Middle East Journal of TEFL

Foreword by Guest Chief Editor

Chief Editor — 2023-07-27

Welcome to Volume 3 Issue 1 of the Middle East Journal for TEFL. We present 4 papers for your
research studies. But before summarizing we need to discuss the challenges AI is placing on the
Research Review and publishing field.

Academic Writing in An English for Specific Purpose Context: A Japanese Perspective

Neil Heffernan — 2023-07-27

This paper outlines an academic writing course that was taught in Japan to 100 students who took
the course as a precursor to a study abroad program at the University of British Columbia (UBC),
Vancouver, Canada. The steps taken to ensure that the students would be properly prepared for
their academic life in Canada and their study abroad experience as a whole are also delineated.
The results demonstrate that upon returning from an 8-month stay in Vancouver, the students
showed a dramatic improvement in their writing abilities. Indeed, they displayed not only high
writing abilities, but the ability to maintain solid grades in their other courses during their time in
Canada. Finally, overall enjoyment of the course was deemed to be extremely high, further adding
to the students’ satisfaction with the program.

Teaching Shakespeare in China within a Communicative Orientation

JIAO Min — 2023-07-27

This article outlines the necessity and challenges of teaching Shakespeare to EFL students in
China. It argues that teaching Shakespeare’s plays fulfills the multidimensional purposes of
English learning including developing linguistic, literary and cultural competence, as well as
facilitating critical capacity and personal enrichment, which are indispensable for advanced
language learners. Through the introduction of the teaching procedures of Shakespeare’s Henry V
and its two film versions, which are designed within a communicative orientation, it concludes
that Content-Based Instruction (CBI) and Task-based instruction (TBI) are central to fulfilling the
aforementioned goals in literature teaching, and can cope-well with the tough challenges in
teaching a difficult author to EFL students.

The Impact of Feedback to Improve Writing Skills

Bhaskara Rao Chintha — 2023-07-27

The present study was conducted to highlight the importance of feedback and as a response to the
need to improve independent writing habits in ESL learners. It is suggested that teachers use
written feedback as an effective tool for the teaching of composition writing through multiple draft
approaches. The students expressed in this study they haven’t got any kind of feedback since their
schooling. In fact they felt that they required feedback for improving the skills in composition
writing. It was claimed the earlier research that, multiple – draft approach leads to effective
writing. This study explored that what are the comments more useful to the students in rewriting
their mistakes. This study also explores that, whether the feedback is given individual, or in a
group, there is no much differnce, but according to students group, feedback is more effective,
since the peer can discuss the feedback and write the proper change.

HEDGING ISSUES IN LANGUAGE DOCTORAL DISSERTATIONS IN ESL SETTING

Colette Lydio — 2023-07-27

Hedges, the rhetorical devices in mitigating ideas are essential in research writing. This
exploratory study analyzed 10 journal-type language doctoral dissertations with a total of 92,726
words in an ESL setting to identify the hedges used and the issues in using hedges. Using manual
corpus analysis, the study reveals that the language dissertation participants mainly made use of
modal lexical verbs, modals, and epistemic adverbs as hedges in their papers. Although all classes
of hedges were used, the total frequency of 1,279 and the few hedges in each category used imply
inadequacy. The analysis also discloses structural issues of limited use of hedges, inconsistency in
mitigating intent, unnecessary use of hedges, and limited hedging vocabulary. Highlighted by the
findings is a need for postgraduate language ESL writers for explicit instruction in hedging for its
skillful applications in research and general discourse texts as individual research writers, as
research advisers and editors, and as teachers of effective discourse.