Mahmood Reza Atai; Esmat Babaii; Elahe Fazlollahi
Abstract
The problem of plagiarism has been a hot issue of concern to the academic community in recent years. In this study, we probed the factors which overtly or covertly lead to plagiarism growth among graduate students of agricultural sciences in Iran. To this end, we investigated the perceptions of 187 graduate ...
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The problem of plagiarism has been a hot issue of concern to the academic community in recent years. In this study, we probed the factors which overtly or covertly lead to plagiarism growth among graduate students of agricultural sciences in Iran. To this end, we investigated the perceptions of 187 graduate students in the field of agricultural sciences towards: the nature of plagiarism, different forms of plagiarism, and the underlying motives for plagiarism through a questionnaire. Academic literacies model was adopted as a reference point to uncover those injustices in the educational sector deterring the literacy development. The results revealed that most graduate students of agricultural sciences had a rather good understanding to the nature of plagiarism, and considered it as an unacceptable serious problem which should be avoided. Nonetheless, in marked contrast, their perceptions towards different forms of plagiarism unfolded further doubts on their understanding to who should be known as author and who is deserved to be awarded authorship. The results revealed that recursive practice of a long list of violations, seemingly, made the academics blind towards their faulty nature, pushed back the borders of literacy and made them common academic norm. The findings further indicated that plagiarism grows hand in hand with deviation from scientific values and devaluation of science, marketization of science and violations of academic commitments, and politicization of science and alienation from the universal standards. The findings could provide useful implications for revisiting and reforming the educational policies in general and English for Academic Purposes (EAP) programs in particular.
Mandana Zolghadri; Mahmood Reza Atai; Esmat Babaii
Abstract
The study investigated a second language teacher educator and teacher learners’ awareness of classroom interactional competence (CIC) to communicate pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) on a teacher education course in Iran. Therefore, the teacher educator’s classroom discourse was scrutinized ...
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The study investigated a second language teacher educator and teacher learners’ awareness of classroom interactional competence (CIC) to communicate pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) on a teacher education course in Iran. Therefore, the teacher educator’s classroom discourse was scrutinized using classroom observation triangulated with an interview data with the educator to characterize the interactional features of his talk-in-interaction with respective discourse modes. The resulting 43 interactures represented four interacture types which mediated Effective Eliciting, Shaping Learner Contribution, Facilitating Interactional Space Focused on the Learner, and Facilitating Interactional Space Focused on the Teacher. The corresponding mode analysis revealed frequent mode integrity incorporating classroom context mode with a pivotal role in all except Facilitating Interactional Space Focused on the Teacher interactures. Later, the taxonomy was incorporated into CIC TLA questionnaires. 32 teaching candidates, and the educator completed respective ethnographically-developed questionnaire versions indicating their awareness of the teacher educator’s choice of CIC interactures. Besides, the interview data concerning the TLA deliberation was triangulated with a Spearman rho correlation results of the perceived CIC strategy frequencies. Consequently, the confirmatory evidence for the significant degree of correspondence (rho = 0.67, n = 33, < 0.01) between the educator and teacher learners’ awareness revealed the student teachers’ heightened declarative TLA. The findings urge language teacher educators to tune interactures in type, mode, and intensity to the professional content and the TLA they negotiate with teacher learners thereby.
