Eye movements in code reading:relaxing the linear order

Abstract—Code reading is an important skill in programming. Inspired by the linearity that people exhibit while natural lan-guage text reading, we designed local and global gaze-based mea-sures to characterize linearity (left-to-right and top-to-bottom) in reading source code. Unlike natural language text, source code is executable and requires a specific reading approach. To validate these measures, we compared the eye movements of novice and expert programmers who were asked to read and comprehend short snippets of natural language text and Java programs. Our results show that novices read source code less linearly than natural language text. Moreover, experts read code less linearly than novices. These findings indicate that there are specific differences between reading natural language and source code, and suggest that non-linear reading skills increase with expertise. We discuss the implications for practitioners and educators. I

How does reciprocal teaching scaffold reading comprehension of non-fiction text?

This study was conducted in a suburban fourth grade class in New Jersey. Its purpose was to examine how Reciprocal Teaching scaffolds comprehension when reading non-fiction text. Students were evaluated prior to the study. Teacher modeling preceded students\u27 application of the strategies. Throughout the study, students were evaluated on whether they were using the four strategies, predicting, questioning, clarifying, summarizing, in a manner that made sense and was related to the text. Rubrics were used to evaluate each of the four strategies. Additional data came from the discussions among students while reading text together. Data analysis showed the use of groups provided unplanned discussions through questions among the students as well as when making text connections

Preschool Oral Narrative Retell Intervention: A Contextualized Approach

The purpose of this study was to investigate the efficacy of a contextualized, explicit narrative intervention on oral narrative retell skills in typically developing preschoolers as a means for fostering the development of narrative structure, story comprehension, and narrative retell skills. Participants were recruited from the Childhood Development Laboratory preschool classrooms located in Buzzard Hall at Eastern Illinois University. Prior to intervention, participants\u27 core receptive and expressive language abilities were assessed using the Comprehensive Evaluation of Language Fundamentals-Preschool-2nd Edition (CELF-P-2), and oral narrative retells were analyzed for narrative complexity using the Test of Narrative Retell-Preschool Edition (TNR-P). The six weeks of narrative intervention consisted of explicit story grammar instruction and narrative retell practice. Participants\u27 oral narrative retells were reassessed using the TNR-P at week three, week six, and five weeks post intervention. The results of the study indicated that participants who received the experimental instruction demonstrated significant gains on narrative retell scores concluding the six-week intervention while their control group counterparts demonstrated no gains in narrative retell abilities. Likewise, experimental group participants demonstrated significantly higher skill maintenance five weeks post intervention compared to control group counterparts. Interestingly, participants\u27 core language abilities were inversely related to their TNR-P scores at baseline, while baseline sentence recall skills demonstrated a positive, linear relationship with narrative performance at the conclusion of intervention

Reading is thinking: improving reading comprehension using the think-aloud method

Esta investigación tuvo como fin reportar el impacto generado por la estrategia de pensar en voz alta en la comprensión de lectura de 5 estudiantes de ingles pre-intermedio de una universidad pública de la ciudad de Pereira. Así mismo, se reportarán las percepciones de los estudiantes con respecto a la estrategia de pensar en voz alta. Los métodos usados para llevar a cabo la recolección de datos para esta investigación fueron: diarios, observaciones y entrevistas. Los resultados obtenidos al final de esta investigación fueron positivos en términos de comprensión de lectura en ingles, ya que después de implementar la estrategia de pensar en voz alta los estudiantes lograron una mejor comprensión de los textos leídos en clase. De igual manera, los estudiantes que hicieron parte de este proceso alcanzaron cambios favorables en aspectos del idioma Inglés tales como: el vocabulario, pronunciación, escucha y escritura.The aim of this study was to report the impact generated by the think-aloud method in the English reading comprehension of 5 pre-intermediate students who belong to a public urban university in Pereira. Likewise, the perceptions of these students in regards to the think aloud strategy are reported. The methods used to collect all the data in this investigation were: journals, observations and interviews. The results obtained at the end of this study were positive in terms of English reading comprehension, since after implementing the think-aloud method; these pre-intermediate students achieved a better comprehension of the texts used in the English classes. In the same way, the students who took part of this process reach positive changes in English such as: vocabulary, pronunciation, listening and writing