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This study explores the effects of teaching apologies at a discourse level on a group of Spanish learners of English as a foreign language both in the short and in the long-term. It adopts a one-group pre-, postand delayed post-test design to particularly examine the effectiveness of a pedagogical model on learners’ appropriate use of apology formulas not only after immediately receiving instruction, but also five months later. An interactive discourse completion test was used to analyse learners’ performance when apologising in different contrasting scenarios. Results show that the types of apology formulas produced by learners in the pretest differ significantly from those produced in the post-test, as well as in the delayed post-test. After receiving instruction, learners produced more elaborated apologetic responses attending to the sociopragmatic aspects involved in the different situations, a performance that was maintained over time. These results seem to demonstrate the positive benefits of instruction to foster learners’ pragmatic knowledge in terms of both frequency and variety of apology formulas not only in the short-term but also in the long-term., Este estudio explora el efecto de enseñar disculpas a un nivel discursivo a un grupo de estudiantes españoles que aprenden inglés como lengua extranjera tanto a corto como a largo plazo. Adopta pues un diseño de un grupo, pre- post- y post-test a largo plazo para examinar en concreto la eficacia de incorporar un modelo de enseñanza en el uso apropiado de fórmulas de disculpa no solo inmediatamente después de recibir la instrucción, sino también cinco meses más tarde. Se utilizó un test interactivo para completar el discurso y analizar el comportamiento de los estudiantes cuando pedían disculpas en diferentes situaciones. Los resultados indican que los tipos de fórmulas de disculpa que utilizan los estudiantes en el pre-test difieren significativamente de las utilizadas tanto en el post-test como en test distribuido a largo plazo. Después de recibir instrucción, los estudiantes usaron respuestas de disculpa más elaboradas prestando atención a los aspectos sociopragmáticos de cada situación, un comportamiento que se mantuvo a largo plazo. Estos resultados parecen demostrar los beneficios positivos de la enseñanza para fomentar el conocimiento pragmático de los estudiantes tanto en la frecuencia como en la variedad de fórmulas de disculpa no solo a corto sino también a largo plazo.

This article describes different perspectives in response to language change, and aligns the perspectives of language change to English language pedagogy in non-English speaking contexts. The Pre-Neogrammarian and Neo-grammarian linguists that believe the change leads to respectively language decay or language existence will be outlined. This article suggests that the theories derived from both perspectives can be applied to any language. Once there is cultural contact between languages, the dominant language tends to suppress the non-dominant language. Hence, besides focusing on changes that happen in English and the effects of the changes into this language, this article also considers that other language—in this case EFL teachers’ “local language”—experiences an adverse change as the result of the speakers’ interaction with English. Then, this article also describes how the changes might lead to EFL teachers’ adaptation in their practice and cause teachers’ dilemmas.

The present study focused on investigating EFL writing instruction in Indonesia due to the unavailability of previous researches focusing on writing instruction in EFL context. Most of research studies on EFL/ESL writing instruction were carried out at the university level. The present study was intended to describe approaches in teaching writing by high school English teachers in Indonesia in the early implementation of the competence-based curriculum. The present study applied qualitative research using the design of multi-case study. Data on approaches in teaching writing were collected from three high school English teachers piloting the implementation of the competence-based curriculum.

Having used an integrated approach comprising language-based approaches and stylistics as a pedagogical framework, the present paper serves to illustrate the impact of the proposed way of literature teaching in the Turkish EFL context. The main focus of the paper is to investigate and reflect the responses of Turkish undergraduates to the proposed teaching approach which is hoped to encourage students to experience literary texts directly as a part of a process of meaning-creation. The study groups involved in the research consisted of two comparable groups; an experimental group and a control group. However, only the experimental group students were exposed to the proposed teaching approach. The students in the control group, on the other hand, kept undergoing the teaching process they were used to having. In order to reveal the students’ responses to teaching methodologies employed in their classes, qualitative and quantitative investigations of the data gathered through interviews, questionnaires and field notes both in the experimental group and control group were compared and contrasted. The analyses of the data revealed significant differences in the nature of the students’ responses to the teaching approaches they received in their control and experimental groups. It was observed that there was a significant relation between the teaching methodologies employed in both classes, and levels of motivation, involvement and appreciation of the literary texts under study. The findings suggested that application of the proposed teaching approach significantly increased levels of students’ involvement and changed the classroom dynamics in a positive way, Le présent travail a pour but d’exposer quelles sont les influences d’une méthode d’enseignement de littérature, composé de “language-based” et “stylistics”, que l’on applique dans un cadre pédagogique dans des classes “Turkish EFL”. La focalisation de la présente étude est d’étudier et de révéler les réactions des étudiants de licence turcs envers cette méthode qui vise à les encourager à considérer les textes littéraires comme une partie du processus direct de la création de signification. Le groupe d’enquête sur lequel on travaille est divisé en deux groupes comparables tels que le groupe expérimen tal et celui de contrôle. Mais, c’est seulement les étudiants du groupe expérimental qui ont subi cette méthode proposée. Ceux du groupe de contrôle ont suivi la méthode traditionnelle. Pour révéler les réactions des étudiants sur les méthodes appliquées dans leurs classes, les données qualitatives et quantitatives, obtenues par des interviews, des questionnaires et des notes d’observation, ont été comparées les unes avec les autres. Les analyses des données obtenues ont montré que les réactions des étudiants de deux différents groupes sont, elles-aussi, différentes. Les motivations et les participations des étudiants sont directement liées à la méthode appliquée dans la classe. Selon les suites de ce travail, il est clair que la méthode proposée a augmenté considérablement le niveau de motivation et de participation des étudiants.