This paper reports on a study investigating the washback effect of the General Secondary English Examination (hereinafter referred to as GSEE), a high-stakes exit test for secondary school students (12 th grade) in Yemen. The main aim of this study is to gain preliminary insights into the relationship between teaching and learning factors affected by the washback effect. It focuses on eight pedagogical dimensions: four of them concerned the teachers (teaching methods, teaching experiences, content assessment, and beliefs) and four concerned the students (learning styles, learning activities, attitudes and motivation). A semi-structured interview was conducted with three English teachers who have over ten years of teaching experience. Based on the interview, a questionnaire was constructed and then administered to 30 Yemeni English teachers of the 12 th grade English classes. The data were analysed using SPSS software, version 20. The results showed that the test had a great influence on the learners and teachers mainly on teaching methodology and on learning styles. Triangulation with the qualitative data confirmed the findings. Hence, the study provides a clear evidence of the washback effect of the exam on the components of the language teaching-learning processes in Yemen and its influence on what and how the teachers teach, and the learners learn.

General Secondary English Examination (GSEE) is the highest secondary school exit test run by the Ministry of Education, Yemen. Due to the significance of the exam being the foundation of the students’ future, teachers are only preoccupied with how to help students get high marks in this final examination to be eligible to join university. The aim of this study is to investigate the dominant wash back effect of the GSEE on Yemeni teachers who are highly engrossed by the test. The study focuses on four pedagogical dimensions namely teachers’ teaching methods, content assessment, attitudes and motivation. Mixed mode approach (qualitative and quantitative methods) was applied using classroom observations, semi-structured interviews, group discussions and a questionnaire of 72 items administered to 46 English teachers. NVivo10 was used to analyse the qualitative data. SPSS/V22 was used for analysing the quantitative data in which the Cronbach's Alpha reached (.88). The results revealed that the test had a great influence on teachers (P<.001) mainly on their teaching methods. Triangulation with the qualitative analysis confirmed equivalent implications. The study contributes a clear evidence of the powerful exam washback on the factors of the language learning practices and its influence on how and what teachers teach.

The aim of this paper is to explore Mahmoud Darwish’s consistency of resistance and nature to the aggression of homeland occupation of Palestine as depicted in selected poems during his exile. In spite of Darwish exile from Palestine, the sense of resistance and opposition can be elicited from his poetic voice momentum regardless of the wide distance between him and his own homeland. In this research paper, the discussion will mainly focus on how Darwish metaphorically develops Palestinian nature creating a unique world full with righteous and justifiable opposition to the hatred colonizers of his homeland in his selected poems of exile. Theoretically, the framework of this study mainly relied on the postcolonial and the ecocritical theories of reading literature which is defined as an ecoresistance framework. Critically, the implications beyond the various notions of ecoresistance in the exile selected poems by an intellectual giant as Mahmoud Darwish, the researchers expect to provide new insights into man’s interrelation with land as an approach to resist the aggression of colonialism.