This study explored the effect of timing of feedback (i.e., immediate vs. delayed) and learners’ age (adolescent vs. adult) on the development of English regular past tense structure. Two intermediate classes of adolescent and adult learners were selected as the participants. Participants were asked to carry out two narrative tasks which set the context for the provision of corrective feedback. The selected target structure was the regular past tense –ed feature. The untimed grammaticality judgment test was used to measure explicit knowledge development and elicited imitation test was employed for the measurement of implicit learning. These tests were administered at the beginning of the study as pre-test, immediately after the provision of immediate feedback and again immediately after the provision of delayed corrective feedback. The results demonstrated that whereas both adolescent and adult learners improved their implicit knowledge after the delayed feedback, explicit knowledge was improved in adult learners after both immediate and delayed feedback but in delayed feedback in adolescent learners. The implications of the findings are discussed in light of theories of second language acquisition. پرونده مقاله

Free riding behavior or not contributing equally in group work, is a common obstacle in many cooperative activities in language learning. The present study aimed at comparing male and female EFL learners' attitude and their free riding tendency to use the benefits of lowering free riding behaviors in order to make group work more influential in language learning. To this purpose, 140 intermediate and upper intermediate Iranian EFL learners and 30 teachers participated in the study. Semi-structured interviews and questionnaires were used to investigate the topic. The obtained results revealed that the female learners act better in reducing free riding behaviors. The results further revealed a positive perception of interpersonal activities at both level of language proficiency-- intermediate and upper-intermediate. Actually, the obtained results showed that the intermediate group (males and females) acted more positively than the other group in this respect. The findings of the study bear some implications and suggestions for scholar interested in the topic of this. پرونده مقاله