyvaskyla and Turku. The test battery comprised 309 multiple-choice items and was completed by 843 candidates. Hirvonen's paper examines problems of student selection and theoretical aspects of…

This is a presentation of the results of a factor analysis of a battery of tests intended to measure listening and reading comprehension in English as a second language. The analysis sought to answer the following questions: (1) whether the factor analysis method yields results when applied to tests which are not specifically designed for this…

After tests are administered, they are scored and the scores are given back to the students. If the real purpose of the test is to improve student learning, simply returning the scores is not sufficient. The first step in evaluating test results is to be sure that the test has tested the intended concepts and content. Calculating the mean and the…

The twofold objective of this book is to enable the teacher of English to speakers of other languages both to improve his own classroom measures and to make sound assessments of standardized tests which he may from time to time be asked to select, administer, and interpret. Chapters 1 and 2 introduce the general purposes and methods of language…