This article reviews research on peer feedback in second language (L2) writing published in the last decade (i.e. 2005–2014). We analyse first the theoretical underpinnings that have informed both peer feedback research and the pedagogical use of peer feedback in L2 writing instruction. We also provide a critical interpretation of existing peer feedback research and discuss seven important themes emerging from the literature, that is, (1) effectiveness of peer feedback compared with teacher and self-feedback; (2) benefits of peer feedback for feedback-givers; (3) computer-mediated peer feedback; (4) peer feedback training; (5) student stances and motives; (6) peer interaction and group dynamics; and (7) cultural issues in peer feedback. Next, we examine the contextual and methodological issues in peer feedback research and then conclude the article with implications for future research.

We review and synthesize empirical evidence at the intersection of two populations: children with language learning impairment (LLI) and children from immigrant families who learn a single language from birth and a second language beginning in early childhood. LLI is a high incidence disorder that, in recent years, has been referred to by researchers and clinical educators as specific language impairment (SLI), primary language impairment (PLI), developmental language disorder or language disorder not otherwise specified. Over the past two decades, significant international attention has been directed at the LLI-sequential bilingual learner interface. Researchers have developed linguistic profiles of children with LLI who are learning different language pairs, investigated the diagnostic accuracy of various measures and, more recently, examined the relative efficacy of different treatment protocols. Participants in these studies range in age from 3 to 12 years. A main goal of this review is to relate available evidence to key theoretical and pedagogical issues. An additional aim is to indicate main areas of need for future research.

This paper provides an overview of the research into deaf children's bilingualism and bilingual education through a synthesis of studies published over the last 15 years. This review brings together the linguistic and pedagogical work on bimodal bilingualism to inform educational practice. The first section of the review provides a synthesis of the research, addressing linguistic, cognitive and social aspects of bimodal bilingualism. This is followed by a focus on bimodal bilingual language experience and use in different learning contexts. These first two sections provide the context for the main focus of the review: education and learning. The third section reports on links made between bimodal bilingualism and learning with regard to deaf children's literacy development. The fourth section examines further research into bimodal bilingual pedagogies. The final section considers the theoretical and practical implications of the field to date in developing a contemporary model of bimodal bilingual education for deaf children. It also charts future research priorities.

This state-of-the art paper focuses on the issue of linguistic giftedness, somewhat neglected in the second language acquisition (SLA) literature, attempting to reconceptualize, expand and update this concept in response to latest developments in the fields of psychology, linguistics and neurology. It first discusses contemporary perspectives on foreign language aptitude, concentrating in particular on the models proposed by Skehan (1998), Robinson (2002) and Sternberg (2002). This is followed by a discussion of the definitions of talented individuals and the criteria for their selection, as well as an overview of empirical research on gifted language learners, divided into early studies with those focusing on the ultimate attainment of post-pubescent learners, and those dealing with super-learners of foreign languages. The subsequent sections touch upon such issues as the relationship between first language (L1) ability and second language (L2) aptitude, and linguistic giftedness and intelligence, memory, personality factors and language learning strategies, as well as neurolinguistic research on brain functioning in gifted learners. The paper closes with the discussion of the limitations of current research, its future directions and methodological considerations.

Speakers of a second language (L2), regardless of proficiency level, communicate for specific purposes. For example, an L2 speaker of English may wish to build rapport with a co-worker by chatting about the weather. The speaker will draw on various resources to accomplish her communicative purposes. For instance, the speaker may say ‘falling ice’ if she has forgotten the word ‘hail’ or may repeat the last few words of her interlocutor's utterance to show that she is listening and engaged. The term communication strategies (CSs) refers to the strategic use of various resources (both linguistic and non-linguistic) for communicative purposes. While speakers also use CSs in their native languages (L1s), research on L2 CS use is particularly interesting because speakers’ L2 linguistic resources and the associated cognitive processes are typically less developed, compared to those in their L1. Therefore, for L2 users to accomplish their communicative purposes in the L2, it is important that they effectively use the resources available to them. This research timeline presents key developments in theoretical understanding and empirical research targeting L2 CSs, mainly in oral communication. The timeline places particular emphasis on the evolution of theoretical approaches to the study of CSs and the consequent expansion of research in terms of the nature of participants, speech samples, and analytical tools used.

This statement opens the first collection of papers that specifically consider the deterioration of linguistic knowledge among bilinguals (Lambert & Freed 1982: see timeline), a field which in one of the papers in the volume is referred to as being in an ‘antenatal’ state (Berko-Gleason 1982: 22). Thirty years down the line it is still a fact that far less is known about the loss or attrition of language skills than about their acquisition.

This article provides a timeline of research on form-focused instruction (FFI). Over the past 40 years, research on the role of instruction has undergone many changes. Much of the early research concentrated on determining whether formal instruction makes any difference in the development of learner language. This question was motivated in part by a theoretical discussion in the field of cognitive psychology over the role of explicit versus implicit learning, on the one hand, and a debate in the field of second language acquisition (SLA) over the role of naturalistic exposure versus formal instruction, on the other. In the early 1980s, for example, based on the notion that the processes involved in second language (L2) learning are similar to those in first language (L1) learning, Krashen (e.g., Krashen 1981, 1982, 1985) made a distinction between learning and acquisition and claimed that an L2 should be acquired through natural exposure not learned through formal instruction. Thus, he claimed that FFI has little beneficial effect on language acquisition. This position, which has also been known as a ‘zero position’ on instruction, was also taken by a number of other researchers who argued that L1 and L2 learning follow similar processes and that what L2 learners need in order to acquire a second language is naturalistic exposure to meaning-focused communication rather than formal instruction (Dulay & Burt 1974; Felix 1981; Prabhu 1987; Schwartz 1993; Zobl 1995).

Reading and writing relations, as this concept applies to academic learning contexts, whether as a major way to learn language or academic content, is a pervasive issue in English for academic purposes (EAP) contexts. In many cases, this major link between reading/writing and academic learning is true even though explicit discussions of this relationship are commonly identified in other ways. For example, research on summarizing skills is an aspect of abilities that come under reading-writing relations. Similarly, topics including synthesis writing, note-taking, plagiarism, content-driven essay exams, term papers, theses, and dissertations, among other topics, are all aspects of reading-writing relations. These core academic skills become even more complex aspects of reading and writing together, when we add electronic texts, web page resources, and other media sources.

This article reviews the significant and diverse range of research in applied linguistics published in Australia in the period 2008–2014. Whilst acknowledging that a great deal of research by Australian scholars has been published internationally during these seven years, this review is based on books, journal articles, and conference proceedings published in Australia. Many of these sources will be unfamiliar to an international audience, and the purpose of this article is to highlight this body of research and the themes emerging from it. The journals selected in this review include Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, Australian Review of Applied Linguistics (ARAL), BABEL, English in Australia, English Australia, Papers in Language Testing and Assessment, Prospect: An Australian Journal of TESOL, TESOL in Context, and University of Sydney Papers in TESOL. Selected refereed proceedings are from key national conferences including: ALAA (Applied Linguistics Association of Australia), ACTA (Australian Council of TESOL Association), ASFLA (Australian Systemic Functional Linguistics Association), and ALS (Australian Linguistics Society). Our review of selected applied linguistics work revolves around the following themes: the responses to the needs of government planning and policy; the complexity of Australia's multicultural, multilingual society; the concern for recognizing context and culture as key factors in language and language learning; social activism in supporting language pedagogy and literacy programmes at all levels of education; and acknowledgement of the unique place held by Indigenous languages and Aboriginal English in the national linguistic landscape.

This paper reviews a purposive sample of 23 doctoral dissertations in second language (L2) education, completed between 2009 and 2013 and published in Germany. From amongst all (approx. 70) relevant dissertations from this period, the following three broad thematic strands can be identified, for which a selection of exemplary dissertations was chosen to review: (1) Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL); (2) learning and teaching about culture in the language classroom; and (3) language teacher education. Categorization of themes was guided by a bottom-up approach, clustering thematically (rather than methodologically) similar works. We identify relevant topics and link these with trends in research methodology (qualitative/quantitative/mixed-methods). We also discuss the depth and breadth of these dissertations and situate their scholarly contributions within German and international research on language education.

In this article we review research on English as a foreign language (EFL) teaching and learning published in Argentina between 2007 and 2013. This is the first review of a Latin American country in this series. Argentina has a century-long tradition of training EFL teachers but a comparatively shorter though fruitful history of foreign language (FL) research. The article examines 88 articles that appeared in locally published peer-reviewed conference proceedings, academic journals and one edited collection. The contributions cover a wide spectrum of topics that illustrates prominent research interests in the country, such as the role of imagination, emotion and affect in language comprehension and production, intercultural dimensions, FL teacher education and development, content and language integrated learning (CLIL), computer-assisted language learning (CALL), the teaching of English for academic or specific purposes, testing, assessment and evaluation, and materials design and course development. The review includes work by specialists whose research may not be known outside the boundaries of Argentina but who produce high-quality situated research that accounts for the specificity of the local educational setting.

This article reviews recent studies on English language teaching (ELT) in South Korea, where a great deal of research has been produced in recent years in local journals. In this article we review 95 studies from a pool of some 1,200 published between 2009 and 2014 on English language teaching and learning, focusing on research within the public school context. Using themes from the national curriculum as an organizing principle, the review covers selected studies in the following areas: (1) second language teacher education, (2) communicative language teaching, (3) language use and interaction in classrooms, (4) co-teaching with native-speaking English teachers, (5) curriculum and materials analysis, (6) treatments of teaching methods, and (7) assessment, testing and washback. We include commentary on the research undertaken in each area and conclude by discussing the limitations of the review and summarizing ideas for future research directions, perhaps the most important of which is questioning whether or not there is enough research of reasonable quality being produced to sustain roughly 60 journals publishing articles on English education in South Korea.

With global attention currently focused on the challenge of providing Education for All (UNESCO 2000), we must ensure that the language of teaching and learning remains a topic on the agenda towards making sure that the education being provided is effective. This is therefore a critical time to review medium of instruction debates, and to reassess what empirical evidence exists to guide policymaking that is both appropriate and achievable. Contributing to this endeavour, this paper argues for the approximate replication of two key studies. The first is Afolayan (1976), a widely-cited study conducted in Ife, Nigeria to test the effectiveness of teaching children in the mother tongue for six years of primary education. We argue that the frequency with which the success of this study is cited, without due attention paid to the details of its methodological procedure, may actually be detrimental to the success of other experiments, thus necessitating the careful replication of the original study. The second study is Siegel (1997b), one of the few studies that have been conducted to evaluate the impact of initial education in an English-based pidgin on the subsequent learning of English. We argue that there is an urgent need for replication of one of the few available studies of pidgins and creoles in education, given the prevalence of negative attitudes towards this category of languages.

Ever since Karen Price's ground-breaking work in 1983, we have known that same-language subtitles (captions) primarily intended for the deaf and hearing-impaired can provide access to foreign language films and TV programmes which would otherwise be virtually incomprehensible to non-native-speaker viewers. Since then, researchers have steadily built up our knowledge of how learners may make use of these when watching.

The question remains, however, whether, and to what extent, watching subtitled programmes over time helps develop learners’ language skills in various ways. Perhaps surprisingly, this question of long-term language development has still not been fully addressed in the research literature and we appear to be in a largely ‘confirmatory’ cycle. At an informal level, on the other hand, there are countless stories of learners who have been assisted in learning a foreign language by watching subtitled or captioned films and television.

I shall review the contributions of key research studies to build up a picture of the current state of our knowledge and go on to outline, first, the current gaps in research and, second, some encouraging new approaches to learning by autonomous ‘users’ of foreign-language Internet media and same-language subtitles across languages, now more widely available.

This article reviews doctoral research into English language teaching and learning completed between 2009 and 2013 at Turkish universities. The 25 dissertations reviewed here fall into these four general categories: (1) instructional variables and designs, (2) learners, (3) textbooks, and (4) development and evaluation. The majority of these dissertations focus on classroom teaching and learning. Half are particularly concerned with the effects of different instructional variables and designs on learning-related issues. The dissertations are presented with a focus on research methodologies to provide the reader with an evaluation of not only the validity of the findings in each study but also their strengths and weaknesses.

This lecture considers what reference and pedagogical grammars and grammar teaching materials for L2 learners should ideally include, based on corpus evidence from both native-speaker and learner corpora. I demonstrate how learner corpora can be used to track the emergence of grammatical features, from the elementary level to advanced, how learners get to grips with new grammar and what we can learn from the statistical output of error-coded corpora. Additionally, we look at how the divide between lexis and grammar becomes progressively blurred and how corpus information can best be used to produce useful grammars and teaching materials for students at different levels. The advanced level in particular is focused on. The lecture is presented within the framework of the English Profile Project (EPP), a large, international, inter-disciplinary project which uses corpora to investigate learner competence at different levels of the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR).

Today many second language (L2) teachers work with school-aged learners who need to be supported in their language development at the same time they learn school subjects. Applied linguists and researchers in second language acquisition (SLA) have much to contribute to those teachers, but to do so in more powerful ways calls for an orientation toward the goals of the content classroom. This plenary describes a project in which the theory of systemic functional linguistics is providing useful metalanguage for exploring language and meaning in curricular activities that also support disciplinary learning. It illustrates how language-based content teaching can provide the support children need.

In order to better understand the role of working memory in second language (L2) written production, this study contributes to recent research attempting to apply Kellogg's model of working memory in first language (L1) writing to L2 writing research (Ellis & Yuan 2004; Ong & Zhang 2010; Johnson, Mercado & Acevedo 2012). This paper describes an approximate replication of a study presented by Johnson et al. (2012) in order to determine whether the effects of pre-task planning sub-processes (idea generation, organization, and goal setting) are mediated by a hypothesized threshold of proficiency in the target language. To do this, the current study replicated a quasi-experimental research design to test the effect of specific pre-task planning sub-processes on the written language production of a group of L1 speakers of English. Using measures identical to those in Johnson et al. (2012), the study found no significant, multivariate effect of pre-task planning on the fluency and complexity of the participants' written language production, suggesting no support for the hypothesized threshold of general proficiency in the target language. The implications of the study's results are discussed in terms of Kellogg's model (1996) of working memory in L1 writing and its ability to describe L2 composing processes.

Interactive alignment is a phenomenon whereby interlocutors adopt and re-use each other's language patterns in the course of authentic interaction. According to the interactive alignment model, originally proposed by Pickering & Garrod (2004), this linguistic coordination is one way in which interlocutors achieve understanding in dialogue, occurring at the level of the lexicon, grammar, and pronunciation. The goal of this paper is to extend this model to second language (L2) pronunciation and to discuss its possible implications for L2 pronunciation teaching.

In this paper I propose an agenda for researching language learning motivation ‘through a small lens’, to counteract our tendency in the second language (L2) motivation field to engage with language learning and teaching processes at a rather general level. I argue that by adopting a more sharply focused or contextualized angle of inquiry, we may be able to understand better how motivation connects with specific aspects of second language acquisition (SLA) or particular features of linguistic development. Keeping the empirical focus narrow may also lead to interesting and illuminating analyses of motivation in relation to particular classroom events or to evolving situated interactions among teachers and learners. I propose a number of possible research tasks that might be undertaken by experienced researchers, teacher-researchers or student-researchers wishing to investigate language learning motivation ‘through a small lens’.