bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Comprehending coherent and incoherent texts: evidence from eye movement patterns and recall performance
Authors: Vauras Marja , Hyönä Jukka , Niemi Pekka 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTThe effect of text structure on the reading process and recall performance was examined. Adult readers’ eye movements were monitored when they read coherently and incoherently structured texts (N=19). Incoherence was brought about by changing the sentence order in the middle paragraphs of the two stimulus texts. Each subject read and learned one text in a coherent and the other in an incoherent form in two experimental sessions. Immediate free recall followed the reading. The eye movement data showed that during the first pass reading, i.e. initial reading of a sentence until the end of the sentence is reached, structurally incoherent text segments attracted the largest number of regressive fixations, and, hence, were given more visual attention than coherent text segments (indicated by the total duration of fixations). On the other hand, more rereadings, i.e. all fixations made after the first pass reading but before moving away from the given sentence, were devoted to text segments resolving the incoherence. Textual incoherence was further found to lead to inferior recall. However, no clear‐cut correspondence between eye movement behavior and quantitative recall performance was found.
Necessary indeterminacy and the microethnographic study of reading as a social process
Authors: Bloome David 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTThis article discusses a microethnographic approach to the study of classroom reading and writing. Inherent to a microethnographic perspective is a view of reading and writing as social and cultural processes. Reading and writing are viewed as a set of social and cultural events, in which people act and react to each other. This view of reading and writing is contrasted with dominant psychologically‐oriented views. Two dimensions of reading and writing as social and cultural processes are emphasized in the article: (1) author‐reader interaction, and (2) social relationships among people during a reading or writing event. The actions and reactions that people take to each other are necessarily indeterminate in meaning and significance, their meaning and significance is negotiated and reconstructed as people continue to interact. The indeterminacy of actions, reactions, and utterances provides a basis for dialogue and the co‐construction of meaning and action. A transcript of part of a classroom reading lesson is analyzed and discussed to provide an illustration of a microethnographic approach to understanding reading and writing as social and cultural processes and the role of indeterminacy. Implications of viewing reading and writing as social and cultural processes and the concept of necessary indeterminacy are extended to the conduct of reading research.
Talk about texts: reading as a social event
Authors: Maybin Janet , Moss Gemma 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTDrawing on anthropological evidence that interactions with texts are often mediated through oral language practices and Vygotsky's ideas about the primacy of social dialogue for individual intellectual development, the authors argue that children's informal talk about both electronic and printed texts throws new light on the reading process as a whole. They analyse children's talk about a school library book, a piece of graffiti, a television programme and a film to show how readings are shaped by the social organization and personal relationships of the readers, whether in curriculum activities, friendship groups or at home in the family. Readings are constructed, contested and negotiated through talk at the point where texts are first calculated and reshaped again when they are jointly recalled. Talk also helps to construct the text's legitimate audience and the reader's position within it.
The social construction of reading strategies: new directions for research
Authors: Parry Kate 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTIn recent decades reading research has moved from predominantly quantitative work to more qualitative studies in which individual readers are observed in interaction with texts. Considerable differences have been found in the strategies employed by these readers, especially by those of different social and cultural backgrounds. These diverse strategies can be partly attributed to the different processes by which people learn to read and through the different ways in which they see written texts used in their own social environments; the contrasting situations and strategies of Japanese and Nigerian readers are used to illustrate the point. If teachers are to deal effectively with readers of various cultural backgrounds—as they must do in ESL and EFL classes—they need to know more about such contrasts; more work is therefore needed on the relationship between the literacy practices of cultural communities and the reading strategies of particular individuals.
L1 and L2 vocabulary glosses in L2 reading passages: Their effectiveness for increasing comprehension and vocabulary knowledge
Authors: Jacobs George M. , Dufon Peggy , Hong Fong Cheng 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTThis study investigated the effect of vocabulary glossing on recall and vocabulary learning, as well as learners’ preferences as to glossing. Eighty‐five native speakers of English studying Spanish at the university level participated.Participants read a Spanish text under one of three treatment conditions: no gloss, English glosses, or Spanish glosses. They then were asked to write what they recalled of the passage, translate a list of the glossed vocabulary, and complete a questionnaire. The translation task was repeated four weeks later.Results showed that glossing did not significantly affect recall for the participants overall, but that those with higher than average proficiency recalled more if they had read a glossed version of the text. Those who had glosses outperformed their peers on the translation task administered immediately after they had read the text. However, this difference disappeared on the retest. Participants expressed preference for glosses, wished that they be located in the margin, and favoured Spanish glosses if they were comprehensible.
Sentence context and meaning frequency effects in children's processing of ambiguous words
Authors: Simpson Greg B. , Krueger Merilee A. , Kang Hyewon , Elofson Amy C. 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTNine‐ and twelve‐year‐old children named target words which were preceded by sentences ending in words having more than one meaning. Sentences biased the ambiguous word toward its dominant (more frequent) or subordinate (less frequent) meaning. Targets were related to the same meaning as that biased by the sentence, the other meaning, or were unrelated. Targets were presented 0, 300, or 700 ms following the sentence. For both ages, dominant sentences facilitated responses only to the contextually appropriate target. However, subordinate sentences led to facilitation of the appropriate meaning only for the younger group. Older children showed greater facilitation for the inappropriate (but more common) meaning. These results indicate that younger children are more sensitive to the sentence context in which an ambiguous word appears, while the processing of the older children is determined more by the relative frequencies of the words meanings.
The relationship between musical ability and literacy skills
Authors: Douglas Sheila , Willatts Peter 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTResearch has shown that a relationship exists between phonological awareness and literary skills. It has been suggested that a structured programme of musical activities can be used to help children develop a multi‐sensory awareness and response to sounds. The relationship between musical ability and literacy skills was examined in a study that showed an association between rhythmic ability and reading. A further pilot intervention study showed that training in musical skills is a valuable additional strategy for assisting children with reading difficulties.
Reading medical English abstracts: a genre study of the interaction between structural variables and the reader's linguistico‐conceptual competence (L2)
Authors: Salager‐Meyer Françoise 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACT Study Objective: To investigate how structural variables influence readers’ construction of meaning from short‐text samples of expository prose across different levels of background knowledge, text familiarity and L2 competence. Subjects: 36 Spanish‐speaking medical graduates of different L2 proficiency—18 High Intermediate (HI) and 18 Advanced subjects (AD)—were randomly divided into 2 sub‐groups of 9 subjects. Design: Rhetorical manipulations were performed on the published versions of three semantically different medical English abstracts (familiar and relatively unfamiliar topics). Each sub‐group received one of either version and completed a reading test. A questionnaire elicited background information on the subjects. Self‐generated comments on the abstracts were optional. Statistical Treatment of Data: The number of correct answers for each abstract was recorded. Between‐group one‐ and two‐way ANOVAs were applied. The questionnaires and self‐generated comments were both qualitatively and quantitatively analyzed. Results: Both groups differed in their background knowledge and in their intensity of English reading. The AD subjects outperformed the HI ones in reading performance for all three abstracts together, and for the two relatively unfamiliar abstracts only. No difference was observed for the familiar abstract. In the well structured but relatively unfamiliar abstract, only L2 competence affected reading performance. In the relatively unfamiliar and poorly structured abstract, text structure, L2 competence and the interaction between both variables affected reading comprehension. Conclusions: Textual variables operate differently depending on the extent of the readers’ background knowledge and linguistic competence. Variables such as exposure to reading materials (in L1 and L2), background knowledge and L2 competence seem to outweigh the importance of structural variables.
The teacher response to children's miscues of substitution
Authors: Campbell Robin 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTThe teacher response to the miscues of substitution, produced by two beginning readers (6 years old) during the course of a complete academic year within the naturalistic setting of an infant classroom, was explored. The teacher responses were categorised into five main types. The study demonstrated that the teacher response was determined, in part, by the nature of the miscue in terms of its graphophonic, syntactic and semantic link with the text word. The effectiveness of the teacher response was also explored. It was found that although ‘providing the word’ was the most effective strategy to employ for immediate results it was least effective for supporting the child during future readings. Non‐response when used for meaningful substitutions did not impede the child's subsequent reading. Most effective was the restarting of the sentence for the child; this helped the child to repair the miscue immediately and had a continuing positive effect when the word was next met.
Inner speech in young French children's reading
Authors: Liva Angeline , Pugh A.K. 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTThe role of speech and inner speech in reading is contentious and the study of inner speech in reading is fraught with methodological problems. An approach sometimes used is the ‘e‐cancelling’ method, where subjects are instructed to mark all incidences of the letter ‘e’ in a text so that inferences can be made from underlining ‘e's that would be silent versus those that would be sounded in speech. However, this method does not work well in the French language and, in attempting to use letter cancelling approaches with French children aged 7–8 years, we have used other vowels as targets. In this paper we present some results about the effects on rate of reading and comprehension of various tasks intended to induce attention to the sound of parts of the text. Our conclusion, in line with that of Liva (1987) and other researchers, is that, at this early stage of reading development, reference to the sound of text does not inhibit comprehension.
Portuguese preschool teachers' beliefs about early literacy development
Authors: Guimãraes Ana Sofia , Youngman Michael 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTThis work describes a questionnaire survey conducted in a county in central Portugal. The intention was to ascertain preschool teachers’ opinions about early literacy development and its place in preschool education, and to investigate the skills and knowledge seen by teachers as important for early reading and writing development.The results show that, overall, teachers regard preschool education as important for future literacy acquisition, but the majority do not think that early literacy activities should always be part of the preschool curriculum. Concerning the skills that they perceive as important in terms of literacy development, greater emphasis was attributed to verbal, perceptual (auditory and visual) and fine motor skills. Letter/sound knowledge and phonological awareness were considered the least important. Various inferences are drawn, and recommendations for future policy decisions are offered.
The metacognitive reading strategies of five early readers
Authors: Brenna Beverley A. 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTThe purpose of this study was to examine the metacognitive reading strategies of five children, four to six years of age, who were reading fluently prior to formal instruction in grade one. Fluency was judged on whether the children could conduct meaningful reading (Smith, 1988) with relative smoothness (Duffy and Roehler, 1989). Methods of this case study included semi‐structured interviews, role playing, observations and informal miscue analyses of oral reading. The children's personal characteristics and home environments provided a context for their reading strategies, and particular attention was given to the caregiver‐child interactions which may have facilitated the development of metacognitive reading strategies.Findings suggest that each of the children utilized a variety of metacognitive reading strategies and showed individual preferences for certain strategies, as indicated by the number of times these strategies were used. The children also responded differently to particular research methods, a finding which supports the employment of a variety of methods when studying young children. Findings from this study also draw a relationship between caregiver‐child interactions and the development of particular metacognitive reading strategies.
Researching and promoting phonological awareness in the nursery class
Authors: Layton Lyn , Deeny Karen , Tall Graham , Upton Graham 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTThe paper summarises the pilot study and the first two phases of a longitudinal study which set out to prevent the emergence of written language difficulties, by addressing the ability of pre‐schoolers to make phonological judgements. It describes the assessment procedure which was used with 240 nursery‐class children, aged 4 years 5 months, and the activities which were designed to give these children experience in attending to the sound structure of language before the assessment was carried out. Following assessment 41 children were identified as having poor rhyme awareness and were targeted for one‐to‐one training. In the second phase of the study, also discussed here, 21 were given training in the skills supporting phonological awareness and the remainder were assigned to a control group for equivalent training in categorisation skills. It is intended that the literacy skills of both groups will be assessed when the children are 7 years old.
Uninterrupted, Sustained, Silent Reading: the rhetoric and the practice
Authors: Robertson Chris , Keating Iris , Shenton Lesley , Roberts Ivy 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTThe study investigated whether the rhetoric of uninterrupted, sustained, silent reading (USSR/ERIC) was evident in primary classrooms where the practice was professed to operate. Nine primary schools in three different counties were surveyed, and the sample included both urban and rural schools. Structured interviews were undertaken with the headteacher and two members of staff in each school, followed by classroom observations, focusing on what do teachers do in practice during USSR/ERIC.From both interviews and observations it was evident that teacher interpretation of how the sessions should be organised and managed was not specifically that of the rhetoric, with only one school closely following the prescribed model. Whilst the value of a quiet reading time was generally acknowledged and much good practice observed in sessions, it would appear that many models which operate under the guise of ‘uninterrupted sustained silent reading’ are governed by teacher preference or pupil need.
Conceptions of literacy in primary and secondary school teachers
Authors: Webster Alec , Beveridge Michael , Reed Malcolm 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTRecently, teachers have been described as lacking an organised and consistent understanding of how children acquire literacy. Arguments about falling standards have been aired in the media, and links drawn between methods currently in favour in UK schools, and an apparent failure of children to acquire ‘basic skills'. Proposals have now been made by the Department for Education which give greater prominence to more structured, skill‐based primary teaching which, it is claimed, will raise standards and better prepare children to meet the demands they face as they move into secondary school. This study analyses teachers’ conceptual maps of literacy teaching as the preliminary phase of a research programme aimed at describing and enhancing pupils’ functional use of literacy across the curriculum. The analysis is based on a four‐quadrant model of adult‐child proximation. Using a questionnaire format, important similarities and contrasts were found between the views of primary and secondary teachers. However, the study does reveal that teachers have complex models of literacy which underpin their work and do not adhere to simplistic, uni‐dimensional methods.
Do bilingual children read words better in lists or in context?
Authors: Wong Mei Yin , Underwood Geoffrey 
Published: November 2005

ABSTRACTThe aim of this study was to determine whether 11‐year‐old children in Singapore, from English Dominant or English Non‐Dominant backgrounds, read better orally when words were presented in list or text. The children read words in passage and in list form presented in counterbalanced order. In a study of good, average and poor readers, Nicholson (1991) found that context was of more benefit to poorer readers and to younger readers. With the English Non‐Dominant readers in the present study regarded as less proficient readers of English, these children should be expected to show the greatest gains from passage presentations. Error analyses showed that English Non‐Dominant readers performed less well in list readings relative to text readings, while the English Dominant readers produced no difference in performance for these conditions. This indicates that readers with less exposure to English relied more on contextual information than the more experienced readers. Thus, Goodman's (1965) idea of enlightened guessing was again questioned in this study for the case of bilingual readers. Additionally, reading miscues were found to vary in type according to whether the same words were being read in list or in context.
Empowering learners: an exploration of mediating learning for care workers
Authors: Miers Margaret E. , Coles Jonathan G. , Girot Elizabeth , Wilkinson Geoff 
Published: November 2005

AbstractCare workers in learning disability services have welcomed the introduction of a university Certificate in Empowering Practice designed to meet their learning needs. An independent evaluation in 2001 confirmed students’ and employers’ satisfaction with the award. Subsequently, four colleagues – two evaluators and two lecturers on the empowering practice modules – engaged in a co‐operative inquiry to explore lecturers’ perceptions of the learning and teaching processes intrinsic to the success of the certificate. This article reports on the rationale, process and outcomes of the co‐operative inquiry. Co‐operative inquiry involves working with each other as co‐subjects and co‐researchers. The inquiry focuses on transfer of learning and on facilitating learning in groups. The study explores the significance of conceptual understanding; moving back and forth between theory and practice; lecturers’ person and student‐centred philosophy and practice; accepting emotional influences on learning; metacognitive control; and managing risk through relationships. It reviews ideas underpinning the development of the programme and design of the curriculum, including the situational model of curriculum development and the notion of constructive alignment. The outcomes of the co‐operative inquiry include enhanced understanding of the importance of the nature of lecturer/learner relationships in empowering care workers to change practice.
Fructooligosaccharide consumption improves the decreased dentin formation and mandibular defects following gastrectomy in rats
Authors: Morohashi T , Sano T , Sakai N , Yamada S 
Published: November 2005

Objective:  We examined the effects of fructooligosaccharides (FOS) consumption on gastrectomy‐evoked osteopenia and disorders of dentin formation in rats.Materials and methods:  Male Sprague–Dawley rats (n = 28, 35‐day old) were equally divided into two groups; sham‐operated and gastrectomized, and sham‐operation or total gastrectomy was performed. Four weeks after each surgery, the rats were divided into two sub‐groups (n = 7 each); with or without 7.5% FOS‐feeding for 6 weeks. Backscattered electron images of the mandibular sections were taken to calculate trabecular bone area, cortical bone area and total scan area. Thereafter, the dentin formation rate in maxilla were calculated using a fluorescent microscope.Results:  Trabecular bone area and cortical bone area in GX rats were markedly decreased. FOS‐feeding significantly counteracted this reduction, but not to the level seen in sham‐operated rats. Total scan area in gastrectomized groups was significantly decreased. The dentin formation rate was not statistically different among the groups, except the gastrectomized group.Conclusion:  These results suggest that FOS consumption partially restored osteopenia and almost completely restored the reduction in dentin formation following gastrectomy in rats.