Foreign language teachers need to motivate their students to learn English. Literature can be a good means to achieve motivation in ELT classes. There has recently been a revival of interest in literature as a practical, motivating and an effective resource available for language learning. Therefore, we can assume that literature and authentic literary materials, especially short stories can enhance motivation of ELT students. Keeping this in mind, this study was carried out in an ELT classroom by using two homogeneous groups: an experimental group and a control group. First, for one semester, Experimental Group was provided with unabridged, authentic short stories, whereas Control Group was exposed to abridged and simplified texts and reading passages. The findings showed that the Experimental Group’s overall results of final exams and outcomes were better than that of the Control Group. Second, an attitude survey was used to understand the level of motivation of literature and to determine whether literature has a positive effect on reading and writing. The results suggested that use of short stories enhances learning and may be good motivational means in second and/or foreign language teaching settings through developing integrated reading, speaking, writing and listening skills. The results of this study may be beneficial to language practitioners in their classroom teaching

Foreign language teachers need to motivate their students to learn English. Literature can be a good means to achieve motivation in ELT classes. There has recently been a revival of interest in literature as a practical, motivating and an effective resource available for language learning. Therefore, we can assume that literature and authentic literary materials, especially short stories can enhance motivation of ELT students. Keeping this in mind, this study was carried out in an ELT classroom by using two homogeneous groups: an experimental group and a control group. First, for one semester, Experimental Group was provided with nabridged, authentic short stories, whereas Control Group was exposed to abridged and simplified texts and reading passages. The findings showed that the Experimental Group’s overall results of final exams and outcomes were better than that of the Control Group. Second,an attitude survey was used to understand the level of motivation of literature and to determine whether literature has a positive effect on reading and writing. The results suggested that use of short stories enhances learning and may be good motivational means in second and/or foreign language teaching settings through developing integrated reading,speaking, writing and listening skills. The results of this study may be beneficial to language practitioners in their classroom teaching

Learning responsibility is one of the responsibility types which are frequently emphasized particularly in recent years. However, determining to what extent schools and educators are able to make the students acquire learning responsibility is an important problem that should be paid attention. This study was aimed to develop a measurement tool which can be used to determine school learning responsibility levels of primary school students based on their self--perceptions. Study group of this study consisted of a total 579 primary school students. In development process of the scale, firstly, literature review was made and was interviewed with primary school teachers. Within the framework of validity analyses of the scale; (1) Exploratory factor analysis, (2) Confirmatory factor analysis, (3) Item-test correlations, (4) Item discrimination powers were done. The reliability analyses were done as calculated (1) internal consistency (2) determination and (3) unbiasedness coefficients. After exploratory factor analysis; a scale structure consisting of 24 items collected under 2 factors were observed. KMO value of the scale was 0.937; Bartlett’s test values were x2=4638,648; sd=276; p<0.001. Factor loads of the items were between 0.459 and 0.728. Amount of explained variance was 44.385%. Confirmatory factor analysis indicated that among model fit values s χ2/d (3.17), RMSEA (0.61), GFI (0.90), AGFI (0.88) showed an acceptable match while S-RMR (0.047), NNFI (0.97) CFI (0.97) and IFI (0.97) showed perfect match. Item--test correlations of the items in the scale were between 0.503 and 0.680; while t-test values related to discrimination powers were between 10.562 and 19.236. Each relationship and difference was significant at p<0.01 level. Internal consistency of the scale was Cronbach’s alpha 0.920. Unbiasedness coefficients were between Cronbach’s alpha 0.862 and 0.921. Coefficient of determination was 0.712 by Pearson’s test. It can be stated that School LearningResponsibility Scale (SLRS) is a valid and reliable scale which can be used to determine students’ levels of fulfilling learning responsibilities.Findings obtained from SLRS for students’ levels of fulfilling their learning responsibilities can be effectively used to determine potential precautions to be taken to make educational process more efficient and to encourage students to be individuals with learning responsibility. On the other hand, we hope that school administrators and teachers make realistic assessments about the cases of academic failure of students.

Research on educational usage of social networks focused on university students because of their more intense usage of medium. In this context, it is necessary to determine social network usage objectives, adaptation levels and patterns of prospective teachers as future educators. The main purpose of this study is to analyze prospective teachers in terms of intended uses of social network sites and the level of adoption of social networks. Research was conducted with 453 prospective teachers' studying at the faculties of education in Marmara, a state university and Maltepe, a foundation university in Istanbul. In this study universities were also compared by their types and differences were found. For data collection, Intended Use of Social Networking Sites Scale and The Social Network Adoption Scale were used. In addition, authors developed a Personal Information Form to determine prospective teachers' demographic characteristics and patterns of use of social networks. For this study, comparative and relational analysis techniques were used and statistical results have been obtained. The results showed that (a) Prospective teachers' duration of use of social networks varies according to the type of foundation or state university; (b) Prospective teachers studying in both types of university, do not prefer social networks for discovery and recognition of themselves and their peers; (c) Prospective teachers' rates of educational use of social networks is quite high; (d) Prospective teachers' adoption levels of social networks is high.