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Many language teachers employ collaborative learning within their classrooms. However, expectations surrounding the efficacy of working collaboratively need to be empirically verified. This study employed dynamic assessment to investigate whether learners who are situated within an undergraduate Qatari EFL context learn second language grammatical structures more effectively by working either collaboratively with their peers or individually. Interventionist dynamic assessment was used to quantify the extent of the learning gains made by male Arabic undergraduate EFL learners (N = 52) three times (pretest, posttest, and delayed posttest) over a 12-week period. In between the pretest and the posttest, six form-focused treatment tasks were administered. The experimental group (n = 20) completed the tasks collaboratively with their peers; a comparison group (n = 16) completed the tasks individually; and a control group (n = 16) did not complete the tasks. The target structures were the simple past passive and the present continuous passive. A Mood's median test (Mood, 1954) found no statistically significant differences between the collaborative condition and the individual condition. Although measuring emergent abilities which are still in the process of developing provided a more complete picture of the efficacy of working collaboratively, the lack of a statistically significant difference between the performances of the experimental and comparison groups for both target structures suggests that working collaboratively is not statistically more effective in facilitating learners' linguistic development than working individually.

This study explores whether collaboratively writing about local issues would enable learners to deepen their understanding of their relationship with their own social context. A discursive space within an English for Academic Purposes (EAP) course at an institution of higher education in Qatar was created. This was accomplished by replacing the readings within a mainstream EAP textbook with texts which explored local issues. This provided an opportunity for female undergraduate students (N = 30) to write term papers about some of the discourses which permeated their lives. Data were collected using open-ended questionnaires as well as examining participants' term papers. Writing the term papers enabled some participants to become more aware of ongoing societal change and reflect on how they are located within this process. Elements of critical pedagogy were brought into a mainstream EAP course whilst at the same time respecting Qatar's traditions and culture.

This paper explores the philosophical underpinnings of three major educational research paradigms: scientific, interpretive, and critical. The aim was to outline and explore the interrelationships between each paradigm's ontology, epistemology, methodology and methods. This paper reveals and then discusses some of the underlying assumptions of educational research. Consequently, this paper is relevant to every English language teacher who is a reader of research.

A time-series analysis was used to investigate Arabic undergraduate students' (n = 50) perceptions of assessed group work in a major government institution of higher education in Qatar. A longitudinal mixed methods approach was employed. Likert scale questionnaires were completed over the duration of a collaborative writing event. Additionally, open-ended questionnaires were administered after the students received their grade for their term paper. This study found that the participants' perceptions were positive towards assessed group work throughout the duration of the event, changed in a statistically significant way after the submission of the first piece of formally assessed work, and are temporal and liable to change depending on what is experienced. The results of this study suggest that: assessed collaborative writing is a feasible pedagogical tool within higher education; undergraduate learners place value on group work as it enables them to collaboratively generate, share and develop their ideas; and researchers who investigate perceptual or attitudinal changes should consider whether their study requires time-sensitive methodology.