STUDENTS’ ATTITUDE TOWARD THE USE OF WATTPAD IN READING COMPREHENSION

This study attempts to seek what components of reading are affected by reading Wattpad and how the students' attitudes towards the use of Wattpad for reading. This research used a descriptive qualitative method. This research is also supported by the theory of reading attitude proposed by McKenna, et.al. The data for this study were collected from two sources, namely a close-ended questionnaire to 20 English Literature students of Universitas Sumatera Utara and supported by interview with 5 out of 20 selected respondents. The results of this study indicate two main things, namely: (1) Vocabulary is the component of reading that is most affected. As many as 40% of respondents chose vocabulary as the most affected reading component, 35% of respondents chose comprehension ability, 15% of respondents chose reading fluency and 10% of respondents chose phonemic awareness. (2) It was found that 10 respondents were judged to show a positive attitude towards the use of Wattpad, 6 respondents showed a neutral attitude and 4 respondents showed a negative attitude towards the use of Wattpad.

Interpretationskonzepte von Deutschlehrkräften und ihren Schüler*innen. Eine explorative Studie

Die Dissertation untersucht Konzepte der Literaturinterpretation bei Deutschlehrkräften und ihren Schüler*innen. Theoretischer Ausgangspunkt sind Ansätze zur Beschreibung sowohl von Interpretationsprozessen als auch von interpretatorischem Handeln. Forschungsgrundlage bildet eine Datentriangulation (Lehrmittel, Interviews, Interpretationsaufsätze und ihre Bewertung durch Lehrkräfte). Die erhobenen Daten wurden inhaltsanalytisch ausgewertet. Die dabei entwickelten Kategorien bildeten die Grundlage für individual- und gruppenspezifische Fallanalysen. Eines der wichtigsten Ergebnisse der Forschungsarbeit ist, dass Lehrkräfte und ihre Schüler*innen Interpret*innengemeinschaften ausbilden, die durch die in ihnen jeweils geltenden – zum Teil sehr verschiedenen – Regeln beschrieben werden können. Lehrkräfte erreichen damit eine hohe Wirksamkeit in ihrer Praxis. Festgestellt werden kann weiterhin, dass die erforschten Konzepte mehrheitlich reduktiv sind und zentrale Komponenten der literarischen Rezeptionskompetenz nicht einbeziehen. Auch das interpretierende Handeln wird nur ansatzweise konzeptionalisiert. The study explores views of literary interpretation of German teachers and their students. The method of research is based on the triangulation of data (teaching materials, qualitativ interviews, so called „Interpretationsaufsätze“ und the teacher’s feedback) and their content analysis. One of the main research result is, that teachers and their students form groups of interpretation that can be described by different interpretational rules. Teachers are therefore highly effective in der professional work. Students are influencend by the teacher’s language, learning-arrangements and the teacher’s feedback. It can also be stated, that most views on literary interpretation lack in central components of reading literarcy. This has an high impact on teacher’s and student’s dealings with literary ambiguity, since it is very often not taken into account. One of the reasons for this is a well established practice of literary interpretation in German grammer schools.

Reading in the system of spiritual and moral education of the sudent community

Spiritual and moral education of the student community is one of the topical subjects discussed by both the scientific community, public authorities and social organizations. Reading plays a particular role in this process. Firstly, it serves as a tool for formation of moralities, secondly, it is a practice that facilitates socialization, and thirdly, reading is one of the basic values to transfer from generation to generation. Scientific literature has accumulated expertise in interdisciplinary analysis of reading practices. This paper presents the findings of the sociological survey conducted among Russian university students. The authors made conclusions about activity-related and axiological components of reading practices as far as university students are concerned. Students from three cities — Moscow, Volgograd and Astrakhan — shared their views on reading and then the opinion findings were submitted to comparative analysis. The research revealed common trends as well as peculiar reading practices of students from different cities. The research outlined the prospects for further investigation into reading practices as part of spiritual and moral education.

Pedagogical Efficacy of Connections-OG in 3-D®: A Reading Program Based on the Science of Reading

No one disputes the importance of reading to life, career, and success. What is under debate is how to teach one to read. This research investigation analyzes the pedagogical efficacy of the Connections-OG in 3-D® reading program. Connections: OG in 3D® is a structured literacy curriculum that systematically teaches the entire structure of the English language. Each lesson provides direct, explicit instruction in the five components of reading, as outlined in the NRP Report (2000). Five elementary schools, in Arkansas and Missouri, used this program with fidelity to teach all their early elementary students how to read. The application of the Connections: OG in 3D® began in 2017 and continues to present day. Each school conducted its own assessments to determine student reading success. These assessments were collected, analyzed, and reviewed by sources outside the school district and Connections: OG in 3D®. The results of utilizing a structured literacy program based on the science of teaching reading is shared.

Neural Components of Reading Revealed by Distributed and Symbolic Computational Models

Determining how the cognitive components of reading—orthographic, phonological, and semantic representations—are instantiated in the brain has been a long-standing goal of psychology and human cognitive neuroscience. The two most prominent computational models of reading instantiate different cognitive processes, implying different neural processes. Artificial neural network (ANN) models of reading posit nonsymbolic, distributed representations. The dual-route cascaded (DRC) model instead suggests two routes of processing, one representing symbolic rules of spelling–to–sound correspondence, the other representing orthographic and phonological lexicons. These models are not adjudicated by behavioral data and have never before been directly compared in terms of neural plausibility. We used representational similarity analysis to compare the predictions of these models to neural data from participants reading aloud. Both the ANN and DRC model representations corresponded to neural activity. However, the ANN model representations correlated to more reading-relevant areas of cortex. When contributions from the DRC model were statistically controlled, partial correlations revealed that the ANN model accounted for significant variance in the neural data. The opposite analysis, examining the variance explained by the DRC model with contributions from the ANN model factored out, revealed no correspondence to neural activity. Our results suggest that ANNs trained using distributed representations provide a better correspondence between cognitive and neural coding. Additionally, this framework provides a principled approach for comparing computational models of cognitive function to gain insight into neural representations.

МЕТОДИЧНА ХАРАКТЕРИСТИКА АНГЛОМОВНИХ АВТЕНТИЧНИХ ТЕКСТІВ ПЕРІОДИЧНИХ ОН-ЛАЙН ВИДАНЬ ЯК МАТЕРІАЛУ ДЛЯ ФОРМУВАННЯ КОМПЕТЕНТНОСТІ В ЧИТАННІ УЧНІВ ПРОФІЛЬНОЇ ШКОЛИ

Introduction. Nowadays the society puts high demands to the level of reading competence of profiled school students that requires applying new effective educational technologies. The English authentic texts of online edition present a panoramic view of the national culture, a wide choice of authentic vocabulary and grammar structures, as well as a variety of motivating, thought-provoking information that is interesting and meaningful to students and meets their needs and interests. When used in teaching reading in profiled senior school, this type of texts develops critical thinking, stimulates the mental activity. Purpose. The article tackles the problem of forming reading competence of profiled school students with the help of English authentic texts of online editions. Methods. The study provides theoretical substantiation backed up with results of empirical research for organizing the process of forming reading competence of profiled senior school students with the help of English authentic texts of online editions. Results. The article contains an overview of the modern scientific ideas regarding the problem of forming reading competence of profiled senior school students with the help of English authentic texts of online editions. It defines the aim and the structural components of reading competence of the profiled school students and considers the advantages of using English authentic texts of on-line editions. Dealing with the notion of text authenticity it also dwells upon characteristics of authenticity peculiar to English authentic texts of online editions. The interactive foreign language teaching and its techniques are suggested as a methodological bases and tool adequate to the tasks of forming reading competence of profiled school students using English authentic texts of online editions. Conclusion. The research has shown that English authentic texts of online editions are an effective means of forming reading competence of profiled school students. English authentic texts of online editions have a powerful lingua-sociocultural, psychological and pedagogical potential; when used as teaching material, authentic texts of newspaper and magazine publications stimulate learners’ motivation and interest to the country of the target language that increases the effectiveness of forming reading competence of profiled school students.

Morphosyntax in Literacy Acquisition Across Languages for Learners Who Are Deaf or Hard of Hearing

Examining the importance of morphosyntax comprehension in literacy acquisition across languages, this chapter will highlight the bilingual and bimodal advantages some deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) learners may possess. Since DHH readers may experience variations in hearing, language, and literacy levels, we examine the interplay of how they develop literacy skills. The complexity of the interplay among the components of reading and writing are considered along with the current research on morphosyntax interventions and assessments for this population of learners. Morphosyntax components that are historically challenging for DHH learners are discussed. Potentially promising practices across morphology and syntax are reviewed, as well as implementations for practice that include an informal assessment designed for DHH learners. Future research necessary to expand our knowledge of how morphology and syntax connect to text is included as a call to action in the quest to improve literacy outcomes for DHH readers.

READING AS A SUBJECT OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH

This article is devoted to the problem of the formation of foreign language competence of reading in pupils of secondary school. The general characteristics of competence in foreign language reading comprehension are given. The aims of its formation at school are defined. The components of reading comprehension competence are named: skills, habits, knowledge and communicative ability. Stages of reading comprehension competence formation are given. The article analyzes the problem of forming foreign language competence in reading. Properly formed foreign language competence in reading helps pupils to work with textbooks and other educational books, contributes to the expansion of the pupils’ scientific knowledge and to the skills formation of independent cognitive activity. The properly formed skills of foreign language competence in reading also allow learners to expand and deepen their knowledge. In this work it is shown that the formation of foreign language competence of reading involves the acquisition of knowledge by learners, the formation of skills and development of reading skills, as well as the improvement of psychophysiological mechanisms of reading. Moreover, in this article it is proved that the ability to read allows pupils to use literature in a foreign language to find information on the speciality and to improve the skills of oral speech. For solving the problems were used following methods, namely general scientific methods of theoretical and empirical research. In addition, methods of comparison and generalization of facts analysis of psychological and pedagogical literature were used at the stage of theoretical research.

Understanding functional illiteracy from a policy, adult education, and cognition point of view: Towards a joint referent framework

The article discusses the emergence of a functional literacy construct and the rediscovery of illiteracy in industrialized countries during the second half of the 20th century. It offers a short explanation of how the construct evolved over time. In addition, it explores how functional (il)literacy is conceived differently by research discourses of cognitive and neural studies, on the one hand, and by prescriptive and normative international policy documents and adult education, on the other hand. Furthermore, it analyses how literacy skills surveys such as the Level One Study (leo.) or the PIAAC may help to bridge the gap between cognitive and more practical and educational approaches to literacy, the goal being to place the functional illiteracy (FI) construct within its existing scale levels. It also sheds more light on the way in which FI can be perceived in terms of different cognitive processes and underlying components of reading. By building on the previous work of other authors and previous definitions, the article brings together different views of FI and offers a perspective for a needed operational definition of the concept, which would be an appropriate reference point for future educational, political, and scientific utilization.