EFL Reading Fluency Development and Its Effects

<p>Speed reading courses have been considered an effective method to improve learners' reading rate. Research in this area has concentrated on the effect of a speed reading course on students' speed improvement, but not on how to structure the course or the effects of speed improvement on other aspects of language and other types of reading. This thesis, in the first place, deals with the issue of scheduling a speed reading course, in terms of lesson frequency and course length, to achieve the best effect. The thesis also seeks to determine if speed development in the course leads to rate improvement in reading texts outside the course. Finally, the thesis looks at the effects of speed improvement on oral reading rate, language accuracy and language complexity. In the first of two experiments, a speed reading course was delivered to the four experimental groups, who followed the course on different scheduling. Four scoring methods were used to measure the participants' speed improvement and it was found that one group made smaller increases than the others in all scoring methods. A pre-test and a post-test for reading other types of texts were administered and the speeds on these texts by the four treatment groups were compared with those by the control group. The results demonstrated that all but one group from the treatment category outperformed the control group. The second experiment was both a replication of the first experiment in order to confirm the reliability of the first experiment's results and an expansion from the first experiment to explore other issues. It involved two control groups, one of which followed the usual English program at the university and two treatment groups, one of which received consultation sessions during the treatment. The results on speed increases within the speed reading course corroborate the findings in the first experiment. Reading rate transfer from the speed reading course to other texts was significant (p<.001). Comparisons within the treatment groups and within the control groups demonstrated that the usual English program did not noticeably affect the speed increase transfer to other texts, oral reading fluency improvement, or language memory span development, but the consultation sessions substantially affected speed improvement in the course and speed improvement on other types of texts. With respect to oral reading rate the experiment found that the difference between the control groups and the treatment groups was statistically significant (p<.05). The relationships between reading fluency, language accuracy, and language complexity were also explored by looking at the comprehension scores and memory span results. It was found that reading fluency improvement does not necessarily negatively affect comprehension. It, however, does not assist language accuracy development to a remarkable degree. More importantly, the experiment showed that the treatment groups considerably expanded their memory span, which implies that reading speed improvement facilitates language complexity. High correlations between speed increases in the speed reading course, reading rate improvement in other types of texts and memory span development were also found.</p>

EFL Reading Fluency Development and Its Effects

<p>Speed reading courses have been considered an effective method to improve learners' reading rate. Research in this area has concentrated on the effect of a speed reading course on students' speed improvement, but not on how to structure the course or the effects of speed improvement on other aspects of language and other types of reading. This thesis, in the first place, deals with the issue of scheduling a speed reading course, in terms of lesson frequency and course length, to achieve the best effect. The thesis also seeks to determine if speed development in the course leads to rate improvement in reading texts outside the course. Finally, the thesis looks at the effects of speed improvement on oral reading rate, language accuracy and language complexity. In the first of two experiments, a speed reading course was delivered to the four experimental groups, who followed the course on different scheduling. Four scoring methods were used to measure the participants' speed improvement and it was found that one group made smaller increases than the others in all scoring methods. A pre-test and a post-test for reading other types of texts were administered and the speeds on these texts by the four treatment groups were compared with those by the control group. The results demonstrated that all but one group from the treatment category outperformed the control group. The second experiment was both a replication of the first experiment in order to confirm the reliability of the first experiment's results and an expansion from the first experiment to explore other issues. It involved two control groups, one of which followed the usual English program at the university and two treatment groups, one of which received consultation sessions during the treatment. The results on speed increases within the speed reading course corroborate the findings in the first experiment. Reading rate transfer from the speed reading course to other texts was significant (p<.001). Comparisons within the treatment groups and within the control groups demonstrated that the usual English program did not noticeably affect the speed increase transfer to other texts, oral reading fluency improvement, or language memory span development, but the consultation sessions substantially affected speed improvement in the course and speed improvement on other types of texts. With respect to oral reading rate the experiment found that the difference between the control groups and the treatment groups was statistically significant (p<.05). The relationships between reading fluency, language accuracy, and language complexity were also explored by looking at the comprehension scores and memory span results. It was found that reading fluency improvement does not necessarily negatively affect comprehension. It, however, does not assist language accuracy development to a remarkable degree. More importantly, the experiment showed that the treatment groups considerably expanded their memory span, which implies that reading speed improvement facilitates language complexity. High correlations between speed increases in the speed reading course, reading rate improvement in other types of texts and memory span development were also found.</p>

The Effect of Label and Medication Package Insert Reading Habits of Parents on their Children’s Oral Dental Health

Objective: The aim of this study is to evaluate the relationship between packaged product label and medication package insert reading habits of parents and their children’s oral/dental health. Study design: A questionnaire including demographic characteristics and label/insert reading habits was filled by parents of 301 children who referred to the Pediatric Dentistry Department. The children were examined intraorally and dmft/DMFT and ICDAS II scores were recorded. The data were evaluated statistically. Results: Label and medication package insert reading were found in 71.4% and 88.4% of the parents, respectively. Label reading increased as the age of the child and the number of children in the family increased. Medical package insert reading increased as the mother’s education and SLS/paraben knowledge increased. Decrease of 1 point in ICDAS II resulted in the 1.410 times increase in the rate of medical package insert reading of the parents. Conclusion: It is concluded that improving the label and medical insert reading rate of the parents would be effective for providing better oral and dental health for their children.

Mobile Image Multi-label Recognition Algorithm Based on PaddlePaddle Platform

As one of the core algorithms of machine vision, the mobile image multi-label recognition algorithm has received extensive attention from researchers in recent years and has been widely used in cutting-edge fields such as deep learning framework paddlepaddle platform, video surveillance, intelligent robots, and unmanned aerial vehicles. However, the existing recognition algorithms are not completely satisfied with the practical application in life and production. Due to the complexity of the platform environment, they can often only propose specific solutions based on existing problems, and there is no universal algorithm that is suitable for all kinds of Complex environment. The purpose of this paper is to study the multi-label recognition algorithm of moving images based on PaddlePaddle platform. This research mainly analyzes and researches the mobile image multi-tag space deployment plan and the multi-tag recognition algorithm, and further improves the tag reading rate and recognition reliability of the mobile image on the PaddlePaddle platform. This research first analyzes several key factors that affect the performance of UHF recognition system, considers the improvement plan of PaddlePaddle platform’s mobile image multi-tag recognition algorithm from the two aspects of space diversity and frequency diversity, and finally determines the multiple The label space diversity scheme, and the introduction of a multi-label optimization recognition algorithm to improve the recognition efficiency of the PaddlePaddle platform’s mobile image multi-label. Experimental data shows that the reading rate can reach 0.907 when identifying 300 tags in the experiment, and when the number of tags is greater than 300, the reading rate is close to 1, which verifies that the algorithm proposed in this paper is used in the multi-tag recognition of moving images on the PaddlePaddle platform.

Reading Predictors in Croatian

Phonological awareness (PA), rapid automatised naming (RAN) and working memory (WM) are considered to be the most important factors supporting reading development. However, their relative importance varies across orthographies and age. The goal of this study was to examine reading predictors in Croatian, a language with highly transparent orthography, after three years of formal reading instruction. The study included 80 participants (mean age: 10.07 years). Reading rate and accuracy were measured using lists of words and pseudowords, and PA was measured using phoneme deletion, phoneme addition and spoonerism tasks. RAN was measured using naming of colours, and WM was measured using the WM standardised measure of digit span (WISC-IV-HR) and pseudoword repetition. In order to find the best predictors of reading rate and accuracy for both words and pseudowords, three-stage hierarchical multiple regression was conducted. The results showed that in highly transparent language when reading is automatised, RAN is the most significant predictor of both reading rate and accuracy. Although this study did not show dissociation between the predictors supporting reading speed and reading accuracy, it confirmed the importance of PA as a suppressor variable for RAN in predicting pseudowords reading time.

Manipulating interword and interletter spacing in cursive script: An eye movements investigation of reading Persian

Persian is an Indo-Iranian language that features a derivation of Arabic cursive script, where most letters within words are connectable to adjacent letters with ligatures. Two experiments are reported where the properties of Persian script were utilized to investigate the effects of reducing interword spacing and increasing the interletter distance (ligature) within a word. Experiment 1 revealed that decreasing interword spacing while extending interletter ligature by the same amount was detrimental to reading speed. Experiment 2 largely replicated these findings. The experiments show that providing the readers with inaccurate word boundary information is detrimental to reading rate. This was achieved by reducing the interword space that follows letters that do not connect to the next letter in Experiment 1, and replacing the interword space with ligature that connected the words in Experiment 2. In both experiments, readers were able to comprehend the text read, despite the considerable costs to reading rates in the experimental conditions.

Reading-impaired children improve through text-fading training: analyses of comprehension, orthographic knowledge, and RAN

Early intervention for children with reading impairments is crucial in order to achieve reading improvements and avoid school failure. One line of reading intervention research focuses on the experimental manipulation of reading rate through a text-fading training approach. Considering relevant reading-related predictors (i.e., orthographic knowledge and rapid automatized naming; RAN), we aim at evaluating the text-fading training’s efficiency for a sample of German reading-impaired third graders (n = 120). The purpose of the present study was to examine (1) the predictive value of orthographic knowledge and RAN and their contribution of explained variance in comprehension performance during training, (2) text-fading training effects on reading rate and comprehension in a pre-post comparison, and (3) (lasting) text-fading training effects at word and sentence level in a pre-post-follow-up design. Results of structural models indicated RAN to be significantly related to comprehension performance for the experimental group, whereas no sufficient regression weight was found for orthographic knowledge. A reverse pattern was found for the self-paced group. No significant improvements regarding reading rate and comprehension were revealed for the experimental group after training. However, significant positive effects on word and sentence level at post-test time point indicate stronger reading improvements for the experimental compared to the control group. The retention of training gains was indicated at sentence-level reading 6 months after the training. Possible explanations for the presented positive training effects as well as the mixed results for reading rate, comprehension, and follow-up preservation are discussed.

EXPRESS: Improving reading rate prediction with word length information: Evidence from Dutch

Previous research in English has suggested that reading rate predictions can be improved considerably by taking average word length into account. In the present study, we investigated whether the same regularity holds for Dutch. The Dutch language is very similar to English, but words are on average half a letter longer: 5.1 letters per word (in non-fiction) instead of 4.6. We collected reading rates of 62 participants reading 12 texts with varying word lengths, and examined which change in the English equation accounts for the Dutch findings. We observed that predictions were close to the best fitting curve as soon as the average English word length was replaced by the average Dutch word length. The equation predicts that Dutch texts with an average word length of 5.1 letters will be read at a rate of 238 word per minute (wpm). Texts with an average word length of 4.5 letter will be read at 270 wpm, and texts with an average word length of 6.0 letters will be read at a rate of 202 wpm. The findings are in line with the assumption that the longer words in Dutch do not slow down silent reading relative to English and that the word length effect observed in each language is due to word processing effort and not to low-level, visual factors.