Asian EFL Journal Volume 24 Issue 1 January 2020
The Asian EFL Journal presents information, theories, research, methods and materials related to language acquisition and language learning.
It is a matter of pride and privilege to present this edition (3.1) of volume 16 of TESOL International Journal. This actually comes at a time when the academic world is faced with serious challenges and uncertainties. It was around this time last year that humanity came face to face with the Coronavirus pandemic, a particularly difficult time for learners and teachers as they were forced to adopt a new educational mode: the virtual one. It would not be an exaggeration to say that we all encountered numerous pitfalls on the way, grappling as much with our concerns of the achievement of learning objectives as with our own and our learners’ physical and mental well-being. Yet, perhaps it was one of the most fecund periods of research endeavors for most of us as our spirit of inquiry was fired by the changed educational paradigm. Collectively, the academic world contributed to the creation of a corpus of literature on practically every aspect of virtual learning, an area of marginal research till now. It was also an opportunity for us to evaluate earlier teaching practices, think of new approaches and pedagogies, and in the process, becoming more sensitized to our learners. All these are reflected in this erudite, prolific, and truly enlightening collection of research, a collection which can be a beacon light in the field for a long time to come. In this issue, given its varying range of articles, we have attempted a thematic classification. We do hope our readers appreciate this change.