Kurdish Undergraduate EFL Students’ Perspectives on Using Conceptual Metaphor-based Approach in Teaching English Idioms

Abstract

The advent of Conceptual Metaphors (CMs) has led to the use of Applied Cognitive Linguistics in recent years to be the growing area within the ELT field. In this regard, previous studies in other language contexts have proven that CM is a good medium for teaching English idioms and other vocabulary items. Despite a great deal of research on the positive impact of the CM-based Approach in teaching vocabulary and idioms to EFL students, very few studies have reported students’ perspectives on its implementation. Such an endeavor is completely new to EFL classes in the Kurdish context since the perspectives of the Kurdish undergraduate students of EFL have not been known yet. Therefore, this study is an attempt to explore the Kurdish students’ perspectives on using the CM-based Approach in teaching idioms within the EFL framework. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected by adopting a questionnaire consisting of closed-ended items and open-ended questions, inquiring 52 junior English-majored Kurdish students. The results indicate that almost all the participants have positive attitudes towards the approach as it has benefits to language learning; hence, they are eager to know more about it. However, negative attitudes towards the approach and its implementation in teaching idioms were observed. Additionally, suggestions were presented by the respondents to improve CM-based instruction in EFL.