Open Access Publications
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Open access publications by faculty, staff, postdocs, and graduate students from the English Language Institute.
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Item Bolstering Student Writing Through a Reading-to-Critique and Reading-to-Synthesize Approach(EnglishUSA Journal, 2024-01-19) Altalouli, Mahmoud; Bentahar, AdilThe authors elucidate two key components of the reading-to-write process—critique and outlining. The researchers, who are also classroom teachers, qualitatively examined the perspectives of undergraduate and graduate students on these instructional approaches in two IEPs. Findings from the study reiterate the key role of explicit and scaffolded instruction during literature review and synthesis paper writing.Item Making Thinking Visible: Reading Metacognitive Strategies in Intensive English Programs(Journal of English Learner Education, 2022-12) Bentahar, AdilThe use of metacognitive strategies has been linked to increased motivation for reading as well as reading fluency and accuracy. In this study, I evaluated whether teaching three metacognitive strategies (planning, monitoring, and evaluating) would (a) improve intensive English program international students’ metacognitive knowledge, which in turn would (b) improve their comprehension. Eight college English learners (ELs) completed the Metacognitive Awareness of Reading Strategy Inventory (MARSI) (Mokhtari et al., 2018) and a reading test at the beginning of a reading-writing course and again at the end of the course. The results revealed an increase from pretest to posttest in all three domains of reading strategies: global strategies, problem-solving strategies, and support strategies with statistically significant differences in each reading scale. Comprehension test scores revealed mixed results. Whereas performance on true/false and word reference tests did not change significantly from pretest to posttest, performance on wh questions improved across time.Item Listening Final Exam Construction: An Exercise in Technical Expertise and Cooperation from Stakeholders(The Journal of Asia TEFL, 2022-03-31) Fields, MichaelThis article describes the development and production of a complete suite of listening final exams at the English Language Institute (ELI) at the University of Delaware, a large public university in the USA. The ELI serves incoming international students at both undergraduate and graduate level. The ELI also serves students seeking to improve their English before beginning programs at other universities. In addition, it hosts special groups, such as visiting English teachers and scholars, businesspeople, and foreign university students enrolled in short courses. The English Language Institute runs eight-week courses at six levels, from beginner to advanced level, roughly corresponding to CEFR levels A1 through C1, though courses are not specifically benchmarked against the CEFR. At the end of each session, students take a series of final exams in reading, writing, listening, speaking, and grammar, which count as 20% of a final course grade that determines whether students will proceed to the next level.Item Educational Change in Saudi Arabia: Insights from One USA/KSA Teacher Professional Development Collaborative(International Education Studies, 2021-09-26) Bentahar, Adil; Copeland, Kathleen D.; Stevens, Scott G.; Vukelich, Carol J.Teacher professional development (PD) programs ideally evaluate how professional learning experiences empower teachers to be effective change agents in their disciplines and communities. The Khbrat [“experiences” in Arabic] program is a year-long, global teacher PD initiative launched by the Saudi Ministry of Education. The goal is to change the mindset of Saudi teachers through immersive experiences in the U.S. K-12 schools and university academic culture so that they can participate as effective “change agents” in the transformation of Saudi schools. Our mixed-methods study examined the impact of the Khbrat program on Saudi teachers’ leadership, classroom experiences, and sociocultural levels; the findings inspire new directions for program design with key insights into teacher PD program evaluation.