Lexical inference in L2: predictive roles of vocabulary knowledge and reading skill beyond reading comprehension

The current study examined the predictive roles of L2 vocabulary knowledge and L2 word reading skills in explaining individual differences in lexical inferencing in the L2. Participants were 53 Israeli high school students who emigrated from the former Soviet Union, and spoke Russian as an L1 and Hebrew as an L2. L2 vocabulary knowledge and decoding accuracy predicted L2 reading comprehension, which in turn was strongly related to lexical inferencing abilities in the L2. In addition, decoding accuracy predicted additional variance in lexical inferencing, beyond the role of reading comprehension. These findings support the idea that beginning L2 readers with more precise and efficient lexical representations demonstrate better lexical inferencing abilities, most likely due to the increased automatization of word reading, which frees up resources for higher level processing. These results suggest that lexical inferencing from text in the L2 might be limited not only by vocabulary knowledge and higher order comprehension processes, but also by basic decoding skills.     

Learning and building social capital in a community of family farm businesses

This paper analyses the processes that occur in a ‘learning community’ of Australian family agricultural businesses for evidence of use or generation of stores of social capital. The purpose of analysing processes that use or build social capital is to derive a framework or checklist of stages and characteristics that can be used to analyse the extent of social capital use and generation in other communities. The qualitative design is suitable for a study such as this, which investigates possible relationships and influencing factors concerning learning and changes to farm management practices. Data collection involved observing a learning activity session and interviewing 12 members in a focus group during the session and subsequently 14 individually at their farms. Data were analysed for themes and coded with the assistance of NUD*IST qualitative data analysis software. An understanding of how what is identified as social capital can be built in a formalized learning programme can be used to facilitate social capital building; in other formal learning settings, as well as more widely. The findings of the study reported here and findings from studies of informal learning in geographic communities have contributed to the development of the Centre for Research and Learning in Regional Australia's model of the simultaneous building and use of social capital. The model, presented in this paper, conceptualizes the way in which social capital is used and built in interactions between individuals.     

Productive group engagement in cognitive activity and metacognitive regulation during collaborative learning: can it explain differences in students’ conceptual understanding?

This paper addresses the nature and significance of productive engagement in cognitive activity and metacognitive regulation in collaborative learning tasks that involve complex scientific knowledge. A situative framework, combining the constructs of social regulation and content processing, provided the theoretical basis for the development of a comprehensive coding scheme for interactive data analysis. An empirical study was conducted with two groups of university students working on two science-learning tasks. It examined the function of metacognitive regulation to control the flow of cognitive activity, and the extent to which group differences in cognitive and metacognitive regulation processes during collaborative learning could explain differences in the groups’ learning outcomes. The findings provide validation of the framework and its derived coding scheme. An example of a way in which a group engages in socially shared metacognitive regulation is presented to demonstrate how the coding scheme was applied to the data. Theoretical and empirical implications of the findings are discussed.     

Lexical processes in the recognition of Japanese horizontal and vertical compounds

This lexical decision eye-tracking study investigated whether horizontal and vertical readings elicit comparable behavioral patterns and whether reading directions modulate lexical processes. Response times and eye movements were recorded during a lexical decision task with Japanese bimorphemic compound words presented vertically. The data were then analyzed together with those obtained in a horizontal lexical decision experiment of Miwa, Libben, Dijkstra, and Baayen (2014). Linear mixed-effects analyses of response times and eye movements revealed that, although response times and first fixation durations were notably shorter in horizontal reading than vertical reading, the vertical reading elicited fewer fixations. Furthermore, while compounds were recognized largely in comparable ways regardless of reading direction, several lexical processes were found to be reading-direction-dependent. Particularly, processing of the first morpheme was modulated by reading direction in a late time frame, such that a horizontal reading advantage was observed for words with a high frequency first morpheme. All in all, the two reading directions do not only differ quantitatively in processing speed, but also qualitatively in terms of underlying processing mechanisms.     

新时期旧词改变原义现象分析

旧词改变原义是改革开放以来旧词新义的主要形式之一。文章从社会发展、词义系统内部调整两个方面阐述了旧词改变原义的原因,然后在此基础上具体分析了它的类型。最后得出结论,认为这是词汇新质要素增加的表现,是词汇发展变化的又一方式。     

A "Black-and-White Box" Approach to User Empowerment With Component Computing

The paper discusses three aspects central to the 10 year-old process of design, development and use of E-slate, a construction kit for educational software. These are: (1) the design of computational media for user empowerment, (2) the socially-grounded approach to the building of user communities and (3) the issue of long-term sustainability as crucial for the component movement to progress, but also as constituting its real strength in relation to standalone technologies for computational media. An analysis of E-slate's features, the process and products of user community constructions with E-slate and the organizational aspects of maintaining on-going development and research is provided. We conclude that the design, development and user-support of empowering computational media should be viewed as a continuing effort to build social change architectures, rather than single R&D projects. We suggest that this can only be done through the development and preservation of hybrid communities across organizations.     

Individual differences in late bilinguals' L2 phonological processes: From acoustic-phonetic analysis to lexical access

The extent to which the phonetic system of a second language is mastered varies across individuals. The present study evaluates the pattern of individual differences in late bilinguals across different phonological processes. Fifty-five late Dutch-English bilinguals were tested on their ability to perceive a difficult L2 speech contrast (the English /æ/-/ε/ contrast) in three different tasks: A categorization task, a word identification task and a lexical decision task. As a group, L2 listeners were less accurate than native listeners. However, at the individual level, almost half of the L2 listeners scored within the native range in the categorization task whereas a small percentage scored within the native range in the identification and lexical decision tasks. These results show that L2 listeners' performance crucially depends on the nature of the task, with higher L2 listener accuracy on an acoustic-phonetic analysis task than on tasks involving lexical processes. These findings parallel previous results for early bilinguals, where the pattern of performance was consistent with the processing hierarchy proposed by different models of speech perception. The results indicate that the analysis of patterns of non-native performance can provide important insights concerning the architecture of the speech perception system and the issue of language learnability.     

Two-Year-Olds Readily Learn Multiple Labels for the Same Basic-Level Category

2 basic frameworks for lexical principles have been proposed (Golinkoff, Mervis, & Hirsh-Pasek; Markman). In many types of situations, these frameworks make the same predictions regarding 2-year-olds' interpretation of novel terms. However, the predictions diverge in some cases. 3 experiments were conducted to address 1 such situation: the case in which the child hears a novel term but already knows a label for each of the objects present. Results of all 3 studies converged on the same outcome: The new term was most likely to be treated as a second basic-level name for the category to which the object belonged. Analyses of individual patterns of responding revealed that, of the 58 subjects, 50 made more basic-level responses than part responses, 1 made equal numbers of basic-level and part responses, and 7 made more part responses than basic-level responses. Implications of these findings for models of early lexical development are discussed.     

词汇输入过程和二语词汇能力的发展

以学习英语的中国学生为对象,通过对概念表征问题的探讨,指出概念表征形成和发展的动态过程即第二语言词汇能力的发展路径。对本科生口语测试中不恰当词汇信息的分析,表明我国学生英语词汇能力发展过程中存在障碍,对其根源进行探究并就如何促进学生二语词汇能力的发展提出一些建议。     

Morphological awareness and bilingual word learning: a longitudinal structural equation modeling study

This longitudinal study examined the contribution of morphological awareness to bilingual word learning of Malay–English bilingual children in Singapore where English is the medium of instruction. Participants took morphological awareness and lexical inference tasks in both English and Malay twice with an interval of about half a year, the first time at the end of Grade 3 (Time 1) and the second time at the end of the first semester of Grade 4 (Time 2). Structural equation modeling (SEM) analyses revealed that within both languages, morphological awareness significantly predicted lexical inference at Time 1 as well as Time 2, and the contribution also became strengthened over time. Cross-linguistic SEM analyses showed that concurrently at both Time 1 and Time 2, English morphological awareness only had a significant indirect effect on Malay lexical inference. The exact indirect relationships, however, varied between Time 1 and Time 2. In addition, an indirect effect of Time 1 English morphological awareness on Time 2 Malay lexical inference also surfaced. These findings suggest concurrent as well as longitudinal cross-linguistic transfer of morphological awareness from English to Malay.     

From Autonomy to Divinity: The Cultural Socialization of Moral Reasoning in an Evangelical Christian Community

This study examined moral reasoning in parent–child conversations within a U.S. evangelical Christian community. The goal was to identify social‐communicative processes that may promote the development of Divinity in children's moral reasoning. Sixteen parent–child dyads (6–9 years old) discussed hypothetical moral vignettes about failures to help peers in need. Analyses revealed that Divinity typically co‐occurred with Autonomy in these conversations and that such co‐occurrences typically happened through three distinct social‐communicative processes, labeled “align,” “scaffold,” and “counter.” Findings are used to explain the shifting priority of Autonomy and Divinity over the life course among members of evangelical Christian faiths that previous research has documented. More broadly, findings highlight socialization processes through which children can rationalize their developing moral outlooks in culturally distinct ways.     

The Influence of Service Learning on Students' Personal and Social Development

Abstract. An explanatory methods design was used to evaluate the influence of a service learning course on learning, personal, and social outcomes for service learning (n = 142) students. These students showed improvements in diversity and political awareness, community self-efficacy, and civic engagement scores from the beginning to the end of the semester. In addition, the students' academic learning, personal and interpersonal development, and community engagement were detected as the major benefits from engaging in service learning. The findings of this study suggest that service learning contributes to students' academic learning and personal and social development through social-emotional processes.     

从大数据到计算教育学：概念、动因和出路

在大数据时代,计算社会科学是社会科学发展的必然走向,教育学作为社会科学的重要分支,同样面临着向计算教育学转型的形势。计算社会科学的兴起催生出一系列亟待明确的核心概念,极大地超越了传统社会科学研究范式。从新计算社会学出现的过程、从大数据时代的背景和特征、从传统研究范式的局限,足以见出计算教育学出现的必然性。在这一过程中需着重处理好四个关键问题:积极适应计算教育学的思维方式;技术繁荣与理论繁荣齐头并进;增强数据挖掘能力以争取话语权;变被动为主动回应时代和政策要求。     

Early linguistic abilities and reading development: A review and a hypothesis

This article is concerned with aspects of phonological processing and linguistic awareness that may set the stage for initial reading development. The aims are first to provide a current review of phonological processes (both underlying and metaphonological) that have been found to be associated with initial reading achievement, secondly to present a new hypothesis relating differences in the nature of phonological representations in the lexicon to the development of phonological awareness and other phonological processes. The hypothesis is concerned withdistinctness of phonological representations, i.e. the separateness of phonological representations. Phonological representations of high distinctness are distinguished from other representations by many features. The distinctness hypothesis is compared to the lexical restructuring hypothesis which suggests that lexical representations gradually become increasingly segmental between one and eight years of age. Implications of each hypothesis (emphasizing the distinctness hypothesis) for the development of language abilities and reading are presented, along with suggestions regarding future research directions.     

Modeling reading vocabulary learning in deaf children in bilingual education programs

The acquisition of reading vocabulary is one of the major challenges for deaf children in bilingual education programs. Deaf children have to acquire a written lexicon that can effectively be used in reading. In this paper, we present a developmental model that describes reading vocabulary acquisition of deaf children in bilingual education programs. The model is inspired by Jiang's model of vocabulary development in a second language (N. Jiang, 2000, 2004a) and the hierarchical model of lexical representation and processing in bilinguals (J. F. Kroll & E. Stewart, 1988). We argue that lexical development in the written language often fossilizes and that many words deaf readers acquire will not reach the final stage of lexical development. We argue that this feature is consistent with many findings reported in the literature. Finally, we discuss the pedagogical implications of the model.     

《红楼梦》中的词汇变化

词汇随着社会的发展而不断变化,影响着整个词汇的基本面貌。《红楼梦》反映了近代向现代过渡时期的语言面貌,尽管在语法方面它与现代汉语已经基本一致,但是词汇仍然有些差异,这些差异甚至来自一些常用的词语。通过这些差异可以看出词汇在近几百年来发生的显著变化。     

Spelling development in 6–11‐year‐old Greek‐speaking Cypriot children

The aim of the present study was to examine the spelling development of Greek‐speaking children in the early school grades. Although Greek orthography is regular for reading, it is much less transparent as far as spelling is concerned. Spelling development was investigated using a word spelling task designed to explore the effects of word length, familiarity and spelling regularity. One hundred and fifty normally developing primary school children living in Cyprus took part in the study. Results suggest that the children employed both phonological and lexical strategies in spelling Greek words. Results indicated that sub‐lexical procedures were more marked for younger children, whereas lexical processing was employed more widely by older children. The findings are interpreted in terms of stage developmental models.     

Phonological contribution during visual word recognition in child readers. An intermodal priming study in Grades 3 and 5

This study investigated the phonological contribution during visual word recognition in child readers as a function of general reading expertise (third and fifth grades) and specific word exposure (frequent and less‐frequent words). An intermodal priming in lexical decision task was performed. Auditory primes (identical and unrelated) were used in order to directly activate phonological codes independently of orthographic processing. Overall, the results revealed a widespread phonological priming effect in both grades. There was a significant interaction between grade, priming condition and frequency, revealing that the impact of frequency on identity priming differed between grades. In third grade, the results indicated that the priming effect was greater for less‐frequent than for frequent words. In fifth grade, priming effects were similar for both frequent and less‐frequent words. These findings indicate that print and speech processing systems are interconnected in young readers. Moreover, phonological codes play an important role in word recognition throughout reading development.     

认知发展、隐喻映射与词义范畴的延伸——现代汉语词汇系统形成的认知机制

汉民族集体认知能力的发展和隐喻映射手段,是现代汉语词汇系统———以词串和词族为代表———形成的内在历时机制。这里将讨论三个相互关联的基本议题:(一)认知发展和新范畴形成的相互关系;(二)隐喻映射在词义范畴扩展和词义网络体系形成中的作用,以及映射的主要类别;(三)源范畴和目标范畴通过能指成分形成词义范畴网络体系的内在机制。从而说明以词串和词族为标志的现代汉语词汇系统的历时语用过程。     

Synergetic effects of phonological awareness,vocabulary, and word reading on bilingual children’s reading comprehension: A three-year study

Using comparable measures of first language (L1) Chinese and second language (L2) English, this three-year longitudinal study examined the synergetic effects of phonological awareness, vocabulary, and word reading on reading comprehension development among 227 Hong Kong Chinese-English bilinguals from Grades 2-4. Structural equation growth modeling revealed that all three factors were significantly linked to one another and to initial reading comprehension for each language. Across languages, L1 Chinese vocabulary was directly linked to initial L2 English reading comprehension, while L1 Chinese phonological awareness was indirectly linked to initial L2 English reading comprehension via L2 English vocabulary and word reading. These findings underscore the synergetic effects of early phonological and lexical skills in determining early reading comprehension ability in both L1 and L2.