using conference submission data to uncover broad trends in language teaching

Paul Stapleton

USING CONFERENCE SUBMISSION DATA TO UNCOVER BROAD TRENDS IN LANGUAGE TEACHING: A CASE STUDY OF ONE CONFERENCE OVER 30 YEARS

© Fariba Chamani, 2015

INTRODUCTION Submissions to conferences provides rich material for

analyzing characteristics and trends within a conference’s history and that of similar conferences, as well as the associated field at large.

The present study reviews submissions to a language teachers’ conference in Japan (JALT National) over 30 years.

OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

The present study aims at exploring:

1. Strands and themes

2. Methodological and topical trends over time

3. Influential researchers

4. Similarities and differences between JALT and other similar conferences

LITERATURE REVIEW Review studies in language teaching:

1. Research methodology

2. Other areas

TABLE 1 A, STUDIES ON RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

Studies Topics Findings1. Stapleton & Collett (2010)

2. Benson, Chik, Huang & Wang (2009);

Ellis (2005); Gao, li & Lu (2001); Lazarton (2000 & 2005); Megnan (2005)

A review of trends in research methodology

A review of empirical studies

Increase of empirical studies

Increase in qualitative studies

TABLE 1B, OTHER REVIEW STUDIES

Topics Studies Effectiveness of L2 instruction Norris & Ortega (2000)

Effectiveness of written corrective Feedback

Ferris (2010)

Effects of L2 instruction oninterlanguage pragmatic development

Leon & Kaya (2006)

RESEARCH PROBLEM

The existing review studies in related literature have mostly examined journals and there are very few reviews of conferences while the data from conferences can indicate trends in research themes and methodologies in a given field. Thus, there is a need for doing review studies on conferences. The present study is an answer to such a need.

RESEARCH QUESTIONS1. How do changes in themes and strands in one conference over the past 30 years reflect trends within the field of language teaching?2. What recent trends appear in the field based on frequency counts of keywords in the abstract submissions of one conference?3. How do major language teaching conferences compare with one another with regard to the present strands on offer and what significance lies therein?4. What researchers are most frequently cited, and what does this reveal about the conference?5. How can the mining of conference data shed light on the language teaching profession?

METHOD1. Classifying strands according to themes based on presentation titles and associated strands from JALT from 1978 to 20102. Counting the frequency of keywords in the digital archive of abstracts from 2003 to 2010 (through using a concordencer)3. Counting the frequency of most cited researchers in the abstracts from 2003 to 20104. Comparing this conference with other major conferences with regard to themes and strands

RESULTS1. Themes and strands2. Keywords3. Comparison with other major

conferences4. Researchers

CONTINUE

SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES IN STRANDS

• “language Skills and Classroom Content” remains with most of its strands but “Grammar” disappears and Vocabulary has been added.

• Strands of “Classroom Pedagogy” declined in importance and replaced by “Language and Technology”.

• Two Strands of “Academic/Research” (Applied Linguistics & Curriculum) disappeared, while 8 more have been added: Bilingualism, Corpus, Gender Awareness, Global Issues, Learner Development, Motivation, Pragmatics and Professional Development.

• For “level of Learner”, Teaching Children only remains as Elementary and Pre-school.

• For “Administration”, two strands conflated to one.

SUMMARY OF THEMES & STRANDS• Two themes of Classroom Pedagogy & Language Skills dominated the content of

presentations (two third) in the early years of conference. However, in 2010

conference, although Speaking and Communication was the most ascribed strand,

the second most popular strand was Teacher Education.

• Likewise, Learner Development and Motivation were the third and sixth most

prevalent strands in 2010; however, these cognitive-oriented strands did not exist 30

years ago.

• Other notable changes include the advance of writing from the least to the most

popular of the four core skills.

• Testing and Vocabulary received little attention 30 years ago, but in 2010 these two

strands ranked seventh and eighth respectively.

FIGURE 1, SUBMISSION BY STRAND, 1970-80

FIGURE 2, SUBMISSION BY STRAND, 2010

TABLE 2, KEYWORDSKeyword 2003 2010 Percentage increase

Data

Reliability

Research

Quantitative

Pilot

Qualitative

questionnaire

78

6

182

5

0

13

30

174

25

408

21

19

60

68

198

370

199

373

-

410

202

COMPARISON WITH OTHER CONFERENCES• JALT is compared with four other major conferences: AAAL, AILA,

IATEEL & TESOL.

• The strands were categorized based on AILA classification of themes.

• In most cases, the strands in other 3 conferences mapped either

identically or closely onto AILA’s.

• Table 3 shows considerable convergence among the four conferences,

with many strands either overlapping in name or in kind.

4. RESEARCHERS

• Figure 3 shows the frequency counts of most cited

researchers in presentation abstracts over an eight-year

period starting in 2003.

• Table 4 reveals the specialty of each researcher who was

cited at least once in each of the 8 years.

FIGURE 3, NUMBER OF AUTHOR CITATION OVER TIME

TABLE 4, SPECIALTIES OF MOST CITED RESEARCHERSResearchers Specialty area

Nation, P.Vygotsky, L.Dornyei, Z.Ellis, R.Krashen, S.Swain, MRichards, J.Gardner, R.C.Day, R.Laufer, B.Nunan, D.Skehan, P.

Vocabulary acquisitonSociocultural theoryMotivationSLA (second language acquisition)SLASociocultural issuesSLAMotivationExtensive readingVocabulary acquisitionLearner-centered curriculumTask-based methods

DISCUSSION: THEMES & STRANDS• The changes in themes and strands over time can show the

patterns and suggest reasons behind some of the trends. • Language Skills and Classroom Content was the theme with the

most strands both at the early and most recent JALT conferences. However, changes in the strands within this theme reflect movements and beliefs within the field.

• Example 1: Appearance of vocabulary coupling with the disappearing of Grammar shows a shift in traditional beliefs in language teaching.

• Example 2: Disappearance of strands associated with Classroom Pedagogy shows the growing eclecticism among teachers in post-method era because they are aware one size does not fit all.

DISCUSSION: KEYWORDS

• Keyword frequency can show if presentations were moving in any particular direction.

• Frequency counts shows a trend towards more formally investigation of teaching practices over the 8 years. This is in line with the results of other studies that reveals a focus on research studies (Magnan, 2005).

• Example: Increased Frequency of the word “Qualitative”.

DISCUSSION: COMPARISON WITH OTHER CONFERENCES

• Comparisons between the conferences show striking

similarities, e.g. going beyond Language Pedagogy and paying

more attention to the themes like Language in Society .

• On the other hand, each conference has its own unique strands,

e.g. Study Abroad in JALT and Dogma in IATEFL.

DISCUSSION: RESEARCHERS• The dozen most-cited researchers represent a healthy cross-section of themes

and sub-areas within language teaching.

• One of the sub-themes that ranked highly was vocabulary acquisition

represented in the top dozen by Paul Nation and Batia Laufer. Clearly,

vocabulary acquisition has struck a chord among JALT presenters.

• It is interesting to note that some of the top-dozen-cited researchers have made

frequent visits to the JALT National conference as plenary and keynote

speakers.

CONCLUSION• This articles has focused on trends and characteristics of a given

conference. Through the review and synthesis of large amounts of data, the nature of one conference has been summarized and made more meaningful.

• This process shows that what is buried in conference archives has the potential, when synthesized, to bring perspective not only to trends within an individual conference, but also to broad directions within a field.

• Such studies can help organizers better understand where their conference stands in comparison to other similar ones so they can better position their offerings, such as themes and strands, in accordance with their own aims as well as the perceived needs of potential presenters.

THANK YOU