Difficulties in L2 Hebrew Reading in Russian-speaking Second Graders

The present study examined factors that influence the process of learning to read in a second language. The Hebrew reading comprehension skills of 68 Russian-speaking children (mean age 7 years 6 months) were screened at the start of Grade 2. From this sample, 40 participants were selected: 20 successful learners and 20 unsuccessful learners. These two groups were then tested on a wide range of language skills (e.g., phonological processing, vocabulary, syntactic and morphological awareness) in both languages (Hebrew and Russian) and reading skills in Hebrew (e.g., reading speed and accuracy). Two factors, level of spoken Hebrew and phonological awareness deficits in both languages, were significant. Phonological awareness difficulties constituted the key factor associated with poor decoding whereas insufficient mastery of spoken Hebrew was important in the case of reading comprehension. An interesting dissociation was also found in our poor readers between impaired phonological awareness and other unimpaired phonological processing abilities such as oral pseudoword repetition and working memory. These findings suggest that, in addition to poor spoken L2 proficiency, poor readers are characterized more by a metalinguistic rather than a linguistic deficit in their native tongue.     

Book Review of The Heart and Soul of Change: What Works in Therapy

The Heart and Soul of Change: What Works in Therapy by Mark A. Hubble, Barry L. Duncan, & Scott D. Miller (Eds.). (1999).     

Science Camps for Introducing Nature of Scientific Inquiry Through Student Inquiries in Nature: Two Applications with Retention Study

Research in Science Education - Scientific inquiry is widely accepted as a method of science teaching. Understanding its characteristics, called Nature of Scientific Inquiry (NOSI), is also...     

The Emergence of Chronic Peer Victimization in Boys' Play Groups

This investigation utilized a contrived play group procedure to examine the behavioral patterns leading to chronic victimization by peers in middle childhood. 30 play groups, each of which consisted of 6 unacquainted African-American 6-year-old or 8-year-old boys, met for 45-min sessions on 5 consecutive days. Play group interactions were videotaped and then examined. 13 boys who came to be chronically victimized by their play group peers were identified, along with matched nonvictim contrasts. Victims demonstrated lower rates of assertive behaviors, such as persuasion attempts and social conversation initiatives, and higher rates of nonassertive behaviors, such as submissions to peers' social initiatives, than contrasts. This nonassertive behavior pattern appears to have preceded the development of chronic victimization. Children who eventually emerged as victims were pervasively submissive, beginning in the initial 2 sessions. However, marked individual differences in victimization by peers did not become apparent until the final 3 sessions. These data provide evidence of strong linkages between submissive social behavior and the emergence of chronic victimization by peers.     

The effect of phonological analysis training on naming performance

Children who are poor readers have difficulty naming pictured objects. Previous research has shown that while poor readers have the same amount of tacit phonological knowledge about words they cannot retrieve as good readers, they cannot use this initial phoneme and rhyme information to produce these words. In this study, thirdgrade good and poor readers participated in a training session to explicitly teach them how to manipulate the phonological structure of words as a means of facilitating naming ability. Both groups benefited from training, even though the good readers performed consistently better than poor readers. It is suggested that with more extensive training, poor readers may learn to use their tacit phonological knowledge of words they have difficulty retrieving spontaneously, by generating and using their own phonemic and rhyme cues independently.     

Cognitive Development and Learning: Analyzing the Building of Skills in Classrooms

This article explores the unique and personal experience of learning within a broader framework of development called skill theory. The framework offers a perspective for recognizing within a diversity of experiences a stable order of increasing complexity in skills that individuals display as they execute or demonstrate changes in their understanding. This order is described in terms of a scale, or ruler, that quantifies across domains the achievement of greater levels of complexity in ability. In particular, we explore the process adults follow as they attempt to understand and apply ideas from science and leadership to allow the reader to witness how individual experiences can map onto a "universal" scale of learning and development.     

年华里，你我是最美的风景

15岁摩羯座女生．懒散且倔强。不是很自信．多半时候比较安静。家乡是北的临海的一座小城。喜欢这里的潮湿空气。没有很大很宏伟的理想。比较随遇而安。属于在人群中平凡得找不出的那类人。