Language Teaching for Young Learners - Online First

Extensive reading (ER) appears to be a promising pedagogy for general literacy. Building on prior research, this corpus study examined extensive reading (ER) of digital science resources (DSR) and the potential for incidental learning of general and specialized vocabulary enclosed in general, academic, and specialized lists developed for second language (L2) learners considering specific time intervals (one day, 30 days, 90 days, 180, etc.) and reading speed (150 and 200 wpm). The results reveal that after a year of reading DSR at a rate of 6,000 words per day, learners encounter, on average, almost 91%, 85%, and 82% of the word families in the examined lists, occurring at least 12, 20, and 25 times and after 342 days of reading 8,000 words per day, learners encounter, on average, about 93%, 89%, and 85% of the target words occurring at least 12, 20, and 25 times. Noteworthy is that extensive reading for even 30 days for at least 40 minutes a day at a speed of 150–200 wpm has the potential to produce substantial vocabulary gains of general and specialized vocabulary items in the examined lists, on average, between 28.40% (25 repetitions at 150 wpm) to 48.11% (12 repetitions at 200 wpm). Looking at word families in the Academic Word List (AWL), the results suggest that extensive reading of digital science texts for 180 days at 150 wpm (reading 6000 words per day for 40 minutes) provides similar or greater opportunities for incidental vocabulary learning to occur compared with fiction for young adults and online news.

This article presents findings from a case study within a broader research project that explored the impact of a teacher education module on the development of six pre-service teachers’ (PSTs) competencies for integrating technology-mediated language learning tasks into young learner English as a foreign language (EFL) classrooms. Conducted over a 15-week undergraduate course, the module followed the principles of a sociocultural approach to L2 teacher education (Johnson, 2015) and was offered consecutively for two semesters at a German university specializing in teacher education. Specifically, this article spotlights the development of Julia, one of the participants, detailing her evolving understanding of technology-mediated language learning tasks through various assignments within the module. The objectives of the study were: first, to trace Julia’s evolving understanding of the concept of technology-mediated language learning tasks and, secondly, to discuss how the teacher education activities created space for strategic mediation that facilitated her learning processes. Data were collected through in-depth individual interviews, video-recorded school lessons, audio recordings of seminar sessions, and analysis of an 80-page reflective report submitted by Julia. The findings indicate Julia’s shift from solely concentrating on technology to recognizing the crucial role of pedagogical design in maximizing technology-mediated task-based language teaching (TBLT) benefits.

This paper aims to explore the perspectives of Chilean primary school children about their English education. A hermeneutic approach was adopted in this longitudinal study to foreground the voices of children. Altogether 9 children (between the ages of 7–9) from two underprivileged schools in Santiago, Chile, participated in the study. The first author spent eight months in the field teaching and researching at the same time. The research question in this paper aims to address the views of children about their English learning experiences, and based on these insights, some pedagogical implications are drawn for the context and beyond. Participatory methods for data collection such as conversations wrapped around information gap activities, role-play games, drawing tasks and reflection tasks were employed to allow the children to express themselves in a relaxed, trusting and comfortable environment. The findings reveal that young children are articulate and capable of reflecting on what they enjoy in their English learning and why. This study highlights the importance of incorporating children’s voices into pedagogical decisions in English language teaching and learning.