In this article, the predictive power of five variables relevant for Linguo-intercultural sensitivity (flexibility) is examined. Communication aspect of intercultural interactions, specifically, the role of English as an international language are emphasized. Attitudes Towards English and Its Usage Scale (ATEUS) was applied to 194 students who attended to international colleges and schools in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. The results suggest that almost all variables are mutually correlated. The findings also reveal Verbal expressiveness and Verbal abilities as statistically significant predictors of linguo-intercultural sensitivity. Other predictors (English competence and Emotional attitudes) do not significantly contribute to explaining Linguo-intercultural variance.

In this work, we have analyzed the opinions of teacher candidates of French as a foreign language on the method that should be used in the teaching of reading-comprehension, one of the main linguistic skills. At the end of the Fall Semester of the 2011-2012 academic year, a survey constituted of three open-ended questions was carried out among teacher candidates studying at the French Language Teaching Programme of the Faculty of Education of Uludag University. Among the 120 students enrolled in the Programme, 64 have participated in the survey voluntarily and expressed their opinions. Students have been priorly informed about the study and the link of the survey prepared via Google Docs has been sent to them through an e-mail where they were asked to fill in the study in Turkish. In the scope of the present work, only student opinions relating to option b of the study's second question -i.e. on the method that should be used in the teaching of the reading skill in French- have been taken into consideration. In this qualitative work based on a case study pattern, opinions have first been sorted out through the content analysis method and have been classified; then, they have been compared with and discussed in the light of opinions and suggestions that already exist in literature. Lastly, findings have been interpreted and presented as a determination.

Grammar; while originating from the natural structure of the language also is the system which makes it possible for different language functions meet within the body of common rules especially communication. Having command of the language used, speaking and writing it correctly require strong grammar knowledge actually. However only knowing the rules cannot be the indicator of using the language correctly and effectively. For the individual, who learns the rules of the language but cannot transform it to daily life, grammar teaching can be difficult and boring. Instead of considering grammar teaching as an independent and abstract lesson, realizing it through integrating with other learning fields will increase the effect and level of success in grammar teaching. The purpose of this research is to determine the views of first language teachers regarding teaching grammar. The study group of the research consist of 10 Turkish language teachers who work in a city in Turkey (Elazig). Within this research, which was carried out with qualitative pattern, the data was gathered with one on one interview technique using semi structured interview form, which consisted of 10 questions. The data gathered was analyzed with content analysis and interpreted being categorized. Regarding the findings frequency distributions were given and interpreted. As a result of the study it was seen that teaching grammar differs in terms of teachers’ views, in addition in some matters they were under expectations.

It can be said that effective development of intercultural sensitivity depends on the regulations and practices in the curriculum. Integrated program implementations are seen as one of the ways of regulation. In the study, a nested integration model was used in a single discipline. In this context, scientific research methods are considered as a discipline, and the achievements of this discipline and intercultural sensitivity development activities are integrated. Understanding different cultures correctly and not being prejudiced are very important for the development of intercultural sensitivity. Scientific research methods course provides students with scientific attitudes and behaviors. In this course, it is thought that students will be able to develop sensitivity by examining different cultures with scientific attitudes and behaviors. In this context, it is aimed to reveal the effectiveness of intercultural sensitization development activities integrated with scientific research methods course gains. The quasi-experimental design with a pretest-posttest and a control group was used in the study. The study group comprised of 86 second-grade students in the English Teacher Training Department. In order to measure the intercultural sensitivities of the students before and after the test procedure, the five-point likert type “Intercultural Sensitivity Scale” developed by Chen and Starosta and adapted to Turkish by Bulduk, Tosun and Ardic was used as data collection tool. It is concluded that the curriculum of scientific research methods integrated with intercultural sensitivity development activities is effective in developing students' intercultural sensitivities.

Pragmatic competence is an indispensable dimension of overall language ability, and proper interpretation of implied meanings is a major constituent of pragmatic competence. In this regard, this study aimed to investigate the efficiency of a film-based instruction program devised to facilitate the interpretation of implied meanings in English. It was conducted with a quasi-experimental design. First, a multiple-choice discourse completion test was given to 144 English language teacher trainees with 77 people in the experimental group and 67 in the control group. After the 5-week instruction given to the experimental group, the test was administered to both groups again. The results revealed significant differences in favor of the experimental group. This makes the program a promising one as it made the participants, who were also prospective English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teachers responsible for helping their own students have pragmatic competence too, significantly more equipped about processing implied meanings as a major constituent of pragmatic competence.

The present study aimed to provide a digital story development experience for pre-service science teachers in the “instructional technologies and material development” course and to determine the impact of these experiences on their views on digital storytelling. Simultaneous parallel design, one of the mixed methods in which both quantitative and qualitative data were collected, was used in the study. Quantitative and qualitative findings are presented in different sections and both were interpreted in the discussion section. The quantitative study data were collected from 50 pre-service teachers, while the qualitative data were collected from 16 pre-service teachers. Quantitative data were collected by a survey and the qualitative data were collected in interviews. Descriptive/inferential statistics were employed in the analysis of the survey data. The steps of the analysis, coding, and categorization were adopted in the study for qualitative data. The positive effect of digital storytelling on the 21st-century skills of pre-service teachers was revealed by both quantitative and qualitative data. Furthermore, it was determined that pre-service teachers considered digital storytelling as advantageous since it provided meaningful and permanent learning, was fun and motivational; however, it also had disadvantages since it was time-consuming and required technological knowledge. It was revealed that they experienced certain difficulties in scriptwriting, finding the related images/videos and photographs, and finalizing the recording, and they considered that most, if not all, topics in the science course were suitable for digital storytelling. For pre-service teachers to acquire 21st-century skills, digital storytelling should be employed in several courses including the teaching practice course, and pre-service teachers should gain experience in preparing the students for digital storytelling.

This study aimed to describe the profile of the students’ social skills of Bengawan Solo nature elementary school. The study was qualitatively conducted as a case study. The participants were teachers and students who were chosen by employing a purposive sampling technique. The data were obtained through observations, questionnaires, interviews, and document analysis. This study employed an interactive model data analysis included: data validating, data collection, data reduction, data display, and conclusion drawing. The conclusions of the study comprise: (1) the cooperation aspect, students can collaborate well; (2) the assertion aspect, students can get along with new friends and communicate with others; (3) the responsibility aspect, students understand their role and responsibility to the God, themselves, others, and society; (4) the empathy aspect, students can feel others' feeling and problem; (5) the self-control aspect, students can control their mental state so that they can avoid anger and bad influences.

As a part of learning process, project-based assessment (PBA) is determined to be a potential approach in higher education evaluation that focuses on developing the important objectives related to critical thinking, team working and problems solving skills. The aim of the paper is to find out students’ reflection and teachers’ beliefs towards using this project-based assessment method in teaching Intercultural Communication Competence (ICC). To collect the data, a project-based assessment design was applied for 124 English major students at B University in the 9 weeks ICC course. This project was implemented from the beginning of the course, and at the end of the course, learners’ products were performed with specific activities regarding culture knowledge competition, online cultural community activities, talent performance, situational judgment ability, and eloquence skills. In addition, a set of questionnaires were delivered to the participants, plus the interviews with 36 teachers who have taught culture-related subjects from the universities in Vietnam, Thailand and Malaysia. The findings revealed that although there were certain challenges, using project-based assessment in teaching culture had satisfactory effects on students’ intercultural competence, problem- solving skills, critical thinking, and learning motivation.

Speaking skills have always been regarded as the most difficult skill out of the four skills that learners should master in language learning. The importance of learning speaking skills has also been highlighted by many researchers in recent years. With the use of technology in this modern era, learners can learn speaking skills through various resources. Therefore, there is a need to identify the learning strategies used by learners for speaking skills in the new learning environment. In this review, the most frequently used strategies in language learning for speaking skills has been examined. The articles reviewed were from 2017 until 2021 across two databases, ERIC and Google Scholar. The PRISMA 2020 methodology is used in the review. From the review, it was found that meta-cognitive and cognitive strategies were most frequently used for learning speaking skills, followed by compensation and social strategies. The least used strategies by learners were memory and affective strategies. The findings help teachers to look for the most suitable teaching method in the current learning environment. For future research, an extensive review of the use of learning strategies for other learning skills could be carried out.

Foreign language teaching in the Slovenian educational context begins in the first grade (age 6). Many studies report a lack of qualified teachers at this stage of learning around the world and numerous authors emphasise the misconception that basic linguistic and didactic knowledge of teachers is sufficient for teaching children. All three Slovenian public universities are aware of this problem and offer pre-service and in-service programmes for (student) teachers who want to specialise in teaching English to young learners. In the present article, we focus on the subject-specific teacher competences for teaching English in the first three years of primary education; namely, linguistic, subject didactic and intercultural competences. We explore teachers’ self-assessment of these competences and their perception of certain elements pertaining to them. The study seeks to answer the following research questions: (1) What subject-specific competences do teachers consider essential for teaching English in the first cycle of primary education? (2) To what extent do teachers believe they have developed certain subject-specific competences? (3) What are teachers’ attitudes toward certain subject-specific competences that the teacher needs for teaching English in the first cycle of primary education? The results of the quantitative survey, in which 100 teachers participated, show that teachers perceive their subject didactic competence to be the most developed and their intercultural competence to be the least developed. Moreover, they consider that a basic level of English is not sufficient for teaching English in the first grades.

Teacher leadership theory has underlined the essence of teacher collaboration (TC) in helping students learn better. Also, many studies and theories have argued that TC can be an effective way to provide learning feedback. Thus, this mixed-method study aimed to experimentally examine the effect of teacher collaborative metacognitive feedback (TCMF) on educational management (EM) students’ metacognition, to see the different effects on EM students’ metacognition as affected by TCMF and by individual teaching metacognitive feedback (ITMF), and to qualitatively probe into students’ perceptions of teacher collaboration. The quantitative study conducted a quasi-experimental method by involving 44 EM students. A valid and reliable scale of metacognition adopted from a previous study was utilized as the instrument of data collection. The qualitative study conducted interviews with 8 students selected purposively, and the data were analyzed interactively to reach credible information. This study revealed that TCMF positively and significantly affected EM students’ metacognition. TCMF contributed to EM students’ metacognition better than ITMF did. The students perceived that TC developed their collaborative skills, continuously supporting their critical thinking skills, intercultural communicative competence, and problem-solving skills. Limitations, implications, and recommendations for further research are discussed.

Regardless of varied lingua-cultural ideologies enriching the theories of communicative competence (CC), the four CC dimensions (e.g., linguistics, sociolinguistics, discourse, and communication strategies (CSs)) still become the main cores of English speaking (ES) classrooms. Of the four dimensions, CSs seem to be the most technical which deserve to be persistently studied. Hence, this study aimed to probe into ES lecturers’ performances of CSs, their efforts to improve students’ CC, and the impacts of their efforts on students’ learning according to students’ perspectives. Two ES lecturers and 10 students at a university in Indonesia were purposively selected to be the participants. They were observed and interviewed according to the study’s purposes. This study uncovered various CSs performed by ES lecturers according to several contexts, such as to understand spoken texts, to understand spoken recorded texts, and to overcome temporary communication difficulties. Various ES lecturers’ efforts were also revealed according to their functions to improve each dimension of CC. Most students perceived the lecturers’ efforts positively due to the impacts on their motivation, self-efficacy, collaborative skills, and metacognition. However, few students echoed negative perceptions about a lecturer’s native-speakerism-endorsed effort due to lingua-cultural issues. Implication, limitation, and recommendation are discussed.

The skill to solve mathematical problems facilitates students to develop their basic skills to solve problems in daily life. This study analyzes students' problem-solving process with a reflective cognitive style in constructing probability problems using action, process, object, and schema theory (APOS). The explanatory method was used in this qualitative study. The participants were mathematics students at the Department of Mathematics, Universitas Negeri Semarang. The researchers collected the data with the cognitive style test using the Matching Familiar Figure Test (MFFT), used a valid problem-solving skill test, and the interview questions. The data analysis techniques used were processing and preparing the data for analysis, extensive reading of the data, coding all data, applying the coding process, describing the data, and interpreting the data. The results showed that (1) the problem-solving process of students with symbolic representation was characterized by the use of mathematical symbols to support the problem-solving process in the problem representation phase; (2) the problem-solving process of students with symbolic-visual representation was characterized by the use of symbols, notations, numbers, and visual representation in the form of diagrams in the problem representation phase.

Metacognitive, critical thinking and opinion expression are in high demand. This study aimed to investigate the effects of the blended project- based literacy that integrates school literacy movement strengthening character education (literasi berbasis proyek terintegrasi GLS dan PPK: Li-Pro-GP) learning model on students' metacognitive skills, critical thinking, and opinion expression. A post-test experimental design was used to answer the research question. The study was conducted from August to October 2021 at Government Junior High School 23 Malang. Seventh-grade students were selected as research participants. The participants included 30 students from class VII-2. The research instrument was five essay questions to measure critical thinking skills. Material and assessment experts validated the essay questions developed by the researcher. The items that were declared valid were tested for validity. The result showed five valid items with high reliability of .670. Metacognitive skills were measured using the Metacognition Awareness Instrument (MAI), which consists of 40 items. The questions declared valid were tested for validity with a very high reliability of .953 for 37 items, and only three items were invalid. The ability to express an opinion was measured with an observation questionnaire validated by experts with a valid instrument score. Data analysis was performed by path analysis using the SmartPLS software. The results showed that the Li-Pro-GP blended learning model significantly strengthened students' metacognitive skills, critical thinking, and opinion formation.

Kindergarten educators represent the first contact of children with the institutional environment. In this article we assume that kindergarten educators have a significant impact on children's perception of their first/mother tongue and their language development. Language is one of the core kindergarten curriculum areas in which the educator needs to be adequately empowered to set an example for the children, while at the same time developing their communicative competence which is the basis for (later) efficient communication. We carried out a questionnaire-based survey involving 236 students pursuing early childhood education in all three public universities in the Republic of Slovenia which prepares students for the role of kindergarten educators in order to study their perceptions of the language. The questionnaire-based survey was answered by students in their first and third years i.e., when starting and finishing their studies. A large majority of future kindergarten educators consider their positive attitude towards language in general to be extremely important for kindergarten children as language forms the basis for all other curriculum areas. Also, when surveyed, almost all future kindergarten educators considered it essential to be proficient in the language and to encourage language development in children by following their own example. Furthermore, they believe it is important to have a well-developed linguistic capability (language knowledge), to have the capability of crafting linguistically accurate written content and to master a suitable literary expression.