Adult beginner distance language learner perceptions and use of assignment feedback

This qualitative study examines perceptions and use of assignment feedback among adult beginner modern foreign language learners on higher education distance learning courses. A survey of responses to feedback on assignments by 43 Open University students on beginner language courses in Spanish, French, and German indicated that respondents can be classified into three groups: those who use feedback strategically by integrating it into the learning process and comparing it with, for example, informal feedback from interaction with native speakers, those who take note of feedback, but seem not to use it strategically, and those who appear to take little account of either marks or feedback. The first group proved to be the most confident and most likely to maintain their motivation in the longer term. The conclusion discusses some of the pedagogical and policy implications of the findings

Expectations eclipsed in foreign language education: learners and educators on an ongoing journey / edited by Hülya Görür-Atabaş, Sharon Turner.

Between June 2-4, 2011 Sabancı University School of Languages welcomed colleagues from 21 different countries to a collaborative exploration of the challenging and inspiring journey of learners and educators in the field of language education.\ud \ud The conference provided an opportunity for all stakeholders to share their views on language education. Colleagues met with world-renowned experts and authors in the fields of education and psychology, faculty and administrators from various universities and institutions, teachers from secondary educational backgrounds and higher education, as well as learners whose voices are often not directly shared but usually reported.\ud \ud The conference name, Eclipsing Expectations, was inspired by two natural phenomena, a solar eclipse directly before the conference, and a lunar eclipse, immediately after. Learners and educators were hereby invited to join a journey to observe, learn and exchange ideas in orde

Language Proficiency and Cultural Intelligence in Distance English-Language Learning

The purpose of this study is to explore the viability of an international distance English-language program in the development of language and cultural proficiency. Students participated in tests at the beginning and at the end of the course to determine how well they developed both language and cultural proficiencies. The measures included (a) the computer-administered Oral Proficiency Interview (OPIc) from theAmerican Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL), (b) ACTFL-aligned assessments of reading, listening, grammar, and vocabulary skills, and (c) the Cultural Intelligence Scale (CQS). In addition, course activities surveys provided additional information about student perceptions of course activities. Participants in this study came from various countries as they prepared to attend a U.S. university in Hawaii.The distance learning program fostered language proficiency through various learning activities, with an emphasis on synchronous dialogue over video chat technologies. In addition to English-language proficiency, the program sought to help students learn to effectively communicate with students from other cultures. Cross-cultural proficiency was fostered through cross-cultural dialogue with tutors, teachers, and other students. Students showed improvement in speaking, listening, vocabulary, and grammar. However, on average, students did not show an improvement in reading proficiency. Students reported that dialogue with tutors and teachers was among the most helpful activities in learning English. Students showed some improvement in cultural proficiency. However, this improvement was not universal across all measures of cultural proficiency. Students reported that certain activities—particularly dialogue with tutors and other students—as helpful in developing cross-cultural proficiencies.This study also investigated the relationship between language proficiency and cultural proficiency. Results were mixed. With a few exceptions, cultural proficiency did not predict a student’s language proficiency at the beginning of the course, during the course, or at the end of the course

Reading Comprehension and Nursing Education: A Missing Variable Associated with Nursing Student Attrition?

ABSTRACT READING COMPREHENSION AND NURSING EDUCATION: A MISSING VARIABLE ASSOCIATED WITH STUDENT ATTRITION? by Debra L. Lajoie, MSN The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee December, 2013 Under the Supervision of Susan Dean-Baar, PhD, RN, FAAN The goals of nursing faculty and administrators are to select students most capable of completing the nursing program and to provide academic support needed for program completion. However, despite stronger entrance requirements, educators are still baffled by the persistent attrition from nursing education programs. The purpose of this study was to describe and compare the level of reading comprehension of two groups of students, a pre-nursing student group and a senior nursing student group, to begin to understanding the level of reading comprehension found in the nursing student population. This could contribute to future research to determine whether reading ability might be an unexplored variable contributing to the persistent attrition of nursing students from baccalaureate programs at a time when resources in these programs are limited, and the demand for a competent and diverse workforce continues to increase. This study used a descriptive, quantitative, non-experimental design. Reading comprehension was measured using the Nelson-Denny Reading Test (NDRT). The findings of this study showed that both the pre-nursing and senior nursing students\u27 levels of reading comprehension are low. The mean grade equivalent score for the pre-nursing student sample was 10.09, and 14.75 for the senior nursing student sample. Pre-nursing and senior nursing students scored below the standardization norms for comparable college students, and senior nursing students also scored below the standardization values for other health profession students at a comparable level of education. Senior nursing students scored at a higher level than pre-nursing students, however, it is not known if this reflects growth in reading ability with exposure to higher levels of post-secondary education or student attrition. Student perceptions of their college reading expectations or experiences were assessed using a five-point Likert scale. Pre-nursing students were extremely optimistic in their abilities to successfully complete their reading assignments, while the seniors were much more realistic and described challenges completing assigned readings. Selected demographics variables were compared with reading scores using simultaneous multiple regression. Three demographic predictors collectively accounted for 51.9% of the variance: (1) group (pre-nursing or senior student), (2) self-reported hours spent working per week, and (3) number of hours spent reading per week. The number of self-reported hours spent working per week was not a significant predictor of the student\u27s total reading score. Limitations of the study included the use of a nonrandomized sample which limits the ability to generalize the findings beyond the sample population, homogeneity of the sample, the use of self-reported measures, and time limitations, which included the age of the normative sample and test administration time limits. This study supports the need for further research in the areas of reading comprehension and student academic outcomes. This will contribute to the emerging body of research describing academic literacy, discipline-specific literacy, and the literacy needs of English language learners

The teaching strategies in the Teaching-Learning proccess of reading skill in eleventh grade, section B at public high school "Augusto Calderon Sandino" in Niquinohomo during the period from March to Octuber 2014

Over the last twenty years, there has been growing interest in incorporating a significant focus on Reading skill into the language curricula. There is a general belief that such focus will help students become more successful learners and it facilitates the activation of the comprehension. It is also assumed that learners who have developed skills in Reading will be able to exploit classroom-learning opportunities effectively, and they will be more adequately equipped to continue with language learning outside the classroom. Reading is the most basic skill, it provides access to other skills and knowledge, facilitates life-long learning, and it opens doors to opportunities in life in several aspects.Thi

Employment of strategies in the listening skill throughout the teachinglearning process from 10 th grade students in the morning shift at Miguel de Cervantes Institute Managua city, district three during the second semester of 2016

This research was carried out at Miguel de Cervantes High School of 10th grade students in the morning shift during the second semester of the year 2016. During some observations, it was analyzed that there are certain weaknesses that learners present. One of the most essential is in the listening skill in which the teacher strategies and the didactic materials that she applies are not effective for the learning process. To support what was identified it was necessary to apply surveys to twenty (20) students and the English teacher. In the surveys were asked several questions regarding to the strategies that the instructor employs and didactic materials that she uses during listening lessons. Through the learner’ responses it is confirmed that students present a poor listening understanding due to the inappropriate strategies and the lack of didactic materials, these factors make the learner face difficulties at the moment of listening a track; as a result, the learners feel overwhelmed, bored, lost, confused and they do not succeed in this skill. Therefore, this also affects the teaching process; the instructor might not achieve her objectives. Teacher must find the most suitable strategies for learners and make use of the available didactic materials in order to create a successful learning process. Therefore, it is recommended that the educator applies some techniques such as: songs and videos because they are entertaining, students prefer them and of course they will learn and will improve their listening skill. In order that the instructor applies these techniques she needs to take learners more often to the technology classrooms. The correct format when teaching a listening lesson, during the prelistening stage for instance, in which the teacher must look for the unknown vocabulary that appears in the track and teach that vocabulary to learners; as a result, students will find the track a little bit easier, also it is vital that the educator teaches first the grammar tense that is going to be listened in the track. If these recommendations are taken into account, the teaching- learning process will improve

Readings on L2 reading: Publications in other venues 2021-2022

This feature offers an archive of articles published in other venues during the past year and serves as a valuable tool to readers of Reading in a Foreign Language (RFL). It treats any topic within the scope of RFL and second language reading. The articles are listed in alphabetical order, each with a complete reference as well as a brief summary. The editors of this feature attempt to include all related articles that appear in other venues. However, undoubtedly, this list is not exhaustive

Serious game-based word-to-text integration intervention effects in English as a second language

Word-to-text integration (WTI) is the ability to integrate words into a mental representation of the text and is important for reading comprehension, but challenging in English as a second language (ESL). However, it remains unclear whether WTI can be trained in seventh grade ESL learners, who often struggle with reading comprehension and display large individual differences. To pay attention to individual differences, the present study examined an adaptive computer game-based WTI-intervention. The intervention, replacing 50 min of ESL classroom instruction, comprized a 12-week program in which students had to complete WTI-based assignments within four serious games, targeting morphosyntactic awareness, translation of words within sentences, recognizing idioms from words in contexts, and a filler game targeting dictation. The intervention group (n = 164) was compared to a control group (n = 166), who only received regular ESL classroom instruction. Both groups completed the following reading measures: decoding, morphological, and syntactic awareness, WTI (argument and anomaly reading speed and processing), and reading comprehension tasks at the beginning (T1) of the school year and at the end (T2) of the school year. Results demonstrated an intervention effect on decoding and anomaly processing as reflected by an interaction between time (T1 vs. T2) and group (intervention vs. control) in a repeated measures MANOVA. Follow-up mediation analyses for the intervention group only - with game performance as mediators between reading measures at T1 and T2 - indicated that students with better T1 scores on reading measures showed more growth in performance within games. More performance growth within the translation game and the idiom recognition game was related to better reading scores at T2. Both high-achieving and low-achieving students displayed performance growth within games, indicating that a WTI intervention yields promising results for a broad variety of ESL readers

The Effectiveness of Using Youtube for Vocabulary Mastery

The study is to examine the improvement in vocabulary comprehension and maintenance of English as foreign language students at SMK Maárif 1 of Kebumen because of this of integrating YouTube in their reading classes. The study also investigated the perceptions of both students as well as teachers towards the inclusion of YouTube on the development of vocabulary. One hundred intermediate level learners aged between 14-17 years old participated in the study. Students were divided into two organizations: an experimental group who watched YouTube during the reading activities and a control group who was not exposed to the videos. Data were collected using pre-tests and post-tests in addition to questionnaires. The findings of the analysis reveal that the group who viewed the YouTube clips outperformed the group who was simply not subjected to YouTube videos in the posttest. The results clearly show that YouTube offered statistically significant effects on the students' vocabulary acquisition. The findings of the study indicate that the participants positively viewed the use of YouTube in their lessons. The findings also exposed significant improvement in the students’ vocabulary achievement. The implications of the findings are discussed within the context of foreign language learning and teachin