The focus of this study was teachers as they were asked to implement educational innovations suggested by nationally instituted educational policy. This study applied empirical data to a structural equation model of Japanese EFL teachers' (N = 876) perceptions of various national-, school-, and classroom-level influences that act on their instruction. Teachers' perceptions of these influences were then related to their approval of classroom activities associated with communicative language teaching. The article highlights the position recent educational policies seemed to take in teachers' minds and the way teachers subsumed the policy into the preexisting educational culture, which seemed to focus on preparing students for form-focused university entrance exams. Through structural equation modeling, the relationships among the many influences teachers perceived on their instruction are demonstrated. The resulting visual image suggests not only impediments to an educational innovation but also routes for potential change.

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In recent years, the learning of English as a Foreign Language in Japanese high schools has become the focus of new educational policies applied at the national level. One of these is The Course of Study issue by the Ministry of Education, in which teachers are, for the first time in a long series of curriculum guidelines, adjured to develop students' "positive attitudes towards communicating in English." Another is the JET program, which has put thousands of native English speaking assistant language teachers (ALTs) into Japanese secondary classrooms for the purpose of team teaching with Japanese teachers. Data resulting from a survey project of 876 Japanese high school English teachers was used to provide empirical evidence of teachers' levels of approval of communicative, audiolingual and traditional (yakudoku) activities. Teachers were also asked to rate the strengths of a variety of influences on their instruction, including university entrance exams, and pre- and in-service teacher education programs. Teachers' perceptions of both activities and instructional influences were examined in light of teachers' length of career, type of school (private versus public, academic versus vocational), and level of contact with an ALT. The data revealed the complexities of imposing broad, national educational policies on a diverse group of teachers, and in an educational culture which likely precludes teachers' use of communicative activities.

In recent years, interest in reading fluency development in first language, and second and foreign language (L2/FL) settings has increased. Reading fluency, in which readers decode and comprehend at the same time, is critical to successful reading. Fluent readers are accurate and fast in their ability to recognize words, and in their use of prosodic and syntactic knowledge to better comprehend text. Reading is a significant and viable means of developing L2/FL ability, particularly in FL settings in which L2 input sources are limited, such as Vietnam or Japan (for English as a foreign language), or the USA (for Japanese or Russian as a foreign language).Yet many L2/FL learners read slowly and laboriously, likely because of poor word recognition skills. Repeated reading (RR) is one method of fluency-building long used in first language (L1) settings and more recently in L2/FL settings, and seems successful in increasing the reading fluency and comprehension of both L1 and L2/FL learners. Nonetheless, it is likely that teachers and learners in L2/FL settings may be unaware of or unconvinced of the role increased reading fluency plays in reading comprehension and, as a result, may not see the utility of devoting class or personal time to repeated reading or, indeed, any reading fluency activity. Because quantitative evidence for positive effects of RR has already been offered (see Taguchi, Sasamoto, & Gorsuch, 2006; Gorsuch & Taguchi, 2008), we offer additional evidence in the form of open-ended, post-reading student reports written over the length of an 11-week RR treatment for 30 young adult EFL learners in Vietnam. Iterative analyses of over 200 pages of student reports provided nuanced evidence of the positive effects RR has on FL learners’ reading fluency and comprehension development, and general language development. Learners’ comments revealed information that suggested a meaningful role for extended experience with RR to increasing use of learner metacognition in reading strategy use, and growing awarenesses on the part of learners of (1) the relationship between fluency and comprehension, (2) the utility of developing fluency as a stand-alone skill, and (3) RR as a causal agent in the development of listening, writing, and speaking skills.

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