Women in TESOL International Conference

1. Diah Kristina, Ph.D.
   Branding Products and Services Linguistically
   The new paradigm of business has opened up a migration from industrially driven economy to people driven economy. There is an obvious shift from rationality to feeling and from objectivity to subjectivity. Consumer’s decision to purchase is strongly influenced by emotional rather than logical consideration. With the use of technology, products and services are connected to consumers on emotional basis in which the most compelling aspect of human character namely, the desire to transcend material satisfaction and experience emotional fulfillment is highly considered. The present small scale study aims at exploring how this new paradigm of engagement between producers and consumers is realized linguistically in advertorials, to what extent cultural notions contribute to the way the producers communicate with their target consumers and how these insights are reflected in their discoursal strategies. Besides, this study will also look at how the new millenium in which chaos and unpredictability becomes a way of life, is perceived and then transferred linguistically by making use of thought-provoking and innovative ideas in the promotional discourse of the text producers. To achieve the objectives, eight advertorials of product and services were scrutinized using an analytical lense of genre proposed by Swales (1990, 2000) and Bhatia (2004) and insights on branding from Gobe (2000). The textual and discoursal analysis is informed by the four pillars of emotional branding advocated by Gobe namely relationship, sensorial experiences, imagination and vision. The present study is expected to be beneficial for the ESP, especially the teaching of business in English.
2. Santri E. P. Djahimo
   Women Versus Men in Teacher’s Professional Development (A Case Study of the Potential for Continued Professional Development for English Teachers in Rural and Disadvantaged Schools in Indonesia)
   This qualitative study investigates the potential for Continued Professional Development for teachers in rural and disadvantaged schools in East Nusa Tenggara Province of Indonesia. Three different rural areas in one of the provinces of Indonesia (East Nusa Tenggara Province) were the places to conduct this study. The main purpose of this study is to examine whether or not English teachers of these schools have any potential for Continued Professional Development (CPD), taking into account the physical, cultural and socio-economic contexts. It also aims at finding out if there is gender equality in CPD. Additionally, it assesses whether or not teachers’ participation in CPD relates to individual teacher characteristics, such as prior qualifications, gender, age, and years of teaching experience. It also aims to examine the relationship between teachers’ CPD and the kind of school they work in, including school size, the profile of the pupils in the school, and eagerness to participate in CPD. The results show that all teachers express their disappointment towards the lack of in-service training. In this case, not many teachers teaching in rural and disadvantaged areas have potential for Continued Professional Development (CPD). Theoretically, gender equality is an important issue to be considered in CPD. However, practically, it has not been fully considered yet. Another finding is that there is a strong relationship between these teachers’ prior qualifications, gender, age, and years of teaching experience and their participation in CPD. There is no relationship between teachers’ participation in CPD and the schools size and the profile of the pupils. In contrast, there is a relationship between the teachers’ participation in CPD and their eagerness to participate in it, and this eagerness relates to gender. This study only has limited aims and has been conducted for a short period of time, that is why, there are some aspects dealing with the long term issues are not observable.
3. Vanessa Petroj
   The Role of Native Languages on ESL Learning
   With increasing numbers of international students in US universities, the multicultural and multilingual population faces a spectrum of challenges: from adjusting to the American education system, to mastering academic English language skills. The complexity of language learning depends not only on the target language (i.e. English) but also on the native language of the learner. More importantly, linguistic (i.e. grammatical and pronunciation) differences between English and the student’s native language play a crucial role in predicting which area(s) of English will be more challenging to master. In order to provide effective and practical learning, language instructors should be aware and understand those differences. This paper focuses on three of the most commonly problematic grammatical areas in ESL learning: the article system (1), plural (2), and tense morphology (3):
   (1) John broke a/the window.
   (2) I have one brother/two brothers.
   (3) She likes/liked Maria.
   Seemingly trivial in English, speakers of languages that lack these structures (e.g. Chinese, a language with very little inflectional morphology) tend to show a pattern of errors in both speaking and writing. In addition to demonstrating these issues, the paper offers practical strategies for identifying patterns and working through the errors; and while the presentation will focus on a small set of languages, this comparative approach can be applied to nearly any language learning situation.
4. Eunice Barbara C. Novio, MAWD / Josemari V. Cordova
   Gender Mainstreaming in EFL Learning: The Case of Vongchavalitkul University
   This study was done to assess the English instruction in EFL class in accordance with the United Nations call for equity in education. The study is intended to reduce the gender discrimination in classroom situations where girls usually suffer in terms of academic achievement. The result of the study will help the teachers as well as curriculum developers in devising methodologies and approaches that will ensure the inclusivity of learning in English classes which is one of the thrust of Jomtien Declaration on Education for All, the 2000 Dakar Framework for Action and the 2000 Millennium Development Goals. The study concluded that English lecturers at Vongchavalitkul University can mainstream gender in their EFL classes even without proper training or knowledge in gender equality. Although Thailand has a highly gendered language, in English classes it is not applicable. In fairness, although most of the respondents are female lecturers, the male lecturers were also unconsciously aware of the equality between male and female students when it comes to performance. This is not, however, a sweeping statement that it is the same in the Thai society.
5. Frances Shiobara
   Where are All the Women?
   Female rates of participation in academia are shockingly low in most countries around the world, but Japan was recently found to be the lowest amongst 400 of the top universities in the world (Grove, 2016). There are a number of reasons for this, but the difficulties of having children and maintaining a career seems to be one of the major reasons that women drop out of the workforce. This paper will argue that offering greater flexibility in the work place, especially regarding professional level part-time work, will lead to higher rates of participation in the work force by working mothers, and in the long term enable these women to return to full-time work. The author will also make some suggestions as to how governments, employers, and co-workers can help to improve this situation through providing flexible work options, encouraging women to return to work after maternity leave, either full-time or part-time, and increasing opportunities for part-time workers to return to full-time positions when they are ready. Increasing the number of women in the work force may aid the economy, as well as improving gender equality.
6. Surti Nur Utami / Dwi Sulisworo
   The Effect of Creative Reading Instruction: A Comparison of Technique between Number Head Together (NHT) and Make a Match in Narrative Text at the Seventh Grade of Junior Level
   This quantitative research investigates the student’s creative reading instruction. Comparing between using Numbered Head Together (NHT) and Make a Match to teach narrative text. The main purpose of this study is to examine whether NHT or Make a Match is effective or not to teach narrative text. Regarding, that each techniques has different characteristics the researcher used cluster random sampling to take the sample. The sample is in the same level of seventh grade which consists of heterogeneous students. This research was held in a school that located in rural area, where English is become unfamiliar and even strange for students.
   Consequently, reading especially in English is become bizarre habit for students. Further, this paper show significant result of students’ reading narrative score by using NHT technique. The data were collected from pre-test which was conducted at first meeting and the post-test was conducted at the last meeting. A three-week treatment by implementing of two learning techniques; NHT in experiment class while Make a Match in control class to teach reading comprehension in narrative text.
7. Ikhfi Imaniah / Aidil Syah Putra
   The Strategy of Implementation of Bilingual Program of First Grade Students at SD Islam Raudah
   The aim of the research was to observe the activities that teachers do in implementing bilingual program in teaching math and science deals with students’ characteristics of first grade students at SD Islam Raudah, analyze the problems that may occur in implementing bilingual program in teaching math and science, analyze the teachers’ strategy in implementing bilingual program of first grade students at SD Islam Raudah, identify the students’ special needs in the bilingual program class; particularly math and science, identify the appropriate assessment of the bilingual program in teaching math and science. The research was conducted to the first grade students of SD Islam Raudah. The subject of the research was the first grade students which consist of 32 students at SD Islam Raudah.
   The design of the research was qualitative research, in which the researchers started from the phenomena of bilingual program in the reality and collecting the data by using observation and interview. The researchers applied two meetings on class observation and interviews for the teachers, parents and principles.
   The findings show the strategies of implementation of bilingual program of first grade students at SD Islam Raudah still need improvement in order to achieve the goals of bilingual program. Moreover the parents have the important roles in developing students’ language competency.
8. Huynh Ngoc Tai
   Fostering Student-Writers’ Writing Self-efficacy with Wordle
   Much has been written on the vital roles of writing self-efficacy and its influences on learners’ writing performance. Additionally, numerous of strategies have also been proposed to improve writing self-efficacy for learners of English as a foreign language. However, there seems to be a lack of research on the application of Wordle, a text visualization tool, to foster learners’ writing self-efficacy. This paper examines if introducing Wordle into writing instructions can bring about significant changes in learners’ perceptions of writing self-efficacy or not. Two groups of 30 undergraduate English-major students at Tra Vinh University were invited to participate in our investigation. Statistical results from quantitative data analysis revealed positive influences of Wordle on student writers’ level of confidence in their writing abilities including beliefs about capabilities in idea generation, using relevant vocabulary and developing paragraphs. Pedagogical implications for incorporating digital tools into foreign language classrooms to enhance independent learning are also discussed.
9. Ratna Rintaningrum
   Maintaining English Speaking Skill in Their Homeland through Technology: Personal Experience
   How are children still able to speak in English in their homeland where the English language is not readily available there? The ability to speak English in a setting where the language is not readily available there, is not as easy as people think. Moreover, it becomes a major concern when the status of the language is only a foreign language, meaning that the language is not widely used as a tool of communication. However, in global era where technology develops very rapidly, proficiency in English, in particular, speaking skill is highly demanded. Increasingly, every year international students from Asian countries such as Japan, Korea, Vietnam, China, and Indonesia continue their study in English speaking countries such as the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia. Their family such as their wife or their husband as well as their children goes with them for some years to live in an English speaking country. This study investigates a set of efforts concerning the ability of those children to sustain their spoken language in a country where the English language is not there after returning back from an English speaking background. This study employs observation and interview to obtain the data. This study argues that technology is a tool that can be used to maintain children’s ability to speak in English under a foreign language setting. This study documents how children keep talking in English where an opportunity to use English is very limited in their country.
10. Martha Castillo Noriega / Mirna Romero Coloma
    Regaining Leadership through Ontological Coaching for Female EFL Instructors
    There has been a persistent debate about the contradiction of how male and female leaders manage organizations. In education, even though female EFL instructors have been supported in a natural way, certain traits of leadership have been omitted from their position as leaders of their classes or in administrative positions. This qualitative case study describes the leadership skills needed to regain leadership in an educational institution with the approach of Ontological coaching as a tool to enhance body, emotions, and language in order to improve female EFL instruction. The subject leader of this study is a female EFL instructor and coordinator of two academic areas in an elementary school. In-depth interviews were used to identify the perceptions of the administrators, colleagues, and subordinates about her performance as the leader of her teams; while three self-assessments helped the subject leader identify her most remarkable leadership skills.
    Overall analysis indicates that trust, effective communication, support, concern about well-being, tactfulness, and assertiveness are the most common traits that, linked to Ontological coaching, allow female EFL instructors to regain leadership in their classes. One remarkable result that emerged from the findings was that even though Ontological Coaching has not been related to education, its origins are solely based on theories of leadership in education that enables female EFL instructors to accept the fact of being humans with different perceptions in a changing world that affect their personal and professional life.
11. Hee Sio Ching
    Direct vs Indirect indicators in Negotiation of Meaning among High Proficiency ESL Learners: Gender Interaction
    In negotiation of meaning, an ‘indicator’ or signal of non-understanding plays an important role in second language acquisition as it prompts for modified interaction. As indicators have an impact on the type of linguistic responses produced (Pica et al., 1989), it is important to investigate the forms of indicators produced by second language learners during an interaction. This study utilizes Gass and Varonis (1986) categorization of direct and indirect indicators to examine the types of indicators produced by female and male interlocutors in face to face interaction. The different types of indicators produced affect the responses in an interaction. For example, an indirect indicator may trigger in a form of clarification responses while direct indicators may prompt for immediate and explicit responses. 24 high-proficiency learners participated in this study; 12 females and 12 males and paired in mixed gender dyads. Two tasks were utilized to elicit the data. The study found both genders produced higher number of indirect indicators compared to direct indicators. However, the females are shown to produce greater number of direct and indirect indicators where this suggests that females required more input and the males prefer to produce modified output that can be beneficial to SLA.
12. Xuying Fan
    An Investigation of Teachers’Interpretations and Practice of Teaching Thinking Skills in Chinese EFL classrooms
    The teaching of thinking skills has received extensive attention in mainstream education, yet remains under-researched in TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages). More particularly, very little attention has been given to TESOL teachers’ understanding of thinking skills. The primary purpose of this case study is to investigate Chinese primary school teachers’ conceptions of thinking skills and how they promoted students’ thinking in class. Four EFL teachers were interviewed and teaching classes were video recorded (1,120 minutes) and transcribed for discourse analysis purposes. The research findings show that participants adopted different methods, such as questioning techniques, the use of silence, and collaborative learning, to promote students’ higher-order thinking. The findings indicate how the Chinese learning style has been misinterpreted; they overturn claims that the Chinese learning style is rooted in a surface approach to learning which does not generate in-depth thinking. Based on the results of this research study, a number of suggestions are made for future research studies and for the development and improvement of the EFL curriculum.
13. Kimberly Joy R. Villanueva
    The Bet, (A Pop Fiction): A Symbol of Achievement and Inspiration
    Literature or Latin Literature can be referred to work as the result of creative imagination, such as poetry, drama, fiction, nonfiction, journalism, and song. This definition, without much ado thus confirms that, The Bet, ( a Pop Fiction), written by the author of this paper is a guaranteed work of literature. As a representative literary writing, it has expressed forms of human experiences as created by the author who loves to do imagining sprees, all serving as lessons that any person can relate to himself or can learn from by himself. Truly, the book as a symbol of achievement by the author, as a result of her many challenges during the writing stage, she will gladly recall for future young writers who may attempt to pursue this similar pop fiction-writing-endeavor. Moreover, the remarkable effect from among the readers’ milieu, spending some time reading the book has encountered learning experiences too. Lastly, the unbelievable approval and acceptance by one famous movie production company, converting it to a movie adaptation, have all proven that the book has credibility, a source of inspiration and a type of reading material not implying sheer youth awe and wonder, but integrating morals deserving emulation by these promising generation. This qualitative study will include discussions on the Items stated, and correlations as necessary to qualify the book as a literary writing. This important presentation will confidently culminate in leveling-up today’s youth on qualities worth taking to heart or not.
14. Corazon Dauz Sampang, Ph.D.
    College Students' Essays: A Subject Analysis
    Teaching essay writing to college students can be dull and monotonous; however, the fruit derived from hard work is encompassing. Proper motivation and heartfelt support to students are the keywords to help them do their best in their college work. Teaching can then be deemed self-fulfilling, if the teacher has her ‘head and hands’ full with related ideas, some examples to share and the ‘readiness’ to teach essay writing well. This study highlighted the following: 1. What is a Subject Analysis type of study? 2. What subjects were revealed in the college students’ essays? 3. How did the subjects become reflective in the students’ essays, such as preparing for an examination, their personal life as a whole, their goals, ambitions, friendship, inspiration, family, an important event or celebration, and even their gratefulness to God.. 4. What implications could these observations give to the teaching of paragraph and essay writing? Such students’ essays were written from November-December, 2015 during their English 2 or Writing in the Discipline Classes. The students’ essays reflected how they survived their personal challenges, appreciated family togetherness, and found hope on the Christmas Season. The paper interestingly revealed among others some understanding on their emotions, aspirations, and choice of activities or models. A simple qualitative study, yet this effort can earnestly touch and encourage teachers that inevitable motivation and wholehearted guidance in the classroom will definitely lead to an eventual difference in the students’ work outputs.
15. Tanzil Huda
    Gender-Based Communication Strategy
    The issue on gender differences has become one of the research topics for a few decades and considered as one of the important factors in second or foreign language acquisition. This study is aimed at investigating the communication strategies of male and female EFL learners which specifically analyzes the following issues i.e., how male and female EFL learners performed their communication strategies; what kinds of communication strategies which were established by male and female EFL learners. The study is expected to give significance information about communication strategies performed by male and female EFL learners in non-English mainstream. This study may also give a valuable contribution to the area of language teaching for it will give the other perspective about the gender issue in language acquisition and learning. This study was conducted by employing a qualitative approach. While the design of this study was descriptive as it tried to describe data represented in the form of spoken utterances which transcribed in written form. The subjects of the study who also became the source of data were the fourth and fifth semester undergraduate students of English Education Program. Based on the findings of this study, the conclusion of the research is drawn as the followings. English language learners overcome their communication problems by using communication strategies. Generally, the subjects resorted to using some kinds of strategy while communicating to overcome their communicative problems. Strategies adopted by the learners were determined by knowledge of the language they possessed. The results of the study also indicated that the majority of the English language learners used achievement strategies to cope with problems.
16. Yoko Kobayashi / Jitsuko Kitsuno
    Considering Professional Identity: A Case Study of a Female English Teacher in Secondary Education
    This research is about the life story of a Japanese woman teaching English as a part-time teacher at a junior high school in Japan. It is a case study that considers what can constitute a teacher’s professional identity. A significant number of Japanese women do not work while their children are little. They go back to work as low-wage part-timers only after finishing child-rearing. The same tendency is seen in the context of education. Women in their 30s or older have difficulty finding full-time teaching positions even if they are qualified enough. The interviewee of this study is one of those women. This study sought her motivation as a teacher, the gap between reality and ideals, and the relationship with her family through analyzing the narrative data and aim to draw a part-time teacher’s professional identity. Applying Gee’s perspectives of identity, several elements were found; 1) “woman” and “daughter;” 2) “mother,” “homemaker,” and “teacher”; 3) “a middle-aged woman in the neighborhood”; 4) “part-timer.” Motherhood could be a part of professional identity in the case of female teachers with children.
17. Rosalyn S. Herrera
    Graphic Organizers as Effective Tools in Improving Reading Comprehension in English
    English language changes lives. As an international language, it becomes the gateway for many people to progress and to global competitiveness. In K12 English in the Philippines, this lays stress on the prominent skills: listening, speaking and viewing; reading, viewing and responding; writing and representing as it enhances the thinking skills: critical, creative; and the metacognition. Of all, it is in reading where the students get informed with practically almost anything. So, an English teacher must see to it that her students easily understand the language by utilizing varied strategies. Only, some students have difficulties because of indifference to reading. Acknowledging the need to improve the reading comprehension skills of the students, this study will find out the effectiveness of using graphic organizers in improving the reading comprehension in English of the fifteen Grade 8 – Timothy students; determine the level of comprehension of the groups based on the speed and comprehension tests and pre- test scores; discover if there is a significant difference in the students’ reading comprehension between those who are exposed to the graphic organizers and to those in the traditional teaching – learning methodology; and, determine if there is a significant improvement in the reading comprehension of the fifteen identified students in the lowest level of reading using the graphic organizers.
18. Mania Nosratinia / Niousha Nikpanjeh
    Promoting Foreign Language Learners’ Writing: Comparing the Impact of Oral Conferencing and Collaborative Writing
    This study was an attempt to compare the effect of oral conferencing alongside collaborative writing on writing ability of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners. For this purpose, a piloted sample of the Preliminary English Test (PET) was administered to 90 intermediate female EFL learners, between 20 and 32 years old (Mage = 26). The results of this test enabled the researchers to select 60 homogenous individuals who were then randomly assigned into two experimental groups of 30 named “oral conferencing group” and “collaborative writing group”. To ensure the homogeneity among the participants in terms of their writing ability before the treatment, their scores on the writing section of the PET test were analyzed in isolation and it was considered as the pretest of the study. Oral conferencing included the discussions and negotiations among the participants and the teacher before and after writing activities followed by live teacher-student as well as student-student feedbacks. In the collaborative writing group, the participants wrote compositions in groups based on the same topics introduced in the oral conferencing group. At the end, both experimental groups were given another piloted writing section of the PET test as the posttest. The analysis of the test scores using an independent samples t-test and analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) revealed that there is a significant difference between the effect of oral conferencing and collaborative writing on EFL learners’ writing ability. It was concluded that the ability of EFL learners’ writing was more affected by applying oral conferencing rather than collaborative writing.

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