Development of word reading fluency along primary education: a six-year follow-up / El desarrollo de la fluidez en la lectura de palabras en educación primaria: un seguimiento longitudinal de seis años

Word reading fluency is a key component in the process of reading. In order to understand its acquisition it is crucial to conduct longitudinal studies. The aim of this work was to describe the development of word recognition in Spanish, considering accuracy and speed, from a longitudinal perspective. A group of 31 children were followed for six years. Reading performance was assessed with a list of 72 stimuli in which lexicality, frequency and length were manipulated. Results show that initial gains in reading accuracy occurred very rapidly. However, the growth of reading speed was found to be more difficult and complex, and automatic word recognition remains low at the end of Grade 6. Low frequency, long words were the most difficult stimuli. High stability in reading speed was observed and it was a relevant indicator that differentiates between good and poor readers. The findings also highlighted the need to develop training programs with the specific aim of improving word reading fluency throughout primary education.     

Dealing with Diversity and Digital Culture

Cultural diversity is broader than ethnic and language considerations alone. It includes gender, age, economic or social conditions, education, technological infrastructure and computer and information literacy All of these have to be taken into account when digital information is received or provided. Understanding and respecting diversity in each country is a major issue for the country itself, as well as for the information providers from abroad. The main barriers for participating in the digital culture for Latin America are the differences of each of the countries: the few people that have access; the technological infrastructure; the lack of relevant contents in the primary languages; and the fact that English is the pre-dominant language of the Global Information Infrastructure. Nations should focus on three main areas: technological infrastructure, contents and access. Projects should be prepared so as to strengthen the Latin American identity.     

Segmentación fonológico-silábica y adquisición de la lectura: un estudio empírico

El artículo presenta una investigación cuyos resultados muestran la menor capacidad de segmentación silábica entre aquellos niños con peor habilidad lectora. Plantea también la funcionalidad, facilidad de aplicación y carácter motivador de la prueba realizada—una tarea de ordenador—para evaluar la capacidad de segmentación.     

Comparing Disaster News on Twitter and Television: an Intermedia Agenda Setting Perspective

Intermedia agenda setting predicts a high degree of convergence between news media agendas. However, the rise of social media forces a re-examination of this expectation. Using the 8.8-earthquake of February 27, 2010 in Chile as a case study, this article compares which topics were covered by professional journalists on broadcast news and Twitter, analyzing both cross-sectional and longitudinal trends. A positive, reinforcing influence was found among the journalistic agendas of TV and Twitter. However, counter to the idea that social media are echo chambers of traditional media, it was found that Twitter influences TV news more so than the other way around. Thus, the study provides an early lens into the agenda setting function of social media among television news professionals, and its findings are consistent with Twitter succeeding among journalists due to its provision of valuable information.     

Adding interactive graphic organizers to a whole-class slideshow lesson

This study examines the effects of including interactive graphic organizers into a whole-class PowerPoint lesson as an instructional approach intended to improve student engagement and generative learning in schools. A software application was developed and integrated into PowerPoint that makes it possible for the instructor to fill in empty graphic organizers during PowerPoint projection mode. The participants were 152 fourth-grade students selected from three schools that were grouped in four classrooms. Each classroom was divided in two groups—graphic organizer and content-based. The graphic organizer group was taught using an 11-slide PowerPoint presentation on a social study topic that included two empty graphic organizers plus two additional slides explaining how to make a comparison. The content-based group was taught using the same presentation but without these additional slides plus a set of questions students had to answer as a class activity. The lessons were recorded and the verbal statements between instructor and students examined using the Flanders Interaction Analysis System. Results indicated significant differences in how instructors and students interacted in each group, including more questions asked by teachers (d?=?1.99) and more students participating in the classroom discussion in the graphic organizer group (d?=?1.76). Learning outcomes showed that the graphic organizer group outperformed the content-based group on a memory test (d?=?.45) and a comprehension test (d?=?.44). These results encourage the use of graphic organizers as an instructional approach, and are consistent with a generative theory of learning.     

Gender differential in self-assessment: a fact neglected in higher education peer and self-assessment techniques

This paper analyses student cross-assessment with a gender perspective in three different courses along several academic years in an engineering school in Spain. The aim of this study is to contribute to a wider understanding of the hidden effect of gender in higher education by testing if gender has any effect on the way students assess others and themselves. Previous research has demonstrated sex differences in self-image and self-confidence, which are both closely related to self-esteem and same- and other-sex esteem. It follows that gender effects might be expected in investigations on peer and self-assessment (PSA), as both techniques are closely linked to self-image and self-confidence. But a critical review of the literature on PSA with a gender perspective reveals that findings on this field are inconclusive, thus more research is needed. The analysis of the results of our study reveals that women judge themselves too harshly. As the literature on PSA does not show great concern for gender issues, some tentative suggestions are proposed to support PSA with gender-awareness sessions.     

Connecting Levels of Representation: Emergent versus submergent perspective

Chemical phenomena can be described using three representation modes: macro, submicro, and symbolic. The way students use and connect these modes when solving conceptual problems was studied, using a think‐aloud interview protocol. The protocol was validated through interviews with six faculty members, and then applied to four graduate and six undergraduate chemistry students. We used a ‘levels of complexity’ framework to analyse responses: the macro and symbolic modes were considered system‐level representations, and the submicro mode a component‐level representation. We found that faculty members thought of system‐level properties as emerging from mechanistic interactions between particles on the component level—an emergent perspective. In many cases, the students either failed to connect the system and component levels, or thought of system‐level properties as guiding the behaviour of particles on the component level—a ‘submergent’ perspective. Some students used their familiarity with a symbolic equation describing the behaviour of a substance as the starting point of a thought process that leads them to impose mechanistically unwarrantable behaviour upon its particles. We concluded that a submergent perspective inhibits students from confronting their misconceptions regarding particle behaviour, and explains why students are often able to correctly solve algorithmic problems while failing to solve conceptual ones. It is suggested that the directionality of connecting particle behaviour to system‐level properties should be emphasized in teaching.     

A Structural Equation Model of Parental Involvement,Motivational and Aptitudinal Characteristics,and Academic Achievement

The authors used the structural equation model (SEM) approach to test a model hypothesizing the influence of parental involvement on students' academic aptitudes, self-concept, and causal attributions, as well as the influence of the 3 variables on academic achievement. The theoretical model was contrasted in a group of 12- to 18-year-old adolescents (N = 261) attending various educational centers. The results indicate that (a) parental involvement had a positive and significant influence on the participant's measured characteristics; (b) causal attribution was not causally related to self-concept or academic achievement when the task involved finding causes for success, but, self-concept and causal attributions were found to be significantly and reciprocally related when the task involved finding causes accounting for failure; (c) self-concept was statistically and predominantly causally related to academic achievement, but not vice versa; and (d) aptitude and self-concept accounted for academic achievement, although the effect of self-concept was predominant. These results suggest that in adolescence, cognitive-affective variables become crucial in accounting for academic behavior.