A Historical and Methodological Investigation of Teaching Persian to Speakers of Other Languages

Teaching Persian to speakers of other languages has failed to keep abreast of the trends in language teaching. This non-convergence is rooted in political, economic, cultural, and linguistic issues (particularly alphabetical) as well as literary and linguistic perceptions of teaching Persian as a second or foreign language. As a result, one decade of theoretical and pedagogical developments in language teaching has not informed the teaching of Persian. This problem can be investigated from three perspectives. The first one is the relationship between teaching Persian and the emergence of methods and postmethod eras in language teaching. The second perspective concerns the emergence of different syllabi and their employment in Persian course books. The third perspective sheds light on teaching Persian in terms of teaching techniques and activities utilized in Persian course books and classes. The results of the investigation show that there is no single approach or method applied to the selection of activities in Persian course books. In addition, they show the cognitive, affective, and metacognitive variables of learners are not taken into account in the development of materials. Against this backdrop, the paper offers some suggestions to enhance Persian syllabus design and materials development.