Toward the Role of Language Teacher Confirmation and Stroke in EFL/ESL Students’ Motivation and Academic Engagement: A Theoretical Review

Abstract

Following the recent special issue in the journal of Frontiers in Psychology, named “The Role of Teacher Interpersonal Variables in Students’ Academic Engagement, Success, and Motivation,” this review is carried out to describe two prime instances of teacher interpersonal behaviors, namely teacher confirmation and stroke, their underlying frameworks, and contributions to desirable student-related outcomes. In light of rhetorical-relational goal theory and the school of positive psychology, it is stipulated that language teacher confirmation and stroke are facilitators of EFL/ESL students’ level of motivation and academic engagement. Providing empirical evidence, the argument regarding the pivotal role of language teacher confirmation and stroke in EFL/ESL contexts was proved. Reviewing the available literature on the aforementioned variables, some pedagogical implications were suggested for teacher trainers, educational supervisors, and pre- and in-service language teachers. Finally, the limitations and drawbacks of the reviewed studies were identified and some avenues for further research were recommended, accordingly.

The Academic Motivation and Engagement of Students in English as a Foreign Language Classes: Does Teacher Praise Matter?

“…Several studies have also been conducted to examine the effects of teachers' personality traits on students' motivation and engagement (e.g., Gibbs and Powell, 2012;Sabet et al, 2018;Khalilzadeh and Khodi, 2021). Additionally, many empirical and theoretical studies have probed into the role of teachers' positive communication behaviors, including credibility (e.g., Imlawi et al, 2015;Derakhshan, 2021), immediacy (e.g., Dixson et al, 2017;Liu, 2021;Zheng, 2021), and confirmation (e.g., Shen and Croucher, 2018;LaBelle and Johnson, 2020;Gao, 2021), in promoting student academic motivation and engagement. Nonetheless, teacher praise as one of the most influential communication behaviors has received scant attention (Downs, 2017;Caldarella et al, 2021).…”

Cognitive and Affective Learning in English as a Foreign Language/English as a Second Language Instructional-Learning Contexts: Does Teacher Immediacy Matter?

“…The review serves to show support for teacher immediacy as an important element of learner success, that is, the goal of language learning. Immediacy in the class assists learners to form a constructive opinion of the ability, credibility, and thoughtful approach of teachers (Rocca, 2007;Gao, 2021;Liu, 2021). These positive insights can also support to boost learner involvement in the class, and both types of immediacy, namely, verbal and non-verbal communication, are significant (Woods and Baker, 2004) while the former helps to convey subject matter, and the latter is appropriate in increasing teacherlearner relationships (Richmond et al, 2006).…”

Exploring Effective Teacher-Student Interpersonal Interaction Strategies in English as a Foreign Language Listening and Speaking Class

“…However, the most popular and well-documented ones suitable for EFL classes are those proposed by Gao (2021) and Xie and Derakhshan (2021) who proposed nine key positive interpersonal communication skills/strategies, namely care, clarity, credibility, rapport with students, stroke, immediacy, confirmation, humor , and praise . The concept of care was first proposed by Noddings (1984) to refer to a composite sense of compassion, openness to others’ needs, empathy in interactions, and closeness of a caregiver with a person as the receiver of the care.…”

“…As pinpointed by Habash (2010) , the quality of teaching in EFL contexts improves if teachers employ different interactional strategies that stimulate communication among learners. In their seminal papers, Gao (2021) and Xie and Derakhshan (2021) numerated nine key positive interpersonal communication skills/strategies including care, clarity, credibility, rapport with students, stroke, immediacy, confirmation, humor, and praise which will be explained later. Together with these, approximation, interpretability, discourse management, emotional expression, and interpersonal control are also known as effective interactional strategies ( Gallois et al, 2005 ).…”