An examination of student- and across-level mediation mechanisms accounting for gender differences in reading performance: a multilevel analysis of reading engagement

Enjoyment of reading, diversity of reading and metacognitive awareness of reading strategies are cognitive and affective variables pertaining to three facets of reading engagement for students to read happily, widely and skilfully. These have been found to be related to effectiveness in reading instruction. They together form a focus for this study to examine the underlying student- and across-level mechanisms to explain gender differences in reading performance of Macao students. Drawing data from Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2009 Study, the mediation effects of gender and the school’s gender composition on reading performance are analysed. Two findings are of both theoretical and pedagogical interests. Firstly, the three facets of reading engagement from the nurture perspective explain substantially the within-school gender gap. Secondly, in coeducation context where students read happily and skilfully, there are gender-specific peer influences across-level onto student reading performance. Implications for gender-inclusive reading instruction programmes are discussed.     

Predictors of Chinese reading and literacy skills among Chinese school children: a 3-year longitudinal study

Abstract

This study aims to identify the predictors of Chinese reading and literacy skills among Chinese school children in Taiwan. Participants recruited in the study were 182 Grade 1 elementary school students. First, data were collected on these students’ literacy skills, which comprised morphological awareness, orthography processing, visual perception skills, phonological awareness, and rapid automatised naming. In Grade 2, data were collected from these students on their word decoding skills, which comprised character recognition and reading fluency. Finally, in Grade 3, data were collected on the Chinese comprehension skills of the same students. A structural equation model examined the direct and indirect effects of students’ literacy skills at Grade 1 on their reading comprehension at Grade 3, with students’ word decoding at Grade 2 acting as a mediator. Results showed that reading comprehension of students at Grade 3 was predicted by their literacy skills at Grade 1.     

Supplemental reading strategy instruction for adolescents: A randomized trial and follow-up study

In this study, the authors examine the impact of a yearlong supplemental reading course involving daily instruction in the learning strategies curriculum on lower achieving adolescent students' reading achievement and motivation. Using a multiple-cohort randomized treatment-control group design over 4 years, they compared achievement and motivation outcomes for 605 sixth-grade students who participated in the intervention with 530 students who did not participate and 593 ninth-grade students who participated in the intervention with 535 students who did not participate. Results indicated significant impacts of the intervention on reading achievement for ninth-grade students but not for sixth-grade students. Significant impacts on reading motivation were found for both sixth- and ninth-grade students. An exploratory follow-up study indicated potential benefits of a second year of intervention for sixth-grade students who are still low achieving after 1 year of intervention.     

Learning strategies and learning-related emotions among teacher trainees

Teacher trainees are questioned about their strategic and emotional relationships with a key area of their future activity, learning. Characteristics of German teacher trainees are identified through comparisons with German students on a related course of study (educational science), and through comparisons with Swedish teacher trainees. N = 875 people took part in the study, of whom n = 135 German teacher trainees participated again after two years.There are national differences both in the numbers of students allocated to the identified learning strategy clusters, and in the balance of learning-related emotions. In both areas, the Swedish students show more favourable configurations.     

中学生英语阅读策略的培养与应用

阅读是英语学习的重要技能之一。本文概述了中学生阅读应达到的水平,以及需要掌握的阅读策略。在教学实践中,教师应注意影响学生阅读理解的一些因素,并采取必要的教学方法帮助学生提高英语阅读能力。     

Teachers and tests: assessing pupils' reading achievement in primary schools

The purpose of the present study was to examine validity aspects of teachers’ judgements of pupils’ reading skills. Data come from Sweden's participation in the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) 2001, for Grades 3 and 4. For pupils at the same achievement levels, as measured by PIRLS 2001 test, teachers’ judgements of pupils’ achievement levels varied from one teacher to another. Moreover, there were significant differences between teachers’ judgements in Grades 3 and 4. Teachers in Grade 3 who had taught their pupils for almost 3 years showed higher correspondence between their judgements and pupil achievement within classrooms than 4th-grade teachers who, typically, had only taught their pupils for approximately 1 semester at the time of the data collection. The results indicate that teachers’ judgements and tests can be useful within classrooms, but that teachers may need external assessments to calibrate judgements over classrooms.     

The relationship between reading comprehension strategies and reading attitudes

The aim of this study is to determine the relationship between levels of reading comprehension strategy use, reading attitudes, and the amount of reading per year among elementary school students. The study was conducted with 1316 students (649 girls and 667 boys) attending the fourth and fifth grades of 15 elementary schools in Denizli, Turkey. Stratified Sampling Method was employed to obtain data using Reading Attitude Scale (RAS) and Reading Comprehension Strategies Scale (RCSS). The analyses indicate that reading attitude is a significant predictor of the level of reading comprehension strategies used by students (R² = 0.44). The findings show that there is a negative and low-level relationship (r = ?0.054) between daily time spent reading and the level of strategy used, and a positive and low-level relationship (r = 0.01) between the level of strategy used and the number of books that a child reads per year.     

自我监控策略与大学英语课外阅读能力的培养

运用自我监控策略,对阅读动机及阅读过程进行监控：选择合适的阅读材料,确立可行的阅读目标和计划,积极地对阅读效果进行内部反馈,从而提高课外阅读能力。     

基于PISA阅读素养价值取向的阅读教学策略

PISA阅读历程包括“获取与检索”“理解与解释”以及“反思与评价”,由此反映出PISA阅读素养的价值取向,即“接码能力”“解码能力”以及“语用能力”。PISA 阅读素养的价值取向在教学策略的启示,转向阅读素养的教学目标、言语实践的教学内容、阅读历程的教学过程及标准体系的教学评价。     

Exploring metacognitive strategies and hypermedia annotations on foreign language reading

The effective use of reading strategies has been recognized as an important way to increase reading comprehension in hypermedia environments. The purpose of the study was to explore whether metacognitive strategy use and access to hypermedia annotations facilitated reading comprehension based on English as a foreign language students’ proficiency levels. The primary investigation finding revealed that the strategies used the most were problem-solving strategies, followed by global strategies, whereas support strategies were used the least. The specific strategy of guessing content was used much more frequently which was reliably predicted by their comprehension scores; on the contrary, reading slowly might hinder hypermedia reading comprehension. Regarding the frequency of access to annotations, background information was viewed the most frequently, while word glossary was identified as least frequently; no significant relationship, however, was observed among proficiency levels, frequency of annotation use, and reading strategies. Based on further think-aloud investigation results, limitations and future research are discussed and presented.     

Exploration of direct and indirect associations of system-level policy-amenable variables with reading literacy performance

As expectations of the economic impact of educational attainment are soaring (Hanushek & Woessmann, 2009 Hanushek E. A., & Woessmann, L. (2009). Do better schools lead to more growth? Cognitive skills, economic outcomes, and causation (NBER Working Paper, No. 14633). Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) and conjectures about successful national educational reforms (Mourshed, Chijioke, & Barber, 2010 Mourshed, M., Chijioke, C., & Barber, M. (2010). How the world's most improved school systems keep getting better. Retrieved from http://www.mckinsey.com/client_service/social_sector/latest_thinking/worlds_most_improved_schools[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) are welcomed by educational policy-makers in many countries, a careful assessment of the empirical evidence for these kinds of claims is needed. In this article, we present a methodology that was applied to an international data set. A multi-level model of education was used to present a hypothetical scenario, indicated as the “implementation scenario”. The scenario was tested on the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2009 data set by means of multi-level structural equation modelling. Although we find some evidence for direct effects and some support for straightforward implementation, the overall impact of malleable conditions at the system and school level appears disappointingly small. A theoretical strand of literature that would account for “limited malleability” is referred to in discussing these results.     

Cultural,social, and economic capital constructs in international assessments: an evaluation using exploratory structural equation modeling

The article employs exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM) to evaluate constructs of economic, cultural, and social capital in international large-scale assessment (LSA) data from the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) 2006 and the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2009. ESEM integrates the theory-generating approach of exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and theory-testing approach of confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). It relaxes the zero-loading restriction in CFA, allowing items to load on different factors simultaneously, and it provides measurement invariance tests across countries not available in EFA. A main criticism of international LSA studies is the extended use of indicators poorly grounded in theory, like socioeconomic status, that prevent the study of mechanisms underlying associations with student outcomes. This article contributes to addressing this criticism by providing statistical criteria to evaluate the fit of well-defined sociological constructs with the empirical data.     

元认知策略与大学生英语阅读能力的培养

阅读能力对于大学生的英语语言及英语文化学习至关重要。利用元认知策略的计划、安排、监控、调节和评价等手段可以有效提高大学生的英语阅读能力;掌握较好的元认知策略,对于他们阅读理解能力和阅读速度的提高将起到重要的作用。本文根据作者教学实际经验指出了在阅读训练中,我国大学生在使用元认知策略时存在的问题并提出了解决方法。     

The influences of inductive instruction and resources on students' attitudes toward reading: evidence from PISA 2009

The declining trend in the positive reading attitude of students' has concerned scholars. This paper aims to apply a 3-level hierarchical linear model to analyse how inductive instruction and resources influence both students' positive and negative attitudes towards reading. Approximately 470,000 15-year-old students, and their school principals, from 65 countries completed a questionnaire, which was designed by the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). In line with previous research, gender, the student–teacher relationship, online academic searches, and reading habits are correlated with both positive and negative reading attitudes. Multilevel results show that reading attitudes improved when a school provides a context in which inductive instruction has been enforced. The natural log value of gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in a country is statistically significantly negative when associated with a student's positive and negative reading attitudes. Further, in a country with largely unqualified teachers, school-level inductive teaching lowers the negative attitude.     

Building disciplinary literacy: an analysis of history,science and math teachers' close reading strategies

This collective case study explores the strategies history, science and math teachers use to conduct close readings in their disciplines. Through qualitative analysis of forum posts and lesson plans submitted to a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) designed as professional development (PD), this study examines the strategies history, science and math teachers reported using to conduct close readings in their discipline, as well as how these teachers conduct close readings after receiving professional development on reading strategies for their disciplines. Ultimately, the research showed that while more teachers reported using disciplinary literacy strategies following the PD, they did not necessarily report using the strategies that, according to experts in their fields, are considered to be the most important for their discipline.     

Explaining student and home variance of Chinese reading achievement of the PIRLS 2011 Hong Kong

Hong Kong attained the top place in the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) 2011, an international study of reading achievement, which arouses keen interest in understanding the reasons behind this remarkable achievement. Although factors associated with reading achievement in English have been widely studied, similar studies using Chinese as a different language system are limited. The present study proposes and tests a hypothetical model that attempts to explain the variance of reading achievement of Hong Kong pupils in the PIRLS 2011 study, focusing on parental and student factors. Data of 3,875 fourth graders from 132 primary schools and their parents or caregivers (n = 3,682) are involved in the analysis. Structural equation modeling supports the hypothesized model as tenable explaining 34% of the variance of reading achievement. Parental background acts as the fundamental factor that exerts an indirect effect on reading motivation, reading self‐efficacy, and reading achievement of students via books at home and early reading abilities. Reading motivation and reading self‐efficacy are found to be significant in influencing reading achievement. Implications for educational practices and future research are discussed.     

A path analytic test of the reading strategies mediation model: Relating cognitive competences and motivational influences to individual differences in fifth-grade students' reading comprehension

This study examined a theoretical model hypothesizing that reading strategies mediate the effects of intrinsic reading motivation, reading fluency, and vocabulary knowledge on reading comprehension. Using path analytic methods, we tested the direct and indirect effects specified in the hypothesized model in a sample of 1105 fifth-graders. In addition to standardized tests and questionnaires, we administered a performance test to assess students' proficiency in the application of three reading strategies. The overall fit of the model to the data was good. Both cognitive (fluency and vocabulary) and motivational (intrinsic reading motivation) variables had an indirect effect on reading comprehension through their influence on reading strategies. Reading strategies had a unique effect on reading comprehension and partially mediated the effects that cognitive and motivational variables had on fifth-graders' reading achievements.     

Pre-service teachers' use of reading strategies in their own readings and future classrooms

The main purpose of this study was to determine pre-service teachers' use of reading strategies in their own readings. In addition, pre-service teachers' use of these strategies in their future teaching practices was also investigated. The subjects for this study were 505 pre-service teachers enrolled in one of the major universities in Ankara. The results of the study revealed that pre-service teachers employed 28 out of 38 reading strategies most of the time, but interview results illustrated that they reported using very limited scope of reading strategies. An interesting finding in this study was that all subjects accepted the responsibility to teach and improve their future students' reading skills.     

Teaching strategies and differential effectiveness across learning contexts: Evidence from PISA 2012

Modern educational theories emphasise effectiveness enhancing factors at the classroom level and differential effectiveness for sub-groups of students and across different learning contexts. Theoretical developments, however, are generally based on national evidence and have been criticised for lacking cross-cultural perspectives. This study used PISA 2012 data to examine how subject-specific teaching strategies related to mathematics performance of students across education systems whilst considering curvilinear associations and interactions with the socio-economic and instructional context. The results provide consistent evidence of a positive curvilinear relationship between cognitive activation strategies and mathematics performance. The association tends to be stronger in schools with a positive disciplinary climate and for students from advantaged socio-economic backgrounds, but not in every education system. Teacher-directed strategies are positively related to mathematics performance, but the association tends to become negative for high levels of teacher-directed instruction. Associations of student-oriented strategies with mathematics performance are inconsistent. The cross-national evidence contributes to the knowledge base of educational theory.