ReaderBench Learns Dutch: Building a Comprehensive Automated Essay Scoring System for Dutch Language

Automated Essay Scoring has gained a wider applicability and usage with the integration of advanced Natural Language Processing techniques which enabled in-depth analyses of discourse in order capture the specificities of written texts. In this paper, we introduce a novel Automatic Essay Scoring method for Dutch language, built within the Readerbench framework, which encompasses a wide range of textual complexity indices, as well as an automated segmentation approach. Our method was evaluated on a corpus of 173 technical reports automatically split into sections and subsections, thus forming a hierarchical structure on which textual complexity indices were subsequently applied. The stepwise regression model explained 30.5% of the variance in students’ scores, while a Discriminant Function Analysis predicted with substantial accuracy (75.1%) whether they are high or low performance students.This study is part of the RAGE project. The RAGE project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 644187. This publication reflects only the author's view. The European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information it contains

Active Learning

In the context of globalization changes in educational systems, it is important to modify approaches to the educational process and introduce learning technologies that allow for maximum involvement in learning. One such technology is the technology of active learning, which engages learners through participation in the cognitive process and certain tasks as well as through the collective activities of the subjects of the educational process. This book discusses the theoretical analysis of active learning and contains practical recommendations for its implementation

Teaching and Learning Critical Reading with Transnational Texts at a Mexican University: An Emergentist Cast Study.

This dissertation project examines the implementation of a critical reading intervention in a Mexican university, and the emergence of target critical reading processes in Mexican college-level EFL readers. It uses a Complexity Theory-inspired, qualitative methodology. Orienting the selection and design of materials is a deep view of culture that focuses on competing ideologies as a site of cultural production. Also orienting the pedagogical design is a goal to enable readers to infer aspects of a text‘s social and ideological context from deep examinations of its linguistic patterns and rhetorical strategies. The metalanguage and analytic procedures of Appraisal Theory (a subset of Systemic Functional Linguistics), Burkean rhetoric, and Toulmin analysis were used to design activities and discourse organizers aimed at promoting rhetorical inferences and ideological critique. Adapted versions of these concepts and analytic procedures were taught to students. The study focused on investigating the emergence of the target interpretive processes in the student population as well as identifying factors underlying observable student reading practices. Results from these analyses were used to inform the theorizations of learning and instruction underpinning the intervention. Findings show that previous, non-target genre and rhetorical knowledge strongly influenced some students‘ initial implausible interpretations of authorial attitude and audience. However, the intervention was successful in helping students to produce plausible interpretations. Genre and rhetorical knowledge thus emerged as important elements of the theorizations of learning needs and outcomes, which led to modifications in the underlying instructional theory. Students learned to use the metalanguage of Appraisal analysis and reported that it was helpful in improving comprehension. Unexpectedly, students reported the emergence of an awareness of the need to monitor their comprehension. They also showed and reported increased ability to build richer, more plausible representations of texts in general after doing Appraisal analysis. Some students also reported internalizing the learned analytic procedures and applying them to other genres. These results have implications for L1 and L2 reading pedagogy and contribute to understanding the processes involved in making rhetorical inferences and resisting ideology.Ph.D.English & EducationUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/86301/1/moisesd_1.pd

Tartu Ülikooli toimetised. Tööd semiootika alalt. 1964-1992. 0259-4668

http://www.ester.ee/record=b1331700*es

FIRST GRADERS AS SENSITIVE SOCIAL PARTNERS AND SKILLED READERS

This mixed methods dissertation is guided by a sociocultural framework and a pragmatist stance to contribute to early literacy scholarship about minority children. In particular, I explore the relationship between low socioeconomic status Puerto Rican children’s reading experience and their social cognition by: (1) assessing them through quantitative and qualitative measures that reveal their capacities in these areas at the end of their first grade year, and (2) documenting their reading experiences at home and at school through ethnographic qualitative methods. The analyses revealed significant positive correlations between the tests of reading and social understanding, a scarcity of conventional reading practices in the home, the predominance of a whole-class basal approach to reading in the classroom, and discrepant cross-methods findings regarding who qualifies as a reader and who has insights about the social world

Textual organisation and construal of interpersonal meanings in different genres of medical texts

This thesis investigates thematic organisation and construal of interpersonal evaluative meanings in the Introduction (Beginning) and Discussion (Concluding) sections of two medical genres: medical research articles (RAs) and medical review articles (reviews). Situated within EAP educational context, the study aims to examine variations between medical professionals and PhD candidates in academic writing, thus assisting candidates for successful academic publication. Two sets of corpus data are established, which involve published professional medical papers and students draft medical writings. Linguistic analyses concerning thematic structures and evaluative stances are explored, drawing on Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) and Appraisal theory. The major findings reveal that PhD candidates demonstrate capabilities of handling textual organisation and construction of interpersonal meanings in medical RA genre.However, some problems do arise when they compose their review drafts. The pedagogical implications of this research for the motivation of PhD candidates, for discourse-based writing approach and for raising awareness of organsing textual and interpersonal aspects of meanings in academic writing instruction are considered.These elements may provide useful insights in informing curriculum design for academic writing and publication

Enhancing Free-text Interactions in a Communication Skills Learning Environment

Learning environments frequently use gamification to enhance user interactions.Virtual characters with whom players engage in simulated conversations often employ prescripted dialogues; however, free user inputs enable deeper immersion and higher-order cognition. In our learning environment, experts developed a scripted scenario as a sequence of potential actions, and we explore possibilities for enhancing interactions by enabling users to type free inputs that are matched to the pre-scripted statements using Natural Language Processing techniques. In this paper, we introduce a clustering mechanism that provides recommendations for fine-tuning the pre-scripted answers in order to better match user inputs

Retrieval-, Distributed-, and Interleaved Practice in the Classroom:A Systematic Review

Three of the most effective learning strategies identified are retrieval practice, distributed practice, and interleaved practice, also referred to as desirable difficulties. However, it is yet unknown to what extent these three practices foster learning in primary and secondary education classrooms (as opposed to the laboratory and/or tertiary education classrooms, where most research is conducted) and whether these strategies affect different students differently. To address these gaps, we conducted a systematic review. Initial and detailed screening of 869 documents found in a threefold search resulted in a pool of 29 journal articles published from 2006 through June 2020. Seventy-five effect sizes nested in 47 experiments nested in 29 documents were included in the review. Retrieval- and interleaved practice appeared to benefit students’ learning outcomes quite consistently; distributed practice less so. Furthermore, only cognitive Student*Task characteristics (i.e., features of the student’s cognition regarding the task, such as initial success) appeared to be significant moderators. We conclude that future research further conceptualising and operationalising initial effort is required, as is a differentiated approach to implementing desirable difficulties