AILA Matters

Submitted by Shawn Loewen

AILA Research Networks: Call for Applications

Deadline: 31 October 2014

Research Networks (ReNs) within AILA are formed for promoting researchand disseminating their research findings inside and outside AILA. Each ReNfocuses on special topic areas of Applied Linguistics that have potential fornew cross-disciplinary research. ReNs exist for three years and can berenewed upon reapplication.

The criteria for ReNs includes:

• at least five members, some of whom should be new scholars;• multinational composition with universities from at least three countries;• participants are active in the research area of the ReN;• a research area pertaining to applied linguistics;• a commitment to fill a ReN symposium slot at the AILA Congress three

years hence and;• a report of the activities of the last three years if your ReN is seeking

renewal.

For applications (both renewals and new applications), the ReN convenormust submit a proposal to the ReN Coordinator. The proposal shouldconsist of:

• a statement concerning the scope of the ReN;• a list of the participants of the ReN and their affiliation;• a plan for ReN activities for the upcoming three years; and• a design for a ReN symposium at the 17th AILA Congress.

Applications to set up a ReN should be submitted between 1 September2014 and 31 October 2014. Submissions should be sent to the AILA ReNCoordinator (shawn.loewen@aila.info).

Notification of acceptance will occur by 31 January 2015.

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International Journal of Applied Linguistics ◆ Vol. 24 ◆ No. 2 ◆ 2014

© 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd doi: 10.1111/ijal.12066

Interlocutor/Instructor Individual Differences in Cognition andSecond Language Acquisition

Convenor: Laura Gurzynski-Weiss Indiana Universitylgurzyns@indiana.eduwww.IndividualDifferencesinSLA.com

In its inaugural three-year term, the aim of the ReN on Interlocutor/Instructor Individual Differences in Cognition and Second LanguageAcquisition was to launch a central research network for the systematicinvestigation of the role of interlocutor and instructor individual differences(IDs) in cognition and behavior believed to affect second language acquisition(SLA). These past three years, the ReN has formed and maintained a centralhub for interlocutor ID research (www.individualdifferencesinsla.com),grown in scope and collaboration, and held a yearly meeting at the AmericanAssociation of Applied Linguists. We look forward to presenting a Symposiumat the 2014 World Congress of International Applied Linguists the morning ofWednesday, 13 August (talks outlined below). We will also be having a socialevent at AILA to foster additional discussion and facilitate collaboration,details to be announced on the ReN website and via Linguistlist.

Our ReN Symposium at AILA will focus on the relationship betweeninterlocutor or instructor individual difference factors (such as native language,gender, teaching experience, educational and research background, etc.) in relationto their cognition and/or behavior regarding factors believed to affect languageacquisition in instructed settings (input, instruction, feedback and gestures, tasks,elicitation of output, etc.). Our presentation lineup will be as follows:

Instructor/Interlucutor Individual Differences in Cognition andSLA: AILA ReN Symposium Brisbane 2014

Colloquium introduction

“Why consider interlocutor/instructor individual differences in SLAresearch? Examining the role of the interlocutor from severaltheoretical perspectives” Laura Gurzynski-Weiss, Indiana University

Empirical studies

“The role of interlocutor training and orientation in interactive taskperformance” Charlene Polio and Susan M. Gass, Michigan StateUniversity

We report on two intervention studies that attempt to shift interlocutors’attention away from task completion to language learning. The first study

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involved preservice teachers, while the second study gave learners differenttask objectives in order to change their orientation. Implications for teacherand learner training are discussed.

“How individual differences mediate instructor cognition and theirprovision of learning opportunities in the classroom” LauraGurzynski-Weiss, Indiana University

This paper reports on three studies examining instructor cognition andbehavior regarding their provision of input, feedback and tasks during non-experimental Spanish FL lessons; learner interaction opportunities are alsodiscussed. Results demonstrate that both cognition and behavior appear to bemediated by instructor individual differences, including native language,research, and educational background.

“Interlocutors’ gender impact on L2 acquisition: Analysis of L2grammar acquisition via communicative tasks” Kimi Nakatsukasa,Texas Tech University

This study examined gestures’ effectiveness during recasts in relation toparticipant gender. 28 male and 20 female ESL learners were divided intoControl, Recasts, or Recasts+Gesture conditions. The results showed that thefemales outperformed the males in the Control and Recasts groups. However,the difference diminished in the Recast+Gesture condition.

“Investigating the role of instructor research background in relationto phonological input, instruction, and student attitudes” Avizia YimLong, Indiana University

The present study reports on an investigation of the relationship betweeninstructors’ research background (i.e. training in a particular field of study)and provision of pronunciation-related input, and how this relationship isbelieved to impact acquisition of a second language phonological system byclassroom learners.

Colloquium discussant

Charlene Polio, Michigan State University

Audience questions and discussion

The novel research studies to be presented at AILA, along with additionalinvited contributions, will be submitted for a proposed special issue of a

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journal. The ReN’s long-term purpose is to create awareness of existing andongoing research on interlocutor IDs, to encourage additional study andcollaboration, and to provide support in the development and exchange ofideas on projects investigating how interlocutor and instructor IDs influencecognition and subsequent behavior related to SLA processes, and what thismeans both in theory and practice. To this end, in this next phase of the ReN,we will continue to reach out to researchers who have worked or might beinterested in working in this exciting strand of empirical study. Planning isunderway for an inaugural conference on Interlocutor/Instructor IDs inCognition and SLA to be held at Indiana University. From this workshop wewill be looking to construct an edited volume on this burgeoning area ofresearch.

Our ReN is composed of seasoned and junior faculty from variouscountries and theoretical backgrounds, as well as graduate students. Wewelcome new members to our growing community; please contact the ReNConvenor if you are interested in joining us in our proposal submission forthe next three year term, if you are conducting studies on interlocutor orinstructor individual differences, or if you are interested in learning moreabout this area of study.

Language Teacher Education and Professional Development

Convenor: Yan Zhouzhouyan@bfsu.edu.cn

The Research Network on Language Teacher Education and ProfessionalDevelopment (ReN) has made great efforts in promoting the professionalgrowth of language teachers at all levels since AILA2011, Beijing. It hasincreasingly attracted the attention of scholars in the field since 2010 when thisReN was first established as a platform for interested researchers to shareinformation, exchange ideas and promote the professional development oflanguage teachers.

The Fifth National Symposium on Foreign Language Teacher Educationand Development in China was held on 6–8 December 2013, in GuangdongUniversity of Foreign Studies, China, which witnessed a markedimprovement on the quality of the research papers. A wide range of areassuch as teacher identity, teacher culture, teacher learning and teacher talk inthe classroom were explored at this biennial symposium by a total of nearly300 participants. To promote profundity and foster better interaction amongresearch communities, 10 research teams across the country presented theirprojects, demonstrating vigorous efforts in in-depth understanding of issuesconcerning the education and professional development of language teachers.

Besides the national conferences, featured local seminars and workshopswere held in various provinces on such issues as Computer-assisted Language

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Teaching and Learning, the Professional Development of Normal UniversityTeachers or Reform and Development of Teachers of College English Majors.Many members of this ReN attended these conferences as invited speakers orconveners and made significant contribution to the academic achievements inthis field.

Such conferences along with regular saloons and workshops jointly heldor sponsored by Research Centers attached to universities and publishershave brought about tremendous impact on in-service teacher development inChina in recent years. According to official statistics, the majority of collegeEnglish teachers have benefited from various forms of PD programs over thelast few years. A project that started last year with an aim to train outstandinghigh school teachers by the Beijing Commission of Education in collaborationwith university teacher educators has proved to be a new and effective modelfor high school teachers to benefit from the intellectual, financial andacademic resources of all educational sectors.

Details of such PD projects will be presented at our ReN symposium atAILA2014, Brisbane. The 3-hour colloquium will present findings fromseveral research projects on the prospects and challenges that influence theprofessional development of the language teachers in both basic and tertiaryeducation in Asia. Issues concerning teacher identity, teacher engagement inclassroom research, training models for teacher trainers, teacher-researchercollaboration, teachers’ working context and social relationships in thelearning communities will be addressed.

Academic Writing in English as a Foreign Language

Convenors: Rosa Munoz Luna and Lidia Taillefer University of Malaga

Academic writing is an academic skill that is very often taken for granted inundergraduate students. In the development of this ReN, we have discoveredthat such a skill becomes even more difficult to acquire/learn when studentsare writing in a foreign language (i.e. English). As a matter of fact, learnershave to practise both linguistic and non-linguistic aspects in order to achievewriting proficiency.

Research shows that high-scoring students are more aware ofmetalingusitic aspects in their own L2 academic writing; these learners areable to talk about linguistic features of their writing and also about their ownwriting processes. On the contrary, low-scoring writers cannot comment ontheir writing style or preferences, or about syntactic or lexical features of theirtexts.

Preliminary results so far show that extralinguistic variables are asinfluential as L2 grammatical proficiency. Writers’ academic attitudes andtheir awareness of the academic genre make the difference between high andlow scoring scripts. In the coming months, we aim to analyze more L2 writing

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samples in order to draw variable matrices that can unveil the successful L2writer’s profile.

AILA Research Network on Media Linguistics: Transwriting theNews: Brisbane On-line Pre-conference on YouTube

Convenors: Geert Jacobs and Daniel Perrin

Time is a scarce resource in academia, especially at conferences. This is whythe convenors of the Brisbane panel of the AILA Research Network on MediaLinguistics propose a 10-week pre-conference series of on-line interventions.The main objective of the series is to initiate a preliminary exploration ofthe panel themes, allowing for greater focus and enhanced synergy at theconference. In addition, it is hoped that new researchers will be attracted tothe panel.

Based on a schedule to be announced on 1 May, every week one memberof the AILA Research Network on Media Linguistics and/or contributor tothe Brisbane panel will upload a pechakucha presentation on a designatedYouTube channel. Pechakucha (Japanese: ) is a concise andfast-paced presentation format (originally devised in 2003 by Tokyo-basedarchitects Klein and Dytham) in which 20 slides are shown for 20 secondseach (amounting to 6 minutes and 40 seconds in total) (see also Lehtonen2011). The first (‘launch’) presentation will be delivered on 2 June by one of thetwo panel convenors, Geert Jacobs. The last (‘wrap-up’) presentation isscheduled on 4 August and will be delivered by the other panel convenor,Daniel Perrin. Each week the pechakuchas will be uploaded on Monday and,using the YouTube social network comment management system, the floorwill be open to an on-line discussion. In the opening session of the panel at theBrisbane conference, the convenors will present a summary of the on-lineinterventions.

The Brisbane panel of the AILA Research Network on Media Linguisticsfocuses on transmodal text production in journalistic media as both a sociallyrelevant field of language use and as a strategic field of applied linguistics (fora detailed announcement see, e.g. InJAL volume 24, issue 1, p. 141). Thepresentations provide insights into scientific projects in the emerging field ofmedia linguistics. From empirical micro and theoretical macro perspectives,strategies and practices of research development and knowledgetransformation are discussed.

Reference

Lehtonen, M. (2011). Communicating competence through pechakucha presentations.Journal of Business Communication 48.4: 464–81.

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