JOURNAL OF PERSIAN LANGUAGE TEACHING TO NON-PERSIAN SPEAKERS
Year:2020 | Volume:9 | Issue:1 (19)|Papers Count:10

The interference of native phonetics and phonology on the acquisition of non-native vowels and consonants has been studied extensively, and results typically suggest that discrimination of non-native sounds can be predicted from the perceptual relatedness of non-native categories to native categories. According to Speech Learning Model (SLM), proposed by Flege (1995), L1 and L2 sounds exist in a common phonological space, and thus influence each other. As argued by Flege et al. (2003), the interaction between the two systems involves two mechanisms, namely, category assimilation and category dissimilation. An L2 sound assimilates to an L1 sound when it is perceived as an instance of the L1 sound, despite audible differences between the two sounds. However, category dissimilation happens when learners can auditorily differentiate an L2 sound from the closest L1 sound and from the neighboring L2 sound. Flege makes the assumption that under such a condition a new phonetic category for an L2 sound can be established. This research aims at investigating the pronunciation of Persian dorsal stops in the production of Chinese and Arabic learners of Persian. Dorsal stops are different in Persian from both Chinese and Arabic. Persian dorsal stops are pronounced as either palatal or velar depending on whether the following vowel is front or back, while dorsal stops in Chinese and Arabic are always produced as velar, irrespective of the place of articulation of the following vowel. Given this phonological difference between Persian on the one hand and Chinese and Arabic on the other hand, we asked to what extent the acoustic phonetic characteristics of Persian dorsal stops in the production of Chinese and Arabic learners of Persian agree with those of native Persian speakers. A corpus was designed to test the research hypothesis. Three sets of speakers, namely native Persian speakers, Chinese learners of Persian and Arabic learners of Persian participated in the experiment. The participants were recorded individually in a quiet room using a digital audio recorder, Sound Blaster X-Fi 5. 1, and a directional condenser microphone. The stimulus tokens were digitized at 22. 05 kHz and low-pass filtered at 4. 8 kHz. The output amplitude levels for each individual speaker were normalized to the maximum amplitude range. All acoustic measurements were made using Praat acoustic software (Boersma and Weenink, 2010). Data analysis included spectral examination at stop release as well as regression locus equation computed from measurement of F2 at vowel onset and the steady state of the vowel. Results suggested that patterns of spectral energy distribution in dorsal stops (the release section) are significantly different in the production of native Persian speakers from both Chinese and Arabic speakers, when the stop consonants are produced before front vowels, but they are rather similar when the target stops are produced before back vowels. More specifically, in back vocalic contexts, all speakers, irrespective of their mother tongue (differences in L1) pronounced the dorsal stops in such manner that the distribution of energy was rather compact, with energy being distributed in a polar fashion in three different spectral regions, namely, low formant frequencies, mid formant frequencies, and high formant frequencies. However, in the front vowel context, the native and non-native speakers of Persian differed as to whether the spectral shape of the target stops were diffuse or compact in their pronunciations. While, Chinese and Arabic speakers uttered the dorsal stops in the front vocalic context in almost the same fashion as the back context, Persian speakers pronounced the consonants such that there were less poles in the spectrum, and thus the spectral shape of the target stops were more diffuse than compact. Furthermore, the results indicated that the locus equation slopes serve as phonetic descriptors of stop place in CV utterances. Using the locus equation measurement sites for F2 onsets, dorsal stop consonants in the production of Chinese and Arabic speakers had lower locus equation slopes relative to native Persian speakers. When locus equations were derived using F2 onsets for dorsal stops that were measured closer to the stop release burst, the slopes were radically different between the native and non-native speakers of Persian. These results can be interpreted to suggest that while Persian speakers’ productions of dorsal stops fall within two different phonetic categories, namely palatal and velar, depending on the following vowel; Chinese and Arabic learners of Persian realize Persian dorsal stops as only velar irrespective of the vowel context. The findings are discussed with respect to the theory of Speech Learning Model (SLM), and suggestions are made as how the research findings may be applied in teaching Persian as a second language.

Language assessment is one of the most important part of any language educational system. Much of the effectiveness of Persian language centers depends on the use of precise assessment and evaluation techniques. In fact, Persian language institutions face the fundamental question of how to convert abstract concepts of linguistic knowledge and communication ability into numbers. Understanding learners' progress, identifying their weaknesses, and making accurate decisions about them requires accurate and scientific methods of assessment and evaluation. The present study attempts to evaluate the construct validity of the Writing Skill’ s Assessment rubric in the Ferdowsi Persian Language Examination. The test, which is approved by the Ministry of Science, is held twice a year at Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iraq, and in some other countries. This research attempts to answer the following three questions: 1. To what extent do the constructs defined in the scoring rubric measure distinct components of the writing skill? 2. To what extent can the six-point scale distinguish intermediate, weak, and strong test takers? 3. To what extent do the scorers agree on the use of the scoring criteria? So far, several scoring rubrics have been presented in Persian language in order to assess non-native Persian language speaker’ s writing ability but none of them have been validated by quantitative research methods. The aim of current study was to investigate the construct validity of writing section of Ferdowsi University’ s Persian language proficiency test. This test is designed based on the TOEFL theoretical underpinnings. The writing scoring rubric in Ferdowsi University’ s Persian language proficiency test consists of three components namely language quality, cohesion, and topic development. Obviously, this scoring rubric is derived from a communicative view of the concept of language, which not only measures test taker’ s linguistic knowledge at the level of words, sentence and discourse, but also assesses the ability to perform language tasks. Based on this rubric, in addition to the quality of the language and the cohesion of the text, the evaluators examine to what extent the written text is consistent with the purpose of the language task. In order to evaluate the construct validity of the scoring rubric of the test, the results of one of the tests held in Ferdowsi International Persian Language Center were analyzed by Rash statistical model and factor analysis. The test was held on July 8, 1397 at the International Center for Persian Language at Ferdowsi University of Mashhad and Strasbourg University in France. The writing section of the test includes two tasks. In the first task, an audio file was first played for the test takers, and then they were asked to write a summary of it. In the second task, the test takers were given a topic to write about it in 200 words. The participants in this study were 106 students consisting of 30 women and 76 men. Iraq, with 50 participants, and Pakistan with 30, respectively, had the first and second highest participants. The other participants were from India, Indonesia, Lebanon, Syria, and Italy, each with 13, 2, 2, 4 and 5 participants, respectively. In terms of educational background, the Humanities, with 68 members, constitutes the most participants. Engineering with 23 and medicine with 11 were in the next ranks in terms of number of participants. Factor analysis results showed that the three identified constructs all have high validity. That is, writing skill can be divided into language quality, cohesion, and topic development and can be scored separately. Cohesion with 0. 98 had the highest factor load and the other two constructs each with 0. 97 had the second highest factor loadings. Based on these statistics, it can be said that writing proficiency can be divided into language quality, cohesion and topic development constructs and each of these components measures a separate construct. The Ferdowsi Persian Language Proficiency test use a six-point scoring scale. Rash's statistical model showed that each of the scorers was able to use this criterion fairly correctly because the order of thresholds were in accordance with the order of the scores and did not change. On the other hand, the write map indicated that this scoring scale has the ability to distinguish between weak, intermediate, and strong test takers, and the 0 to 5 criteria cover all range of test takers so this scale can measure all candidates with any level of writing ability. On the other hand, the reliability of the scoring was 0. 96, which is very well. This result indicates that test evaluators have used scoring criteria in the same way so the test has reasonable scorer reliability.

1. Introduction Textbooks are the media that teachers and students use every day so sometimes as a whole syllabus, the teacher emphasizes it. How textbook content is organized, is an important factor in determining how to learn. Sometimes inefficiencies and inadequate content make students difficult to understand or have less than expected results. Non-Persian language textbooks, as well as other educational content, are no exception. Obviously, if the teaching resources of Farsi are more comprehensive and accurate and understandable to learners and create less of a challenge, they will be a good tool for teaching Persian to non-Persian Speakers effectively. The variety and quality of books available for teaching English and many other scientific languages, has made it easier for teachers to teach their respective languages and it has also facilitated learning for learners. The books available for teaching Persian to non-Persian speakers unlike other languages, is limited to a number of special books and relevant training centers and teachers are very limited in the choice of teaching options. Therefore, enriching resources as much as possible, can be an effective and useful step in education. One of the factors that can be incorporated into the design of a book, especially textbooks, is Grice's cooperative principles in conversations because it results in an efficient transfer of meaning. Herbert Paul Grice-language analytical philosopher-writes “ Logic and Conversation” . In order for one person to be able to interpret another person's words, some kind of cooperative principle must be taken into account. At the elementary level of language learning, it is difficult to understand the pragmatics of the second language, and failure to observe it will lead to ambiguity and difficulty. Therefore, it is important to observe this principle in books related to the teaching of non-Persian languages. Five-volume series of the “ Modern Persian Language Teaching” , written at different levels from elementary to advanced, is one of the newest in the field of foreign language education. Therefore, in the present study, it has been attempted to analyze these books using the Grice principles. 2. Theoretical foundations The theoretical framework for the current research is based on the pragmatics and Grice’ s cooperative principles. Grice’ s cooperative principles, is one of the most commonly used topics in pragmatics. It deals with the communicative role of sentences and how language is used in relation to humans. In this respect, it is particularly important in pragmatics. Grice has named the “ Principle of Cooperation” and he has called the four principles of quantity, quality, manner, and relation, Maxim. He outlined the principle of cooperation in four groups, as follows: Maxim of quality: Do not say what you believe is false and also do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence. Maxim of quantity: Make your contribution as informative as is required and do not make your contribution more informative than is required. Maxim of relation (or relevance): be relevant, and says things that are pertinent to the discussion. Maxim of manner: Avoid obscurity of expression and ambiguity. Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity) and be orderly. 3. Deta Collection Method In the present study, the cases of Observance and Non-observance of cooperative principles in “ Modern Persian language teaching textbooks” by Ehsan Ghabool (1396) have been analyzed, violation and flouting of maxims, opting out, infringment and suspension of maxims. This is done separately from beginner to advanced levels. The method of research is qualitative-quantitative and data analysis method is descriptive-analytical. All of the conversations in five-volume series of these textbooks have been reviewed and analyzed. The data of this research are: 76 conversations, totally containing 1972 sentences. Conversations in the CDs of each book have also been written by the researcher and then analyzed. 4. Discussion and Conclusion The data obtained from five-volume series of the Amoozesh e Novin e Zaban e Farsi Textbook shows that, we have the highest level of maxims observance-three maxims of quality, relation and manner-at the elementary level. The result shows the strength of the elementary level because this level is for beginner learners who have little or no knowledge of Persian pragmatics and if observance of cooperative principles at this level is low, language learners will have trouble and there will be no proper training. At mid-level, data review indicates that all the maxims are lower than the advanced level, which is a far-reaching result. At the advanced level, a survey of data shows that in this volume, each of the four maxims is more than the middle level which is a desirable and expected outcome. At this level, learners are expected to be familiar with linguistic concepts and also to some extent able to communicate, so it is better to apply the concepts of pragmatics at this level and it's easier to learn. Age, gender, social status, and experience in the relevant L2-speaking communities, previous experiences with pragmatically competent L2 speakers, are considered to be important factors in the successful production and reception of pragmatic concepts. At the elementary level of foreign language learning, learners are often younger, and as they age, their understanding of language pragmatics increases. So it is better and more acceptable-both in the native and foreign language-to consider the upward trend in Non-observance in textbooks. As learners' pragmatic capability is gradually increasing in line with their direct and indirect language acquisition and training, non-observance is expected to increase gradually, from basic to advanced levels. An upward trend in the training of applied concepts has been well respected at both the elementary and advanced levels but at the middle level we are experiencing a downward trend. The reason for this can be traced back to the gap between the real consciousness and the ideal consciousness that Goldman speaks of. This distance is unfamiliar to a foreign learner and the author's trust in the reader ideal consciousness is to the extent that the necessary relationship between the author and the reader is disturbed.

Word borrowing is a sign of dynamism in a language, there are no language in the word which hasn’ t borrowed from other languages. Arabic is not excluded either. Arabic words have undergone fundamental changes in the semantic field whilst entering the Persian language, in ways that either the original meaning of the word has been forgotten; or the original meaning of the word is preserved and its instance and meaning have been expanded, decreased, Changed, promoted or demoted. The presence of such evolved Arabic words in Persian has caused linguistic interferences in the process of learning Persian by Arabic speakers. The interference between and among native language and target language is one of the most prominent factors in the emergence of linguistic errors. examining how and the extent to which it affects the learning of Persian language among Arabic speakers can be utilized to improve the teaching and learning process, both for teachers and for Persian-language learners. The impact of semantic changes in Arabic words involved in Persian is important in several instances: • Teaching Arabic to Persian speakers • Teaching Persian language to southern Arabic-speaking children of the country • The effect of semantic changes on translation from Persian to Arabic • The effect of Interferences of evolved Arabic words on Persian language learning of Arabic speakers The latter is the main topic of the present study, considering that no similar research has been done in this field in Persian language so far, and the study of the effects of the interference of Arabic words on learning Persian language is unprecedented, the need for research on this case becomes obvious. Therefore, in this study, our main goal is to investigate the effects of the interference of Arabic words on the process of learning Persian language by Arabic speakers, and this study seeks to answer the question of “ what effects do Arabic words in Persian language have on the process of learning Persian language of Arabic speakers? ” Since examination of the extent to which the Arabic words which have entered the Persian language due to historical, proximity, immigration, or other reasons, reveal to what extent Arabic speakers misunderstand the exact meaning of the word. Also in education, being aware of these evolved Arabic words will aid educators. The statistical sample of the present study was 80 Arabic speakers from Persian Language learning centre of Imam Khomeini International University in the academic year of 1397-1397, of which 40 were in general basics level and 40 others at the supplementary level. The 47 evolved Arabic words were given to both groups through a multi-choice test, and using the chi-square test, the number of errors in each of these 47 words was compared in both general and advanced groups. The results of studies of this category of evolved words showed that Arabic words that have entered the field of Persian words have a negative effect on learning Persian, and the rate of errors has been determined to be 49% and 34% in general Persian language learners and Advanced level respectively. These results indicate that the semantic evolution of the imported Arabic words, even with the development of language skill and learning, is still one of the most important origins of errors in Persian language comprehension among Arabic speakers, and the use of the original meaning without understanding its semantic development is one of the most prominent causes of the error. According to the statistical results of the research, the interference of the original meaning of Arabic words with its evolved meaning in Persian on learning a foreign or second language (Persian language), for various reasons such as expanding the semantic domain of the words involved, semantic limitation of words Semantic alteration of the words involved, semantic enhancement and degradation, makes the occurrence of linguistic errors more distinguished, and is one of the effective factors in the occurrence of a significant share of Persian linguistic errors among Arabic speaker learners; Therefore, given that language teaching and learning is based on the three basic principle of the teacher, language learner and textbooks, We need comprehensive participation and adjustment, so it is recommended that teachers who teach Persian to Arabic speakers Note the following: 1. In the field of lexicography, it is recommended that the words originally entered from Arabic into Persian be specified for the language learners, and that the learners be asked to express these words in simple sentences. 2. On the subject of comparison of the words of two languages and meaning alteration, the language instructor should choose similar items from the first and second languages, and this requires that the Persian language instructor increase his knowledge in the field of Arabic and Persian words. To be able to show the differences and semantic similarities of the words between Arabic and Persian. 3. The choice of Instruction methods should be based on the problems of learners and seek to solve them. The task-oriented method is a good option for vocabulary training. 4. Using the example design method from each learner, the instructor in each class can introduce the semantically transformed words and ask the learner to give an example. 5. In regards to the content of textbooks, it is recommended that special books for Arabic speakers learning Persian language be written in the field of Persian language instruction, since in preparing special educational textbooks for Arabic speakers, focal point can be common words among two languages, resulting in reduced vocabulary errors.

Writing is regarded as one of the most complicated cognitive activities whose way of teaching needs loads of attention. So وthe improper teaching of writing skills and procedures can create writing errors. Several social, cultural and psychological issues can affect on learning a language in general and writing skill in specific. Learning writing skills is a very complicated process in which many personal, environmental and psychological aspects are involved. Considering these factors, the present research is intended to analyze and measure the psychological, environmental, personal and linguistic factors affecting writing. Vasilyva et al. ( 2018) proved that family atmosphere and parental approach towards literacy and knowledge directly affect on written and spoken skills of children. Hemmerecht et al. ( 2017) in their study found out that there is a significant relation between parents’ level of education and their economic status in one side and the children’ s language skills in another side. In another study Inomata ( 2017) found that there is a positive correspondence between children’ s cognitive skills and their writing skills. Teng( 2016) stated that the teachers’ believes and ideas on teaching language skills have direct impact on children’ s writing skills and activities. Vanessa ( 2013) showed that the students with high level of communicative skills, positive approach and, regarding school assignments as significant, have less writing errors or mistakes compared with other students. Considering the above-mentioned studies on writing skills, we can claim that less research has been done on the effective factors in improvement of written discourse and creative writing in Iran. So, we believe that regarding the important role of writing skills in learning and learners’ improvement and the role of various factors in learning the writing skills and also very few research done in this field in Iran, doing this research seems to be essential. We are of the opinion that the present research adds to the value of the previous studies in analyzing the psychological, linguistic, environmental and personal factors affecting the students’ writing skills, based on primary school teachers’ view points. In this study, the research method was descriptive-survey. The statistical population of this study included 850 teachers in districts 1 and 2 of Arak city. The sampling system was based on Available Sampling method and the sample size was 265 based on Morgan method. The research instrument was a researcher-made questionnaire including 67 items. Validity was assessed by face validity and the reliability of the questionnaire was confirmed by Cronbach's alpha for psychological factors (0. 87); for linguistic factors (0. 91), for environmental factors (0. 88) and for personal factors (0. 91). One-sample ttest was used for data analysis. To test the hypothesis if the psychological factors affect the improvement of students’ writing skills, we checked the results of the first part of the study which showed that the mean score of behavior parameters was 3. 79 and psychological factors 3. 86 and the expected mean( theoretical) was equal to 3. Regarding the fact that for psychological and behavior factors the T value less than 0. 01 is significant, it can be concluded that the experimental mean and theoretical one are significantly different. Also, as the mean scores are different, we can conclude that psychological factors affect the improvement of students’ writing skills. The results shown in various parts of the study show that the mean of oral factors was 3. 73, writing factors 3. 78 and the experimental ( theoretical) mean was equal to 3. Regarding the fact that the T value less than 0. 01 for oral factors is statistically significant, it can be concluded that the experimental mean is quite different from theoretical one which is significant and meaningful. Based on this fact it can be stated that linguistic factors play a major role and are effective on students’ writing development. The results also showed that from the teachers' point of view, the mean of psychological factors (t = 25. 34, p <0. 01), linguistic factors (t = 32. 92, p <0. 01), environmental factors (t = 21. 94, p <0. 01 ) and individual factors (t = 29. 78, p <0. 01) were above the theoretical average. According to the findings of this research, the factors mentioned in the study can be used to improve students' writing skills in the elementary educational system. The results of this study will be very practical and applicable for teachers and all those who are involved in teaching languages in general and Persian writing in specific.

Illustrating for language teaching books is a subcategory of nonfiction illustration. In general, nonfiction illustration is divided into three groups: narrative, informative and naturalistic. Illustrating for language teaching books is considered as info nonfiction illustrating. Illustrating for these books does not have a long history and majority of the books written to date either have no images or almost have unsuited images. For some reason, even the books published in recent decade mostly have used images rather than digital or hand drawings. In this research, we reviewed the illustrations of two Farsi language teaching books: the second edition of Let’ s Learn Persian 1 (Zolfaghari et al., 2017) and Mina 1 (Sahraei et al., 2017a). These books are for adult learners, written for the introductory level, and cover four skills; therefore, their content is similar. Clark and Lyons (2011) believe the learning value of a graphic depends on three factors: (1) features of graphics, (2) goal of instruction, and (3) learner differences. Features of graphic have three components: (1) surface features, (2) communication functions, and (3) psychological functions. Clark and Lyons (2011) categorize graphic in terms of communication functions into decorative, representative, mnemonic, organizational, relational, transformational, and interpretive. The psychological functions of graphic are: support attention, activate or build prior knowledge, minimize cognitive load, build mental model, support transfer of learning, and support motivation. In this study, to evaluate the learning value of a graphic using the proposed model of Clark and Lyons (2011), we randomly selected %25 of pedagogical contents of each book and evaluated communication, psychological and other functions which affect the pedagogical objectives. In Mina the “ representative” function is the most frequent one and we found no evidence for organizational and representative functions. In Let’ s Learn Persian the “ text representative” is the most frequent function of communication, and organizational, relational, transformational and interpretive roles had no examples. These findings reveal that in the elementary language learning books, the “ representative” or “ text representative” are the major functions of communication. In Mina, the pedagogical content contains 35 illustrations and practices incorporate 19 illustrations, some of which are used in both lessons and practices. However, in Let’ s Learn Persian the illustrations are equally distributed in lessons and practices: 19 in former and 20 in latter. This reveals that in Let’ s Learn Persian the use of graphic in lessons and practices is identical, but in Mina using illustrations in lessons is twice as in practices. Illustrations of Mina have many flaws, including poor presentation of lesson goals, unrelated details, ambiguity in the image, poor representation of the content, small images, lack of clarity, inappropriate perspective, inadequate cultural valuation and negative psychological load. These features prevent the graphics to deliver their psychological functions, including minimizing cognitive load and support attention. For example, the pointless graphic details about unrelated concepts will distort learners’ mind from the main lesson objectives for a while. However, in Let’ s Learn Persian the domain and frequency of these problems are limited. Here the technique of using the same characters has been used. For example, the same characters in an image do various activities. This method helps the readers to recognize the characters once and in later instances she just notices the differences; however, in Mina rarely the same characters have been used. In fact, to appreciate the context differences, it is suggested that one character be put in different situations so as to prevent the mixing of the content objective with the character. Using two color and colorful illustrations in one frame to distinguish the main goal from the marginal objectives of the lesson is another technique used in Let’ s Learn Persian. This technique is also used to distinguish reality from imagination; i. e. the character is colorful, but her imaginations are two-colored and placed in a cloud. For personalization, the illustrator shrewdly has used ambiguous image: whenever it is supposed that the learner put herself in a situation, its related graphic is ambiguous. Another technique used in Let’ s Learn Persian is combining surrounding and colorful designs, and also combining black and white illustrations with colorful ones. However, the illustrations of this book are not flawless either, and poor representation of the content, inappropriate framing, lack of clarity, unrelatd to the lesson goals and graphics ambiguity are some of its shortcomings which generally causes cognitive overload for the learner.

In most educational systems, textbooks are the most common tool in educating learners. The majority of textbooks add visual images with the aim of helping students have a thorough understanding of topics and contents of lessons. These visual images such as pictures, photos and paints, etc. are adopted to transmit the information of different matters. Multimodality is one of characteristics embedded in these discourses. In language teaching, the teacher also needs to use visual aids. Visual aids motivate learners, make them interested in learning, and make learning easier. Persian language textbooks for non-Persian speakers are very versatile today. Nowadays researches show that using visual (also images) and written texts together help learners more. But how are images of such books represented? There is a wide range of approaches to this matter among the existing studies on textbooks. These books have both verbal and visual layers. The understanding of meaning not only requires the analysis of language in text, but also the study of other semiotic resources, such as images, gestures or sounds. This study was an attempt to employ a multimodal analysis of educational books to ascertain the extent to which visual and verbal components create meaning. The theoretical basis of this study was social semiotic theory proposed by Kress and van Leeuwen (1996/2006)) and Halliday’ s (1976/2004) systemic functional theory which investigate images and their related texts in three meta-functions including representational, interactional (interpersonal), and compositional. The present study investigates the central concerns of the use of text and visuals within the Language learning textbooks taught at University which have been prescribed by Ahmad Saffar Moghaddam. To do this, the Language learning textbooks were evaluated and analyzed. The main objective is to “ identify the visual strategies used by writers and illustrators, to convey a representation of reality, to create interaction with readers and to form coherent wholes of communication. The results of the research findings indicate that in the analysis of the three representational, interactive and textual meta-functions of the investigated images, narrative images have very low frequency but the conceptual type has very high frequency and does not depict actions and events. In the sense of interpersonal meaning, most of the participants have more imagery and less interaction among the participants. At the contextual level, most participants are presented with long-shut images, and their location in the image indicates a participant's prominence. Due to the color of all images, the image is of a natural kind and of a high degree of realism. The illustrations in this book aim to present and understand the dominant patterns of Iranian national religious culture to its nonPersian speaking audience. Images often depict non-Iranian students and are genderrepresented equally. Out of a total of 64 analyzed images, about 8 images are the main subject of the human, 8 images are the main subject of those objects (Iranian miniature calligraphy and painting) and other images (about 48 images) are dedicated to historical and religious sites, but no images are related to the subject. Animals have not paid. One of the important and valuable points in representing these images is the strong presence of students in the images. In all of these images, male and female students and professors are interacting with each other. Another important point in the representation of these images is the emphasis and use of religious and national tools, signs, and symbols. The use of images of the shrine of Imam Reza, Hazrat Abdolazim and Imamzadeh Saleh and the mosques of GoharShad and Sheikh Lotfollah are considered as symbols of the religion of Islam. The depiction of Persepolis, the tomb of Ferdowsi, Sa´ di, Attar, Khayyam, Ibn Sina and Ferdowsi are all symbols of the national history. The simultaneous emphasis and use of these national and religious symbols together induces and strengthens the national-religious sense in the audience. In introducing the cities of Iran, the squares, the bazaar and the University of Tehran are depicted. Therefore, it can be concluded that these images reflect a fairly realistic picture of Persian-speaking life. The results of this study and the other studies (like this) can help to increase the knowledge and awareness of textbook authors in using images in the learning process of learners. The study is intended to serve as a framework for assisting authors, teachers and other professionals involved in writing and teaching textbooks that are “ appropriate for students specially students of Persian language” . Findings of the study pedagogically call for using appropriate pictures of real people and real environment which provide sufficient input for language learners.

Statement of the Problem: The so called “ foreign accent” is one manifestation of phonological transfer. The problems investigated in the present study are: first, “ if a part of Chinese Persian as a Foreign Language (PFL) learners’ foreign accent is caused by errors in pronouncing Persian vowels” , and second “ if Chinese PFL learners transfer the acoustic features of the vowels in their mother tongue to their Persian speech” . Theoretical Framework: Knight (2013, p. 16) classifies the status of the speech sounds of a foreign language compared with the corresponding speech sounds in the mother tongue in the three classes of “ new” (as completely different), “ identical” (as completely the same), and “ similar” (as similar sound with slight acoustic differences). The identical speech sounds in the foreign language are mastered with ease by being put in the same class as the phonemes in the mother tongue. The pronunciation of the new speech sounds improve as new phoneme categories are made in mind of the second language (L2) learners through sufficient practice (Fromkin, Rodman, & Hyams, 2014, p. 432). Among these three classes, the similar speech sounds are the most difficult to master nativelikely by the L2 learners and the slight acoustic differences they have might be taken as a major source of foreign accent in the target language (Best & Strange, 1992, p. 105). Methodology: Through a process of convenience sampling, 42 Persian and Mandarin Chinese native speakers (11 female and 13 male native Persian speakers, and 8 female and 10 male native Mandarin Chinese PFL learners) were included in the present study. F1 and F2 of The Persian vowels, the Mandarin vowels, and the Persian vowels produced by the native Mandarin PFL speakers were extracted in a laboratory situation and the data was statistically compared. For calculating the mean F1 and F2, all the 24 native Persian speakers and 18 native Mandarin Chinese PFL learners were included; in the second phase 8 native Persian speakers and 2 native Mandarin Chinese PFL learners were randomly left out to conduct the statistical analyses (independent samples t-test for normally distributed data and Mann– Whitney for abnormally distributed data) on quantitatively similar data samples from both genders. Results and Discussion: in accord with what Knight (2013, p. 16) claims about the so called “ identical” speech sound, among the 5 articulatory similar vowels in Persian and Mandarin Chinese, 4 of them turned to be acoustically “ identical” without causing any meaningful pronunciation errors. Only the F2 of the Persian vowel /e/ was observed to be meaningfully different from the corresponding vowel in Mandarin Chinese. However, in contrast with the findings of Best & Strange (1992, p. 105), the native Mandarin Chinese PFL learners did not put this “ similar” speech sound in a corresponding category of a similar vowel from their mother tongue; instead of transferring the acoustic features of a similar vowel in their mother tongue to the pronunciation of the Persian /e/, the data revealed that the Mandarin Chinese PFL learners treated the Persian /e/ as a “ new” speech sound and pronounce it differently from all the similar corresponding vowels in their mother tongue. The vowel /e/ in the Persian speech of the Mandarin Chinese PFL learners, however, was also different from the native Persian /e/; a pronunciation error which might serve as a source of their foreign Persian accent. A comparison of the vocalic spaces of Persian and Mandarin Chinese shows that in the area where the Persian /e/ is expected to be located, Mandarin Chinese already has 4 closely similar front vowels (phonemes /e/, /y/, and /i/ and the allophone [ ]). It seems as if the Mandarin Chinese PFL learners recognize that the Persian /e/ is fronter than the three /e/-like vowels (namely /e/, /y/, and [ ]) and lower than the similar vowel /i/ in their mother tongue. However, it seems that in order to both compensate for this difference in frontness and make the new vowel also different from the corresponding similar vowels in their mother tongue, they exaggerate in the frontness of their Persian /e/ and that could be the reason behind this pronunciation error causing their foreign Persian accent. Conclusions: the findings of the current study show that the error in pronouncing the Persian /e/ in the speech of Mandarin Chinese PFL learners cannot be taken as a manifestation of direct negative language transfer; this is in contrast with the suggestions of the strong version of language transfer in general and Chen & Wang (2011), Wang & Heuven (2006), and Knight (2013) in particular. The Mandarin Chinese PFL learners have not activated the Persian /e/ as a part of the so called innate linguistic competence, but in their Persian speech, they pronounce an /e/ which is different from both native Persian and Mandarin Chinese corresponding vowels; then, these findings do not also confirm the weak version of language transfer. However, the results of the present study seem to corroborate the modified version of the language transfer, since the observed error in the pronunciation of /e/ in the Persian speech of these PFL learners could be taken as a kind of indirect negative interference of the similar linguistic patterns of the mother tongue in L2.

The use of literature in language teaching is an approach that is no longer in doubt today. Literary texts with their many linguistic and cultural capabilities provide appropriate tools and content for language learners and teachers. In addition, by presenting the authentic text, they expose the language learners to indirect contact with the culture of the second language community and increase their interest and motivation to learn (Khaleghizadeh, 2019). In Persian, many texts can be found that have these linguistic and cultural capabilities and can provide a rich content for learners, including Ferdowsi's Shahnameh. No none can doubt the influence of Shahnameh, more than any other text, on the language, history, and culture of Iran. That is because, as it is well known, Ferdowsi’ s work is vital in the flourishing of Persian in the post-Islamic era of Iran. The presence made the founding martial of Persian, which was rather strong and ready for the best use in 4 century AH, well fortified in Shahnameh. Therefore, all eloquent speaker after Ferdowsi used the material and made their works on the basis on Ferdowsi’ s tryouts (Yahaghi, 2015). The words and terms selection and organization pof Shahnameh have made some believe that the feature is the main reason for the protection of Persian. Researches working on Persian language believe that the most fundamental function of Shahnameh in Iranian culture is its influence on Persian. The influence is so huge that it wouldn’ t be exaggeration if we say Shahnemeh was the reason for the protection and proliferation of Persian (Kazazi, 2008). The vast and deep influence of Shahnameh on other books which makes it a “ hypo text” and as Namar Motlagh (2008) calls it a “ legend text” , needs to be examined in terms of its language, literariness, content and thoughtfulness. For example, the skillful word usage and word formation of the work have made some believe that the features are the main reason that Persian was saved. So, the influence of Shahnameh in saving and prevalence of Persian makes us think that the valuable and rich work can be used in teaching Persian. Some studies conducted on the use of literary capacities in teaching Persian, approved the function of literature in culture transferring of language. Some others focused on the influence of literature in improving language competence and skills. An underresearched topic in this regard on which the study focuses, is the function of literary language in teaching Persian. Since Shahnameh is known to be a literary rather than a teaching text, and one of the main elements of literary language is music (Shafiei Kadkani, 2016), and also since Ferdowsi has paid special and purposeful attention in his work to using elements of music in speech, the study pays close attention to the function of the musical elements of Shahnameh in teaching Persian. Without any doubt using musical elements is not limited to poetry, but they are used in prose too. Ibn Sina (1954) discusses the metre of speech in Shafa and believes that if speech have metre and Saj’ (a sort of figure of speech) will be more memorable. It is because “ the enjoy of using words based on an order and meter makes mind save the attention and makes the perception easier, and as a result, it decreases the attempt needed for the retaining and memorizing a set of words to understand their relations and meaning” (Khanlari, 1958, p. 5). Regarding the abovementioned the following question will be answered: What effects do have the musical elements of Shahnameh on learning vocabulary and comprehension of Persian learners? Considering the repeating meter, the epic genre, and stylistic features of the period when Shahnameh was written, that is, simple language in terms of literacy and vocabulary, it seems there is not a specific feature in Shahnameh different from other poems of the period, Daghighi’ s poems for example. The hypothesis of the research was that using literary language of Shahnameh not only do not help non-Persian language learners in learning vocabulary and comprehension but because of its literary features (including music) impedes learning. To do this, using Shafiei Kadkani’ s definition of music of poem, musical elements of poetry were randomly extracted from 500 verses of 5 books of Shahnameh. The reliability of the data was approved by SPSS software. Then some parts of Shahnameh were selected and rephrased into prose for two groups of 15 adult language learners of different countries at intermediate level. The experimental group were taught using the rephrased and original texts, emphasizing musical elements and the control group were taught only rephrased text. Results of data analysis shows that the intervention has a significant effect on the development of the learning of experimental group. That is, using original literary texts, with an emphasis on the musical elements, improves vocabulary learning and comprehension of language learners.

Cultural intelligence is a special form of intelligence that emphasizes a persons’ ability to understand, reason and function effectively in the culturally diverse situations. At the most general level, cultural intelligence is defined as the ability to adapt to new cultural contexts (Earley, 2002; Earley & Ang, 2003). Due to the expansion of Persian language and growing number of foreign students interested in learning it, Persian language teachers to non-Persian speakers need to develope cultural capabilities and competencies measured by cultural intelligence to create calm and peaceful atmosphere for language learners from different cultures in the same class. In this regard, cultural intelligence helps Persian language teachers to be sensitive across the cultures and communicate with learners of various cultures in the multicultural educational environments appropriately and therefore teach more effectively. According to Earley and Ang (2003) cultural intelligence consists of four components: metacognitive, cognitive, motivational and behavioral component. The metacognitive aspect of cultural intelligence reflects mental processes that individuals use to acquire and understand cultural knowledge. The cognitive aspect of cultural intelligence reflects knowledge of the norms, practices and conventions in different cultures acquired from education and personal experience. The motivational aspect of cultural intelligence reflects the capability to direct attention and energy toward learning about and functioning in situations characterised by cultural differences. The behavioural aspect of cultural intelligence reflects the capability to exhibit appropriate verbal and nonverbal actions when interacting with people from different cultures. The instrumentation for measuring cultural intelligence and its components is the questionnaire of 20 items designed by Ang et al. (2007). Although some studies have been conducted in the field of cultural intelligence of non-Persian language learners, few addressed the Persian language teachers’ cultural intelligence. The guiding study was that of Petrović (2011) in Serbia which determined the cultural intelligence level of 107 elementary school teachers in 4 cities of Serbia and examined 8 predicting variables to recognize the most effective ones as the predictors of cultural intelligence. The study confirmed the high level of teachers’ cultural intelligence. The most and the least important variables were enjoyment of intercultural communications and the importance of knowing other cultures respectively. Then, the present research was aimed to measure cultural intelligence of Persian language teachers to non-Persian speakers and investigate its predicting variables. 30 Persian language teachers from Ferdowsi University Persian language teaching center in Mashhad, by teaching background span from one to over ten years, were asked to answer two questionnaires translated into Persian and modified based on the present teaching context. The first one was adapted from Ang et al. (2007) cultural intelligence questionnaire including 20 items designed on a five Likert scales from completely disagree to completely agree and measured four cultural intelligence components: metacognitive (items 1-4), cognitive (items 5-10), motivational (items 11-15) and behavioral component (items 16-20). Teachers were exposed to Petrović (2011) predicting variables questionnaire of 3 Likert scales, from low to high, too. Predicting variables questionnaire contains 8 predicting variables as follows: contact with the people from other cultures, communication in foreign language, reading of foreign literature, watching TV travel shows, importance of knowing other cultures, considering multicultural composition of the class as challenge, openness for intercultural learning and enjoyment of intercultural communications. For analyzing the data, SPSS provided both inferential statistics (Pearson correlation Test and Multivariable Regression) and descriptive statistics on components of cultural intelligence and its predicting variables for Persian language teachers to non-Persian speakers. The results demonstrated that the mean scores underpinning teachers’ cultural intelligence components were above 3. The highest and the lowest score were reported for the motivational component (M=4. 31) and the cognitive component (M=3. 67) respectively. Pearson correlation Test results indicated that the relationship between cultural intelligence components and the predicting variables was statistically significant. The effect of these variables on the cultural intelligence was studied by conducting multivariable Regression. As a result, the most important variable was openness for intercultural learning. Other variables such as importance of knowing other cultures, contact with people of other cultures and communication in foreign language were in the next ranks respectively. However, reading foreign literature has obtained the least importance. The results of data collected in this study suggested Persian languag teachers’ high level of the cultural intelligence. The two variables including contact with people of other cultures and openness for intercultural learning were placed among the important variables, as the same reported by Petrović (2011), while no evidence of conformity was found for the most important variable for predicting cultural intelligence in the present study, that is, openness for intercultural learning, The latter point may allude to the fact that Persian language teachers are aware that in addition to sufficient knowledge about language skills, cultural capabilities especially more cultural familiarity with various cultures are required to teach effectively, deal with the learners of different cultures and answer their needs and questions appropriately. To conclude, it is necessary to draw the teachers’ attention to improve their teaching pedagogy and cultural capabilities. This can be accomplished if teachers are encouraged to intercultural learning and using multicultural classes as their learning resources in teacher training courses (TTC) targeted at teaching Persian language to non-Persian speakers.