Education Today Has Become More Interesting and Article Review

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Education today has become more interesting and challenging than it has ever been before. This is particularly the case with the teaching and learning of English as a second language. Immigrants to the United States and other English speaking countries, for example, are faced with the challenge of not only learning a new language sufficiently to be able to communicate in their new environment, but also of fitting in with a lifestyle and culture that is more often than not completely foreign to them. These challenges can have both a motivating and demotivating effect on EFL and ESL learners. Teachers who are aware of these effects can then more effectively plan their lessons and work with such students to help them obtain optimal results. Hence, a myriad of research articles have seen the light regarding the challenges faced by this sector of learners. "EFL learners moving to an ESL context: Motivating and demotivating factors in English language learning among Iraqis" by Bao, Abdilah & Chowdhury (2012) is such an article. The authors explore the experiences of Iraqi learners who immigrated to the Australia by directly making contact with them to determine their specific experiences. In reviewing the article, it was found that the over all premise and specific elements were well targeted towards the purpose of the article, which was to determine the experiences and needs of Iraqi students immigrating to Australia.

The two research questions the authors pose include: "…what sociocultural and educational factors have motivated and demotivated Iraqi ESL learners? Has their motivation changed over time and what has caused this change?"

These are good research questions, since they focus on the specific premises identified by the background and earlier stated premise of the article, in that both the cultural and linguistic challenges attached to the immigration process are addressed (Bao, Abdilah & Chowdhury, 2012, p. 2). This correlates well with Spratt's (2000, p. 215) definition of sociological research, which is to "describe and explain social phenomena." Immigration and language learning have a dual sociological perspective from the viewpoint of both sociological and linguistic experts.

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Hence, there are a variety of angles such research could take. This is particularly the case with Iraqi immigrants, since a variety of cultural factors also come into the equation. The choice of research topic and questions is therefore a fertile one for both current and future research. The background discussion includes a literature review that provides a good basis for the investigation and later findings.

The chosen research method is qualitative, with data presented as numeric values from questionnaire responses (Bao, Abdilah & Chowdhury, 2012, p. 5). Since the research questions require open-ended responses from research participants, this is regarded as an appropriate method for this particular study. Spratt (2000, p. 215) confirms that this method is applied to gain descriptive data from smaller groups of research participants. As such, the authors' research include three Iraqi families who have recently arrived in Australia, numbering 12 in total. A combination of questionnaires and interviews were used to obtain information from the participants. Confidentiality was ensured for individuals participating in both these methods. While the research participants were described in detail, those distributing the questionnaires and conducting the interviews were not. This does not appear to be of great importance in terms of the study and its results.

What is of importance, however, is the particular ethical and political factors involved in the research (McTaggart, 1996, p. 3). There are particular political and cultural factors involved when focusing on Iraqi immigrants. Researchers need to be sensitive to these particular factors. Ethically, it has been mentioned that confidentiality was ensured for those participating in the questionnaires and interviews. Politically and culturally, sensitivity was shown when determining the demotivating factors in learning English for Iraqi children, and particularly for females. Basic illiteracy in both the first and second languages, for example, is found to be a major demotivating factor for Iraqi immigrants who are female. Centuries of poverty and a lack of educational opportunities have contributed to this. This is a factor to which the researchers have been sensitive. Conducting prior research before undertaking.....

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