Parlez-vous francais? Effects of structure-based versus dynamic-usage-based approaches on oral proficiency

We investigated the effectiveness of two different teaching methods based on two different theoretical views of how languages are learned in oral proficiency after three years of L2 French instruction. The first method is commonly used in the Netherlands and is in line with structure-based (SB) principles, viewing language as a set of grammar rules that need to be explained to achieve accuracy, usually in the L1. The second method aligns with dynamic-usage-based (DUB) principles in that language is viewed as a set of conventionalized routines that are learned through frequent exposure and the L2 is spoken exclusively in class. In a large study (Rousse-Malpat et al., 2019), the DUB method proved more effective, but the effects of method and L2 exposure could not be separated as the amount of L2 exposure is a crucial difference between the methods. However, one SB teacher spoke French almost exclusively, comparable to what happens in a DUB classroom. In this study, we compared this SB group with a DUB group matching in scholastic aptitude. The free oral L2 French production of 41 Dutch participants was measured in terms of holistic and analytical scores. The DUB method was more effective in terms of general proficiency, fluency, grammatical complexity, accuracy of the present tense, and overall L2 use. Our findings suggest that a teaching method in line with DUB principles is more beneficial in achieving overall oral proficiency and explicit grammar is not needed to achieve accuracy.

SCIENCE PERFORMANCE AND SCHOLASTIC APTITUDE OF GRADE 9 LEARNERS

This study determined the relationship between scholastic aptitude comprised of reading comprehension, verbal ability, mathematical ability, logical reasoning ability, and visual manipulative skills and Science performance of Grade 9 learners in a privately run basic education institution in Lapu-lapu, Cebu, Philippines during the school year 2015-2016. Descriptive and correlational research designs were carried out to assess the relationship among the identified variables. The study anchored its framework on the Multiple Intelligence Theory and the Primary Mental Abilities Theory. Secondary data on learners’ Science performance, scholastic aptitude and selected demographic profile were considered. Findings revealed a strong association in reading comprehension and Science performance of both sexes between scholar and non-scholar leaners. Moderate direct correlations were noted between learners’ scholastic aptitude pertaining to verbal ability, mathematical ability, logical-reasoning ability and visual manipulative skills, and their science performance. Science performance statistically differed between male and female, and between scholar and non-scholar learners. Female scholar learners performed better than their male non-scholar counterparts in science. In conclusion, scholastic aptitude has bearing on achievement of female scholar learners with respect to their science performance. There is enough evidence to conclude that scholastic aptitude goes hand in hand with science performance. It is imperative then that parents and teachers should work together to develop learners’ scholastic aptitude particularly in reading comprehension to reduce if not eliminate, the sex gap in science performance of learners in the study area. <p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/edu_01/0770/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

What's Your Pleasure? Exploring the Predictors of Leisure Reading for Fiction and Nonfiction

Leisure reading is associated with several important educational and cognitive benefits, and yet fewer and fewer young adults are reading in their free time. To better study what drives leisure reading in undergraduates, we developed the Predictors of Leisure Reading (PoLR) scale. The PoLR investigates key predictors of leisure reading, namely reading motivations, obstacles, attitudes, and interests. We examined the PoLR’s ability to predict language skills in 200 undergraduates, both directly and indirectly via exposure to fiction and nonfiction texts. Language skills were measured with a diverse battery of tasks, including items from two sections of the Scholastic Aptitude Test. We found that greater intrinsic reading enjoyment predicts better verbal abilities, and this was often explained via exposure to fiction rather than nonfiction. In contrast, participants who reported reading due to extrinsic pressures typically had weaker verbal abilities, often explained by stronger associations with nonfiction. This pattern was observed across the raw correlations and in a series of path analyses. In sum, it was ‘reading enjoyment’ and ‘identifying as a reader’ that uniquely predicted better verbal abilities in our undergraduate sample. The importance of these findings are discussed in relation to fostering intrinsic reading enjoyment throughout the various stages of formal education.

What’s Your Pleasure? Exploring the Predictors of Leisure Reading for Fiction and Nonfiction

Leisure reading is associated with several important educational and cognitive benefits, and yet fewer and fewer young adults are reading in their free time. To better study what drives leisure reading in undergraduates, we developed the Predictors of Leisure Reading (PoLR) scale. The PoLR investigates key predictors of leisure reading, namely reading motivations, obstacles, attitudes, and interests. We examined the PoLR’s ability to predict language skills in 200 undergraduates, both directly and indirectly via exposure to fiction and nonfiction texts. Language skills were measured with a diverse battery of tasks, including items from two sections of the Scholastic Aptitude Test. We found that greater intrinsic reading enjoyment predicts better verbal abilities, and this was often explained via exposure to fiction rather than nonfiction. In contrast, participants who reported reading due to extrinsic pressures typically had weaker verbal abilities, often explained by stronger associations with nonfiction. This pattern was observed across the raw correlations and in a series of path analyses. In sum, it was ‘reading enjoyment’ and ‘identifying as a reader’ that uniquely predicted better verbal abilities in our undergraduate sample. The importance of these findings are discussed in relation to fostering intrinsic reading enjoyment throughout the various stages of formal education.

Assessment of Word-Level Neural Language Models for Sentence Completion

The task of sentence completion, which aims to infer the missing text of a given sentence, was carried out to assess the reading comprehension level of machines as well as humans. In this work, we conducted a comprehensive study of various approaches for the sentence completion based on neural language models, which have been advanced in recent years. First, we revisited the recurrent neural network language model (RNN LM), achieving highly competitive results with an appropriate network structure and hyper-parameters. This paper presents a bidirectional version of RNN LM, which surpassed the previous best results on Microsoft Research (MSR) Sentence Completion Challenge and the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) sentence completion questions. In parallel with directly applying RNN LM to sentence completion, we also employed a supervised learning framework that fine-tunes a large pre-trained transformer-based LM with a few sentence-completion examples. By fine-tuning a pre-trained BERT model, this work established state-of-the-art results on the MSR and SAT sets. Furthermore, we performed similar experimentation on newly collected cloze-style questions in the Korean language. The experimental results reveal that simply applying the multilingual BERT models for the Korean dataset was not satisfactory, which leaves room for further research.