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Learner attitudes towards learning and the perceptions and beliefs behind them may have a profound influence on learning behavior and on learning outcomes (Cotterall, 1995; Reid,1982) and teachers’ awareness of such needs and preferences will result in more realistic and useful teaching strategies which in turn will have a facilitative effect on the learning process (Horwitz, 1988). Thus, it seems the learners should be given opportunities to express their own language learning preferences especially in reference to definition of objectives in general and awareness of strategies in learning (Bada & Okan,2000). Taking into account the great role identifying learner preferences plays in learning in general and learning a language in particular, 174 EFL students at English Language Department of Islamic Azad university of Hamedan were asked to take part in a survey, expressing their language learning preferences by answering a 13-item questionnaire adapted from Brindley(1984) and containing questions on Learning, Error Correction, and Assessment and/or Evaluation. As a further measure 24 EFL teachers working with the same students were also asked to express their views on the extent to which they were aware of their students’ needs and preferences. The analysis of the data collected pointed to a need for closer cooperation between the teachers and students in arranging and implementing learning activities.

Problem statement: Quick access to the knowledge of modern sciences which are being developed every day is one of the necessities of Medical Education. In this regard, the use of computers as a valuable tool plays an important role in teaching medical students. This can increase the learners’ use of their different senses in education which may enhance their knowledge and lifelong learning Purpose of study: The purpose of the present study is to measure the nursing students’ attitudes and knowledge about the computers and the Internet. Methods: In this descriptive and cross-sectional study a questionnaire was administered to a group of 300 nursing students randomly selected from different levels. Finding and results: The results of data analysis through showed that; 86.8percent of students had access to the computers and 63.5 percent to the Internet. The rates of access include the home access and the University. 73.2 percent of students were not adequately informed of the procedures of professional searching and 59.8 did not have enough information about specialized sites in their field. Conclusion and discussion: Levels of student's achievement and attitudes toward computers and the internet is good but providing different forms of professional training to use this tool seem necessary.

As some studies on brain lateralization (e.g. Knecht et al., 2000) have lent support to the hypothesis that left handed people may reflect a right-brain dominance, and as differences in dominance could have implications about cognitive functioning, the present study aims at investigating whether this difference is reflected in the learning-style and, therefore, learning-strategy differences between left-handed and right-handed EFL students. To do this, three questionnaires, Torrance's (1987) Right/Left Brain Dominance Test; Oxford's(1990) Strategy Inventory for Language Learning, and VAK Learning Styles Indicator, were adopted and administered among a sample of 100 EFL students (50 left-handers and 50 right-handers). The data collected were then analyzed by SPSS Package to find the patterns of difference and the significance of the differences between left and right-handers on the areas of concern by the computation of cross-tab frequencies with Chi-Square and Independent Samples T-test respectively. Although the results of the data analysis showed no significant difference in brain dominance between right-handersand left-handers, the differences between the groups on certain aspects of learning styles as well as learning strategies were found to be statistically significant suggesting a rather different cognitive processing in left-handed learners than right-handed counterparts and bringing to light the need for the educators, teachers, and syllabus designers to give the issue due attention.

The present study is an attempt to investigate the effect(s) of providing feedback on EFL students’ writing performance at Islamic Azad University of Hamedan. To do this, 60 EFL students enrolled in Advanced Writing classes, in which the focus is on developing students’ composition skills, were randomly assigned to three groups: a control group, a direct-correction experimental group and an uncoded-feedback experimental group. The study lasted 7 weeks in the course of which the participants had to write paragraphs on the topics assigned on a weekly basis. The papers were all read by the researcher teacher and returned back to the students providing direct corrections on the errors made on participles and resumptives(two problematic areas to Iranian learners of English) to those in the first experimental group, uncoded feedback on such errors to those participants in the second experimental group, and no feedback to those in the control group.The results of a one-way ANOVA indicated that teacher feedback was a significant factor influencing students’ writing performance in the two experimental groups. The results also pointed to a significant difference in the performance of the students in uncoded-feedback group over those in the direct-correction feedback group and no-feedback control group. The results of the study support the claim that error feedback in general helps in EFL learners’ better writing performance and that uncoded feedback, compared with direct corrections, is providing a more effective strategy to react to students’ writings.

The present study is an attempt to find out whether teaching “cognitive and meta-cognitive strategies” affects EFL students’ reading comprehension across proficiency levels.To that end, one hundred and eighty B.A. students majoring in English from Azad University were randomly selected and were divided into three proficiency groups on the basis of their scores on the quick Test of Michigan. Subsequently, the subjects at each proficiency level were divided into two equal sub-groups, and were randomly assigned to the control and experimental groups. The subjects in each experimental group were taught the desired cognitive and metacognitive strategies, whereas those in the control groups received some sort of instruction on vocabulary and structure. At the end, all the subjects were given reading comprehension tests geared at their proficiency levels.The data thus collected were then analyzed by SPSS statistical package to find out the difference between the means of the groups through the estimation of independent samples t-tests. The results revealed that “teaching cognitive and metacognitive strategies” had no significanteffects on the reading comprehension of elementary students, neither did it have any effect on the reading comprehension of advanced students. However, teaching such strategies had significant effects on the reading comprehension of intermediate students.