PRIMARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’ READING LEVELS OF LINE GRAPHS

The aim of this research was to describe the errors and reading levels that 6th and 7th grade Chilean primary school children reach when working with line graphs. To achieve this objective, we gave a questionnaire, previously validated by experts with two open-ended tasks, to a sample of 745 students from different Chilean cities. In the first task, we asked the children to read the title of the graph, describe the variables represented and perform a direct and inverse reading of a data value. In the second task, where we address the visual effect of a scale change in a representation, the students had to select the line graph more convenient to a candidate. Although both tasks were considered easy for the grade levels targeted, only some of the students achieved the highest reading level and many made occasional errors in the reading of the graphs. Abstract: Spanish El objetivo de esta investigación es describir los errores y niveles de lectura que alcanzan estudiantes chilenos de 6º y 7º grado de Educación Primaria al trabajar con gráficos de líneas. Para lograr este objetivo, se aplicó un cuestionario, previamente validado por expertos, con dos tareas abiertas a una muestra de 745 estudiantes de diferentes ciudades chilenas. En la primera tarea, se pidió que leyeran el título del gráfico, indicaran las variables representadas y realizaran una lectura directa y otra inversa de un valor de datos. En la segunda tarea, los estudiantes deben seleccionar y justificar el gráfico de líneas más conveniente para respaldar a un candidato, donde se aborda el efecto visual de cambio de escala en una representación. Aunque ambas tareas fueron fáciles, solo una parte de los estudiantes logró el máximo nivel de lectura y aparecieron errores ocasionales en la lectura de los gráficos.

The Relationship between Secondary School Students’ Epistemological Beliefs and Critical Reading Levels

This study attempts to depict the secondary school eighth grade students’ epistemological beliefs and their critical reading in terms of several variables and to examine the relationship between them. Descriptive and relational survey models were used within the scope of the study. The population of the study consisted of the secondary school eighth grade students studying in Istanbul. The participants were selected by convenience sampling method. The study deployed personal information form, scientific epistemological belief and critical reading scales. Descriptive statistics, multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) and correlation analysis were used during data analysis. The study results concluded that the eighth grade students’ epistemological beliefs and their critical reading levels were at a moderate level. While no significant difference was identified across the students’ epistemological beliefs in terms of their gender, academic achievement, socio-economic level and book reading, a significant difference was noted across their critical reading levels in terms of gender, academic achievement and book reading, but that was not the case for their socio-economic level. The results of the research have useful implications for teachers. While teachers develop students’ epistemological beliefs in the teaching environment, they will also develop their critical reading skills.

Real-time indoor air quality monitoring association with humidity, temperature, and carbon monoxide level in the residential environment

Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) is the air quality in or around a building that can affect the comfort and health of building occupants. Polluted air contains toxic gases emitted by industry, vehicle emissions, and increased concentrations of harmful gases and particles in the atmosphere. The use of IoT can monitor IAQ reading levels and update IAQ real-time information parameters at different locations in the residential environment for the comfort and health of the occupants. The focus of this work is to measure the level of carbon monoxide (CO) as well as other important parameters such as temperature and relative humidity (RH) as recommended by ASHRAE 55-1992 and MS:1525. The developed system was built using NodeMCU as a microcontroller, MQ-7 to measure CO levels, and DHT22 sensor to measure the humidity and temperature levels. The experiment was conducted in a residential building located in Paya Jaras Tengah, Sungai Buloh, Selangor. The developed system was measured in three different locations, namely the living room, kitchen, and bedroom. In the morning, as the RH increased, the temperature also increased. Since the living room is located nearby the main road, the CO reading was higher than the other two locations, in which the highest value of 12 ppm was recorded. The results obtained showed that the system works well and can record the readings of RH, temperature, and CO level in the residential environment. Therefore, a reliable system can be developed to help the residential occupants monitor the level of IAQ in the house.

Readability levels and thematic content analysis of online and printed lead poisoning informational materials

Background Lead poisoning prevention efforts include preparing and disseminating informational materials such as brochures and pamphlets to increase awareness of lead poisoning, lead exposures and lead poisoning prevention. However, studies have demonstrated that patient education materials for diseases and health conditions are prepared at a reading level that is higher than the recommended 7th–8th grade reading level. This study, therefore, aims to assess the reading levels of lead poisoning informational materials. Methods Lead poisoning materials (N = 31) were accessed from three states; Michigan, New York and Pennsylvania. The readability levels of the materials were assessed using the Flesh Kincaid Grade Level readability test. The Kruskal-Wallis test was conducted to determine if the readability levels differed between the materials obtained from the different states. Thematic content analyses were carried out to assess the inclusion of four themes; definition of lead poisoning, risk factors and exposures, testing and referral and prevention covering 12 subtopics. The Wilcoxon rank sum test was used to examine if there was a difference in the number of subtopics by readability level (dichotomized to >8th grade and < 8th grade). Results The median readability level of the informational materials was 6.7 (IQR: 5.1–8.1). However, there was variability in the readability levels of the materials (range 3.5 to 10.6); materials obtained from Michigan had the highest median reading level of 8.1 (IQR: 6.9–9.0) followed by Pennsylvania. Heterogeneity was observed in the content of the materials. Most of the materials (80%) from Michigan focused on water as a source of lead poisoning, whereas materials from New York and Pennsylvania focused on lead-based paint and other sources. The materials prepared at >8th grade reading level contained fewer topics than materials prepared at <8th grade reading level. Conclusions We find that the materials were often prepared at reading levels lower than the recommended 8th grade reading level. However, there is variability in the reading levels and in the content of the materials. While the materials met the general readability guidelines, they did not necessarily meet the needs of specific groups, especially groups at risk.

Words Matter: An Analysis of the Content and Readability of COVID-19 Information on Clinic Websites

Objective: To examine content and readability of COVID-19 information on outpatient clinic websites in South Carolina.Participants: Thirty-three outpatient clinic websites.Methods: Using a multi-step search strategy, we located three COVID-19 information content sections from each website. Descriptive statistics were calculated for content section characteristics (focus, information source, target population/race, presence of graphics, mobilizing information). Flesch Reading Ease (FRE), Flesch Kincaid Grade Level (FKGL), and Simple Measure of Gobbledygook (SMOG) were used to calculate reading levels. Mann Whitney U and Kruskal Wallis tests were performed to examine readability levels by clinic type (primary care vs. specialty) and content section characteristics.Results: Twenty-six clinics offered COVID-19 information; 70 content sections across all 26 clinics were analyzed. Sections focused on COVID-19 clinic policies (48.4%), prevention (22.6%), testing (19.4%), and symptoms (9.7%). 93.5% lacked target population, 41.9% provided no information source, 38.7% had no graphics, and none mentioned racial/ethnic groups. MFRE = 54.3, MFKGL = 9.9, MSMOG = 9.5.Conclusion: COVID-19 information focused mainly on clinic policy and was written at a ninth-grade skill level. Findings suggest there is opportunity for clinics to update their online content to convey more plain language and sourced information, especially for high-risk groups.

Long-distance syntactic dependencies drive the complexity of legal language

Although contracts and other legal documents have long been known to cause processing difficulty in laypeople, the source and nature of this difficulty has remained unclear. To better understand this mismatch, we conducted a corpus analysis (~10 million words) to investigate to what extent difficult-to-process features that are reportedly common in contracts--such as center embedding, low-frequency jargon, passive voice and non-standard capitalization--are in fact present in contracts relative to normal texts. We found that all of these features were strikingly more prevalent in contracts relative to standard-English texts. We also conducted an experimental study ($n=108$ subjects) to determine to what extent such features cause processing difficulties for laypeople of different reading levels. We found that contractual excerpts containing these features were recalled and comprehended at a lower rate than excerpts without these features, even for experienced readers, and that center-embedded clauses led to greater decreases in recall than other features. These findings confirm long-standing anecdotal accounts of the presence of difficult-to-process features in contracts, and show that these features inhibit comprehension and recall of legal content for readers of all levels. Our findings also suggest such difficulties may largely result from working memory costs imposed by complex syntactic features--such as center-embedded clauses--as opposed to a mere lack of understanding of specialized legal concepts, and that removing these features would be both tractable and beneficial for society at large.

Analysis of Mathematical Representation Ability Based on Level of Reading Interest in Geometry Course

Reading literacy activities are currently being held by all levels of education. Literacy activities have a positive effect on students in understanding information. The ability to understand information can be realized through mathematical representation, which is one of the main elements in mathematical understanding. This research can help educators in mapping the mathematical representation ability based on the reading interest of students. The purpose of this research is to identify which indicators can be mastered by students who have reading interests at high, medium, and low levels. This research is qualitative. The research subjects were students of the Mathematics Education Department of Ivet University. The data collection procedures used were scale, test, and interview. The instruments of this study were the reading interest scale, mathematical representation ability test, and interview sheets. The data analysis technique of this study adopted data analysis techniques from Miles and Huberman. The conclusions of this study are (1) students with high and medium reading levels have the ability to represent mathematical representations to model and interpret physical, social, and mathematical phenomena; have the ability of mathematical representations to create and use representations to communicate mathematical ideas or concepts; have the ability of mathematical representations in selecting, applying, and translating mathematical representations to solve problems, (2) students with a low reading level have lacked on the ability of mathematical representations to use representations to model and interpret physical, social, and mathematical phenomena, thus it caused them couldn’t mastering the ability of mathematical representations to create and use representations to communicate mathematical ideas or concepts and the ability of mathematical representations to select, apply, and translate mathematical representations to solve problems. Keywords: mathematical representation ability, reading interest, geometry.

Mental health literacy websites for children of parents with a mental illness

Objective: This review of online mental health resources was conducted to evaluate and document the availability of mental health resources pertinent to the needs of children of parents with a mental illness (COPMI). This review identified available websites and analyzed the appropriateness of content and readability. Methods: We conducted an extensive 6-month review of websites with available mental health literacy content that may be found by COPMI searching for information. Web content was evaluated and described with qualitative thematic analysis techniques. Web content was also evaluated for reading levels using the Flesch-Kincaid readability analysis tool. Results: The researchers described 7 descriptive themes, 10 content areas, and described what information was available across websites and where gaps existed. They also concluded the average reading level of the websites was 9.7, which was substantially higher than current web development recommendations. Conclusions: Websites can be a valuable tool for COPMI without access to direct services. To improve current web resources, developers should strive to offer content specific to the identified needs of COPMI. Additionally, web content should be developed at a level that is accessible to teens and parents.

Assessing the Readability of Covid-19 Testing Messages on the Internet

The COVID-19 pandemic first became evident at the end of 2019, and because of the many unknown aspects of this emerging infectious disease, the internet quickly became a source of information for consumers. It is important for any vital information to be written unambiguously, and at a level that can be understood by all people regardless of education levels. The purpose of this study was to assess the readability of 50 sources of COVID19 testing information online. Only 6 websites out of 50 received an appropriate readability score on more than one assessment. One-sample, one-tailed t-tests (α = 0.05, df = 49) were used to see if the websites with information on COVID-19 testing are being written at appropriate reading levels. The resulting p-values indicate that each p-value recorded is substantially below 0.05, it is very unlikely that websites on this topic are being written at the recommended levels. Even the optimal messages on COVID-19 reflect a confusing and rapidly changing public health crisis, however if messages are kept simple and clear, individuals will have the best possible chance of optimizing behavioral mitigation strategies. These are compelling reasons for informational hosts to take necessary steps to ensure that messages are written in as simple terms as possible. To this end, it is suggested that internet sites dispersing COVID-19 testing information build in text analysis methods for all published messages, particularly those meant to inform best health practices in the time of a pandemic.

Battle of the Books

Most of my teaching career has been spent in American schools, most recently as a Teacher-Librarian at an English-Spanish elementary school. My international teaching career began in Qatar in August of 2012, when I started my new job as a Teacher-Librarian at a private K-12 school. My first year was spent rearranging the library’s collection and getting a feel for the school, its students and staff. By the end of the second term of the first year, I realized that the most important aspect of my job as a school librarian was going to be improving the literacy skills of my students. How to do this was my next problem and I immediately thought of the Battle of the Books (BOB) Program. My school district in Oregon had used it in seventeen elementary schools, both regular and bilingual. This was exactly what I needed because I was currently teaching in a bilingual school (English/Arabic). I went about getting support from my primary and secondary school teachers and administration. Once I had the support in place, I needed to take a closer look at how we had run the BOB Program in Oregon and then adapt it to my current situation. The things that I needed to consider in order to make the BOB Program a success were the following:1. Deciding which year levels would participate for the Primary and Secondary Divisions2. Selecting the reading levels for each division3. Deciding the number of books for each division to read4. Selecting the right books for the each division5. Making a Timeline6. Deciding the format of the questions7. Writing the questions8. Setting up the tournament9. Using Guest Readers during the tournament for each division10. Rewards for the winning teams of both divisions