Facilitating effective mathematics learning and higher mathematics achievement have long been recognized as a key to the scientific and technological advancement of the African continent. While the central role that language proficiency plays in mathematics teaching and learning has received an overwhelming research attention in the literature over the past two decades, this is not the case among African policy-makers and political leaders. Drawing mainly from our professional experiences as mathematics educators and from the international research literature, our primary intent in this paper is to answer this question: How does the learning of mathematics in English at the basic school level help or hinder students’ mathematical proficiency? To answer this question, the paper is organized as follows. The first part, the introduction, gives a brief overview of the language of learning and teaching in Africa. The second part describes the method and conceptual framework undergirding the research. In the third section, we have analyzed the effects of mathematics learning and teaching through English for basic students whose mother tongue is a Ghanaian language. The conclusion offers four recommendations for developing and improving the mathematics proficiency of students in basic schools.

The purpose of the study is to reveal the effect of cooperative learning on language skills in an English course. The study was carried out for 5 weeks with 66 students studying at the 10th grade at an Anatolian high school in the district of Karadeniz Eregli in Zonguldak during the fall term of the 2015-2016 academic year. The design of the study was ‘nonequivalent control groups pre-test post-test’ which is one of quasi-experimental designs. Data were gathered using an achievement test measuring students’ vocabulary knowledge, grammar knowledge, reading comprehension and listening skills. Results showed that cooperative learning had a larger effect on vocabulary knowledge, grammar, listening and reading skills compared to traditional method.

Achieving the maximum efficiency in teaching a second language (L2) has always been an important issue for educators. Current globalization processes, development of international business relations, political integrations among the various countries throughout the world, and the abilities of latest information and communications technologies (ICT) dictate the more significance of knowledge of foreign languages. All living conditions should be constructed according to the mentioned surrounding changes during the ICT era. Correspondingly, teaching methodologies are also being adapted in order to teach people more efficiently. This paper studies how cellular phones (cell phones) can be used in learning English phrases. In order to examine the impact of cell phones on learning a language an experiment was run among the college and university students in Kazakhstan, supported by GSM Network of KCell (Kazakhstan). This paper discusses the experiment results, in which 126 college and university students participated, and makes some suggestions based on the experimental mobile learning. Study reveals that users could make noticeable improvements learning through their cell phones after the conducted experiment. Positive improvements were noticed on the results of general tests of English language those conducted among all participants of the research.

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 purpose of this research is to experimentally evaluate how the “flipped classroom” model used to deliver Business English, which is commonly an integral part to the ESP course at tertiary schools of Economics in Ukraine, to the students majoring in Economics fosters students’ critical thinking skills and improved their academic performances and what students’ perceptions of this model are. The learning environment used a multimedia-based textbook entitled “Business skills through English”. This was experimental research which used a mixed-methods approach. Students’ critical thinking skills and academic performance (learning outcomes) were the variables for this study. Placement tests, needs analysis questionnaires, Course Satisfaction Questionnaire, a test to assess the students’ critical thinking skills were used to collect the statistical data. Cronbach Alpha coefficient was applied to interpret the test on critical thinking data and SPSS AMOS statistical package programme was used to analyse the consolidated data. The study found that the “flipped classroom” model used to deliver ESP and Business English to the students majoring in Economics has the potential to provide a better learning experience for the students and teaching experience for the teachers. This model fosters students’ critical thinking skills by involving them in problem-solving-based learning and improves their academic performances by increasing their responsibility for learning results and stimulating them to use different learning styles. Overall, the above model substitutes a teacher-centered with a student-centered approach that engages learners in the true-to-life business world and language environment. In this way, learning Business English and ESP at higher educational institutions in Ukraine is a move from just training memory (memorizing professionalism-related English vocabulary and doing grammar drills) to applying language as a learning medium in the specifically designed vocational contexts.

The present study aims at investigating some English speaking problems found by the students of English language education department at State Islamic Institute of Kudus and exploring some implications for speaking curriculum development of English language education department. This study used a descriptive qualitative approach and the data were taken from semi-structured interviews, observation and focus group discussion (FGD). The results of the analysis reveal that the problems encountered by the students in English language education department in speaking English cover the lack of appropriate vocabulary, the lack of grammar mastery, the lack of correct pronunciation, the lack of input of English outside the class, the lack of confidence and the lack of English speaking curriculum development. There have been some implications for developing English speaking curriculum. First, the curriculum of speaking should be well designed. Second, lecturers should design English speaking curriculum integrated by technology and social media that makes students to enrich some culture, knowledge and experience around the world. Third, lecturers should facilitate the English speaking curriculum with the English speaking community so that the students will have more chance to speak English inside and outside the class.

The development of information technology rapidly has an impact on the changing paradigm of education. On the other hand, education holds an important responsibility to create students who have a good and strong character. This research aims to: 1) describe the concept and framework of interactive multimedia courseware; 2) test the feasibility of interactive multimedia courseware by experts and practitioners; 3) test student responses to the use of interactive multimedia courseware. This research and development involved experts, teachers, and students. The data were collected using expert validation sheets, teacher questionnaires, and student questionnaires. They were then analyzed using the descriptive statistics analysis based on mean and percentage. This research yielded interactive multimedia courseware called IMONEC (Interactive Multimedia courseware integrated with Bandura’s Observational learning model and National historical Event to strengthen students' Character) that integrates three important components: the principles of interactive multimedia learning; Bandura's observational learning model; and the noble values and messages of national historical events to strengthen students' characters. The framework of the interactive multimedia courseware consists of the title, user instruction, home, core competency and basic competency, concept map of material, learning material, and quizzes. The results of the expert validation, teacher questionnaire, and student questionnaire showed that the interactive multimedia courseware is feasible for use in learning and effective in strengthening students’ characters.

The implementation of Lesson Study (LS) varies considerably across countries and institutions and is still in a phase of adaptation and experimentation. This article explains the result and the process of a school-based initiative endeavor to implement LS at a suburban elementary in Padang, Indonesia. The study involved 13 teachers, the principal and 6 classes of students. The data were collected through observation and interview. They were classified on the basis of three noticeable emerging themes- teacher collaboration, scaffolding, and reflection. The data were analyzed qualitatively. The results of data analysis reveal a promising improvement in these aspects. Implementing school- support LS increased by weaving the concept into practice helped teachers develop their professionalism gradually. It was obvious that the teachers felt more at ease to work collaboratively when they designed the lesson. This also affected their design which showed more meaningful learning activities and challenging tasks. Then, the teachers improved the way they scaffolded the pupils. The content of reflection and the way the results of reflection were conveyed became better. The principal’s support and the teachers’ strong willingness to elevate their quality apparently took an important role. In spite of that, there were some challenges in carrying out collaboration, providing appropriate scaffolding, and doing reflection. Changing the teachers’ common practice to LS apparently needs some adjustment and time.

The purpose of the research was to identify whether the English language e-classes that are automated and delivered through the Smart Sender platform influence the students’ attendance and procrastination rates, their motivation, time management skills, cognitive processing speed, and satisfaction. The study used qualitative and quantitative methods to monitor students’ attendance and procrastination rates, motivation and engagement, time management skills, thinking speed, and satisfaction. The questionnaire on learning motivation, engagement, and competence, the time management skills test, the mental speed test, and the course satisfaction questionnaire were used to collect data. The focus group discussion questionnaire was used to obtain verbal feedback for the participants. The Smart Sender platform proved effective as an instructional tool for teaching the English Language to students majoring in Philology, International Business, and Law. The automated delivery of the English language e-classes was effective in addressing the issues of dropouts and procrastination in distance learning through automation of the lesson delivery based on the ‘push’ factor. It increased students’ motivation, improves time management skills, and satisfaction. The quantitative findings showed that the students experienced a positive change in attendance, motivation and learning engagement, time management skills, and thinking speed due to the intervention. The students perceived the automated delivery-based approach to language teaching positively. They reported that the delivery approach content met the participants’ expectations and needs. Focus group discussion revealed that the intervention changed their learning behaviour and strategies which were considered the improvements of the quality learning outcomes.

The study is intended to expose mind mapping used as strategy for learning which is able to assist students to write their writing assignments. Thirty students who registered in the Teacher Qualification Improvement Program of Universitas Terbuka (UT) was involved as the participants in this present study. The participants had to follow the face-to-face tutorial session of the Instructional System Design course (ISD) course. One of the given assignments of the course was writing the modular based learning materials for the primary school students. The participants had to study the required knowledge and skills of writing the printed modular based learning materials through the systematic and systematic ways. The mind mapping strategy was used to help the students to complete their writing assignments – the printed modular based leaning resources. At the beginning the participants felt uncertain about the writing assignment. The study was found that the use of mind mapping as learning strategy increased the students learning motivation and improve the ability to write the printed modular based learning materials.

The mastery of Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) is very important for teachers in order to achieve qualified learning. Analyzing the mastery of TPACK by teachers in Indonesia seems to be imperative to provide baseline data to Indonesian government. This study aimed to examine the mastery of TPACK, in particular among biology teachers in terms of their teacher certification status, educational level, and academic background. This research involved 68 biology teachers obtained through proportional random sampling in five districts of Yogyakarta Special Region, Indonesia. The data collection was conducted through a multiple-choice test consisting of 33 items. The results showed that although the teacher’s mastery of TPACK was categorized as fair (60.13), it does not meet the work performance standards as a good teacher in Indonesia which has a minimum score of 76.00. Using Mann Whitney U and Kruskal Wallis Tests (p< 0.05), the evidence revealed that the mastery of TPACK among biology teachers is likely influenced by the academic background, educational level, and teacher certification status.

Online English comic is one of reading material that can be used by students. Students should be triggered by interesting and understandable reading material to increase their reading motivation and English proficiency. The objective of this study is to discuss the benefits of online English comics as reading materials and to discover the applications and websites that are usually used by students to read online English comics. This study applied the descriptive qualitative study supported by interviews as a data-gathering technique. The results of this study showed the benefits of online English comics as reading materials. Those are adding language knowledge such as vocabulary and grammar, enhancing reading comprehension, building critical thinking, increasing creativity, and developing reading motivation. The second finding is about the applications and websites to read English comics that students prefer to read. There are some applications and websites that are usually used by students to read English comics. The applications are Webtoon and Ciayo Comic, and also the websites include Mangakakalot.com, Mangareaderapp.com, Mangazuki.info, and Mangapanda.com.

This research explores how and what strategy is applied for preparing sustainable English teachers' professional development. This study utilizes lesson study strategy-based clinical supervision and quality assurance. Lesson study is a kind of action research based on a cycle base. This study is also recognized as research and development. Based on conceptual and empirical study, it is found that three grand principles of adding quality lesson study implication. Those are cycle reflection in accelerating the teachers’ competencies in English language teaching, clinical supervision nuance, a quality assurance principle by implementing the plan, do, check, and act strategy. This research successfully finds a model for preparing a prospective and sustainable professional teachers development based on lesson study, blended with the clinical supervision and a quality assurance implementation. The outputs consist of connection among professional English teachers; accelerating realization learning and teaching quality based on reflection implication; forming the open attitude and reflecting discussion and depth analysis; building a self-responsibility and awareness as professional teacher attitude; helping one each other in the professional teacher community for accelerating teaching quality by utilizing clinical supervision. Finally, the outcome is obtaining candidates of English professional teachers, prospectively and sustainably, with high-quality EFL teaching performance in national competitiveness.

Many studies have pointed out a proportionate relation between metacognition and reading strategies. This study advances such an understanding by arguing that this relation is comprised of several sub-relations. Metacognitive Awareness Inventory and Reading Strategies Inventory were conducted among 92 English as Foreign Language students at a Vietnamese university. This study highlights 3 major findings. First, metacognition processes do not merely mean “cognition about cognition”. Second, while previous studies tended to portray metacognition as a whole, it is argued in this study that it is constituted by two main clusters (knowledge of cognition and regulation of cognition) which can be further specified into eight sub-components. Third, there seem to be some sub-linearities that underpin students’ metacognition and that influence their uses of reading strategies. These findings are hoped to shed light on preserving spaces and autonomy in curriculum/syllabus development for students to exercise their own metacognition.

The Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic outbreak in the Indonesians nowadays, the public education department established the policy of the online education system to all education levels. Most educators employ an online flipped learning method to support the policy. Research aimed to measure the effect of online based-flipped classroom learning between using Microsoft Team and WhatsApp and student engagement on reading comprehension skills. The research approach was a quasi-experimental model with a 2 x 3 factorial pre-test-post-test non-equivalent control group design. The sample of this investigation was early period undergraduates of the management economics study program. Data analysis employed a two-way ANOVA test. The result confirmed that the online flipped learning scheme using Microsoft Team was better than WhatsApp in improving student engagement and reading comprehension skills. We advise English lecturers to apply better online media services, pay attention to the completeness of the learning features and train their competence in implementing distance learning to use compatible synchronous flipped classroom teaching based on internet technologies.

In Austria, segregated German language support classes (GLSC) were introduced in the school year 2018/19 to intensively support students who had previously little or no contact with German, the official language of instruction. These classes have been widely criticised; however, a formal evaluation of their effects has yet to be published. In absence of this evaluation, this article describes the language support model as it currently exists in Austria and reviews existing evidence about its efficacy. The literature review synthesises findings from educational research undertaken in other contexts that offer insight into features of ‘good practice’ in language support models. The article then explores the extent to which GLSC comply with these features. As such, this review allows insights into ways of ensuring students’ language and socio-emotional development – all central aspects of academic success – in language support models. It therefore allows research-informed understanding of the effects of the newly implemented model of German support classes in Austria and makes recommendations for further development.

The online flipped classroom has become increasingly applied to provide students with active learning. This search aimed to investigate the effectiveness of video lectures in an online flipped learning on students’ learning outcomes, students' video evaluation, and their experience in an online flipped classroom. This study employed mixed-method research implementing a quasi-experimental design using quantitative and qualitative data collection: pre-test and post-test, a questionnaire and interview. The participants were 78 Indonesian undergraduate students taking English as a foreign language (EFL) content course at one of the universities in Indonesia. The findings revealed that the students’ learning outcomes in the flipped classroom outperformed those in the control group. The students’ evaluation of the video lectures was high, and their evaluation was consistent with how they positively perceived the video lectures in the flipped classroom. This investigation showed the roles of video lectures on the students' participation and active learning in the flipped classroom during Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic time.

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 increase of English language learners (ELLs) in the United States of America (USA) public school classrooms and the diversification of the global education landscape urges initial teacher preparation programs to equip mainstream teachers with appropriate skills, knowledge, and dispositions to teach ELLs. This paper reports findings from a focus group study on elementary teacher candidates' (TCs') field experiences with ELLs. Based on interviews with four groups of TCs who completed their two practicums with ELLs, the study illustrates how mainstream TCs perceive their field experiences as future teachers of ELLs. The findings suggest that TCs recognize dissonances and develop care toward ELLs through their engagements in ELL-specific field experiences. The study also demonstrates how the recognition of dissonances led to changes in TCs' beliefs and values, which was observed through their imagination. Informed by their field experiences with ELLs, TCs began forming professional agency as future teachers by imagining specific teaching strategies, methods, and approaches they would like to implement with ELLs. Implications and future directions of teacher education programs are also discussed.

Learning by teaching is a technique where students teach an actual class to facilitate active learning. This paper reports ongoing research involving undergraduate students at an established university in Indonesia. The objective of this quantitative study was to find out the effect of this teaching technique in improving students’ 21st century skills. The sample was selected using a cluster sampling technique, where 25 students who were English as a Foreign Language pre-service teachers were assigned to an experimental group, and the other 23 students were treated as a control group. The students in the experimental group were asked to conduct a workshop in groups to students from the same department at a different university. Each group selected one of the topics in their course syllabus. A pre-test measuring the students’ soft skills was conducted before the course started and after it finished. The results show that soft skills, which include accountability, communication, innovation, problem-solving, teamwork, professional working, and networking skills, improved significantly among students in the experimental group, but the improvement was not evident in the control group. Therefore, learning by teaching should be embraced as an alternative teaching technique when soft-skill development becomes a target of instruction.