Transnational Governances in Higher Education: New Universities,Rhetorics, and Networks in Postwar Singapore

At the close of World War II, Japan’s ouster from Malaya led to the resumption of British control and a new outlook toward political independence. Higher education would play a central role in this complex transition, where the forces of decolonization and nation-building converged with drives toward both interethnic competition and multiethnic cooperation. These tensions stimulated a multiplicity of new rhetorics and new networks for universities and university students. This paper uses the framework of governance to uncover the contrasting rhetorics and networks produced by postwar Singapore’s new universities. By examining their structures and mechanisms of governance, the paper demonstrates how the sudden catapulting of university education to a crucial socio-political position redefined the intersections between education, language, culture, and nation. In doing so, it reveals that these redefinitions forecasted contemporary discourse and mechanisms in higher education.     

Text (Oral) Reading Fluency as a Construct in Reading Development: An Investigation of Its Mediating Role for Children From Grades 1 to 4

In the present study we investigated a developmentally changing role of text reading fluency in mediating the relations of word reading fluency and listening comprehension to reading comprehension. We addressed this question by using longitudinal data from Grades 1 to 4 and employing structural equation models. Results showed that the role of text reading fluency changes over time as children’s reading proficiency develops. In the beginning phase of reading development (Grade 1), text reading fluency was not independently related to reading comprehension over and above word reading fluency and listening comprehension. In Grades 2 to 4, however, text reading fluency completely mediated the relation between word reading fluency and reading comprehension, whereas it partially mediated the relation between listening comprehension and reading comprehension. These results suggest that text reading fluency is a dissociable construct that plays a developmentally changing role in reading acquisition.     

El pronombre en el lenguaje formal del niño

Resumen

El uso de la categoría lingüística del pronombre en el lenguaje verbal del niño es muy temprano, algunas subcategorías de éste aparecen prácticamente desde el primer momento de la aparición de las primeras palabras. No obstante, el adecuado uso anafórico depende del grado de complejidad de cada una de las formas que posee este elemento morfológico. Diversos estudios señalan que en los niños de edad escolar todavía no se encuentra consolidado en alguno de los aspectos esta forma lingüística.

Por tanto, es importante intentar identificar las pautas de adquisición de los pronombres, debido al importante papel que desempeñan en el ámbito lingüístico.

El presente trabajo consiste en el estudio de los pronombres que aparecen en la producción verbal de 180 escolares de 2.° curso de EGB, pertenecientes a colegios públicos de las distintas zonas de Madrid. La recogida de datos se realizó a través de una prueba de expresión libre. Se analizaron la producción total de pronombre, y asimismo, se analizaron los errores que aparecen en la narración infantil.

De este modo se pretende precisar aquellos aspectos que suponen mayor dificultad de uso.

Tras el estudio, encontramos que el pronombre, lingüísticamente hablando, constituye uno de los elementos en los que los escolares cometen mayor número de errores sintácticos.     

Borderland:On the Edge of the “immense ocean of truth”

Borderland, a journal of the occult, was published in London by William T. Stead from 1893 through 1897. Its goal was to be at once receptive to new ideas and scientific in their examination. Stead’s early career is reviewed, and Borderland, is described. The topics investigated included spirit communication, spirit photography, Martian, life, ghosts, dual personalities, and palmistry. Grace Eckley has found that William T. Stead is the biographical original of James Joyce’s hero inFinnegan’s Wake and has published several articles on Stead and Joyce. She promotes the William T. Stead Memorial Society and edits the journalNews Stead, which began publication in November 1992.     

Metacognition of young readers in an early intervention programme

This qualitative study was designed to investigate the metacognitive behaviour displayed by young children during their involvement in a reading intervention program, using videotapes of both intervention sessions and stimulated recall to access metacognition. The children demonstrated a wide range of metacognitive behaviour consistent with models of metacognition for older children proposed by researchers such as Flavell (1979) and Paris (Cross and Paris, 1988). Most metacognitive responses during intervention sessions involved self-regulation whereas responses during stimulated recall tended to reflect metacognitive awareness of reading strategies. Results support the need to use multiple measures of metacognition with young children as well as the need for further research on the relationship between metacognition and reading achievement of children in reading intervention programmes.