14th Research Day at King Khalid University: A Beacon of Linguistic Research and Innovation
On April 3, 2019, King Khalid University held its 14th Research Day, spearheaded by Dr. Ismail Al-Refaai, the Director of the Language Research Center. Following the recitation of the Holy Qur'an, Dr. Abdullah Al-Melhi, Dean of the Faculty of Languages and Translation, welcomed all attendees, urging faculty members and graduate students to partake in this vital intellectual exchange.
Dean Al-Melhi expressed his admiration for those who had contributed substantially to the event, especially the students, and encouraged researchers to focus on topics of practical relevance for contemporary teaching and learning scenarios. He extended heartfelt appreciation to the organizing committee for their tireless efforts behind the scenes.
The event was structured in three sessions, each featuring a series of presentations on various language and translation topics. The first session featured presentations on topics including stance-taking strategies, negotiation strategies in language learning, cognitive styles of Saudi female EFL learners, and the application of the Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) approach in enhancing oral fluency.
The second session started with Dr. Ahmad Al-Faifi exploring the causes behind mismatches in students' translation outputs versus the original input. The session continued with presentations on practical formulas for translating proverbs, semantic peculiarities in Quranic translations, linguistics' impact on translation, stress placement difficulties among EFL students, and the importance of using students' first language in meaning clarification during EFL classes.
The third session was no less engaging, with topics ranging from interactive teaching methodologies, cognition and metacognition in language learning, student attitudes towards studying English literature, dialect mutual intelligibility, effects of reflective thinking strategies on reading skills, language teacher cognition theory, and semiotic analysis of caricatures.
In addition to the oral presentations, several poster displays enriched the research diversity. They covered a broad array of subjects, such as paperless assessments, classical Arabic interrogatives, medical terms translation, video technology in language learning, demotivating factors in EFL learning, and the impact of English linguistic hegemony on Saudi EFL learners, among others.
This 14th Research Day, a testament to the Faculty of Languages and Translation's commitment to intellectual exploration and knowledge exchange, underscored the importance of research in shaping teaching and learning methods for present and future EFL students.
