Contemporary Issues in Foreign Language Education (eBook)

This edited volume offers an insightful theoretical conceptualization of issues central to 21st century foreign language learning and teaching. Drawing on research results obtained in the fields of pedagogy, social psychology and sociology of education, this book provides a comprehensive practical exploration of issues experienced by researchers in Poland and in Europe, and which can easily find far-reaching implications in other educational contexts.

Part I, Focus on the Teacher, includes seven texts discussing topics relevant to teacher initial and in-service education, as well as the functioning of foreign language instructors in educational systems. The eight contributions included in Part II, Focus on the Learner, explore learner-internal and learner-external factors that affect the effectiveness of the language learning process.

The exploration of key contemporary  topics and the wide range of methodologies applied make this book of high relevance to Second Language Acquisition scholars, teacher educators,  teachers, and language education policy makers.

Malgorzata Baran-Lucarz holds a PhD from the University of Wroclaw, which she has been affiliated to  since  2004. In  1998-2013  she  worked  also  as  a  teacher  trainer  at  the  Teacher  Training  College  in Wroclaw. She has published widely on IDs (anxiety,  aptitude, motivation, personality, cognitive style, WTC) in relation to FL pronunciation acquisition and pronunciation pedagogy, teacher  development and  training. She is also interested in inclusive education and teaching older adults. At the moment  she  is  involved  in  an  Erasmus+ KA2 Strategic Partnership Project 'Digital Tools for Inclusive Foreign Language Education'. For over two decades she has been conducting several courses and workshops for pre-and in-service EFL teachers.

Anna Czura - a  researcher, academic teacher and teacher trainer. Her research interests centre around language assessment, intercultural competence, learning mobility, virtual exchange, CLIL and European language  policy.  She  is  an  assistant  professor  in  the  Institute  of  English  Studies  at  University  of Wroclaw. In 2019-2021 she was a post-doctoral researcher and Marie Curie fellow (MSCA IF) at the Department of Language and Literature Education and Social Science Education of the Autonomous University of Barcelona. She also acts as the Polish Ministry of Education expert who certifies published teaching materials for school use.

 Malgorzata Jedynak is a researcher, academic teacher and teacher trainer in the  Institute  of  English Studies at the University of Wroclaw. She is a specialist in the pedagogy of blindness and visual impairments and a chair of TYFLO Research Group whose members conduct interdisciplinary research in the fields of language learning and teaching, typhlopsychology and special education in the context of  blind and partially sighted learners. Her research interests revolve around typhlo-sciences (typhlopedagogy, typhlopsychology), EU language   education policies,   intercultural issues and teaching L2 pronunciation. Currently she is involved in the project 'Comparative study of pre-pandemic and pandemic well-being of visually impaired learners of English'.

Anna Klimas is a researcher, academic teacher and teacher trainer. She holds a PhD in Linguistics from the University of Wroclaw. Her research interests in the field of foreign language teaching concentrate on  teacher  education  and  professional  development,  learner  and  teacher  motivation  and  autonomy, research  methods  used  in  classroom-based  studies,  developing  21st  century  skills  as  well  as  the application of new technologies in L2 instruction. Currently she is involved in Erasmus+ KA2 Strategic Partnership Project 'Digital Tools for Inclusive Foreign Language Education'.

Agata Slowik-Krogulec is an assistant professor at the Institute of English Studies, at the University of Wroclaw, Poland. She completed her PhD on older adult learners' and their teachers' subjective theories related to foreign language education in later life. She is an applied linguist, teacher trainer as well as a CELTA and DELTA qualified teacher with more than ten years of experience in teaching various age groups, including learners at the age of 60 and older, at the University of the Third Age in Wroclaw and in private language schools. Her principal research areas are: Foreign Language Geragogy (FLG, i.e. Foreign  Language  Learning  and  Teaching  to  Older  Adults),  Lifelong  Learning,  Individual  Learner Differences, as well as the Age Factor and Positive Psychology in SLA.