H. Whiteley

The developmental progression of comprehension‐related skills in children learning EAL

Many children who speak English as an additional language (EAL) underachieve in areas of English literacy, especially in the primary years. These difficulties are often attributed to low levels of English language fluency as they enter the education system. In an effort to provide a greater understanding of this underachievement, the cognitive-linguistic factors underlying literacy development in monolingual children and children learning EAL were examined in a three-year longitudinal project. The project, conducted in schools in the north of England, followed the developmental progression of forty-three children learning EAL and forty-three monolingual children from school years Two to Four. Children were assessed on measures of reading accuracy, reading and listening comprehension, receptive and expressive vocabulary, and reception of grammar. Analysis revealed similarities between the two groups of children on reading accuracy, but children learning EAL had lower levels of vocabulary and comprehension at each point in time. Data are discussed in terms of the development of underlying language skills and the impact of these skills on both reading and listening comprehension. The implications of the findings for classroom practice are considered.

Supporting the Development of Emotional Intelligence Competencies to Ease the Transition from Primary to High School

This study aims to explore (1) whether pupils with high emotional intelligence (EI) cope better with the transition to high school; and (2) whether the introduction of an intervention programme to support the development of EI competencies can increase EI and self‐worth, and so ease the negative effects of transition. Results suggest that pupils with high/average levels of EI cope better with transition in terms of grade point average, self‐worth, school attendance and behaviour than pupils with low EI. In addition, pupils with low baseline EI scores responded positively to the intervention programme, although a negative change was noted in pupils with high baseline emotional intelligence. Results are considered in terms of implications for educational practice.

Emotional Intelligence: Review of Research and Educational Implications

Abstract This article provides a critical review of the research field of emotional intelligence (EI) and examines the usefulness of the construct in the debate on educational policy and practice. The authors examine two approaches to the theory and measurement of EI and summarize the evidence linking EI to life success and academic achievement. Also considered is whether or not EI can be changed or developed, and how it might be facilitated in educational practice. In conclusion, while a distinct construct of EI remains debatable; many of the attributes encompassed by this term do predict that life success and programmes of socio-emotional learning in schools may usefully contribute to the development of these attributes.

The comprehension skills of children learning English as an additional language

BACKGROUND Data from national test results suggests that children who are learning English as an additional language (EAL) experience relatively lower levels of educational attainment in comparison to their monolingual, English-speaking peers. AIMS The relative underachievement of children who are learning EAL demands that the literacy needs of this group are identified. To this end, this study aimed to explore the reading- and comprehension-related skills of a group of EAL learners. SAMPLE Data are reported from 92 Year 3 pupils, of whom 46 children are learning EAL. METHOD Children completed standardized measures of reading accuracy and comprehension, listening comprehension, and receptive and expressive vocabulary. RESULTS Results indicate that many EAL learners experience difficulties in understanding written and spoken text. These comprehension difficulties are not related to decoding problems but are related to significantly lower levels of vocabulary knowledge experienced by this group. CONCLUSIONS Many EAL learners experience significantly lower levels of English vocabulary knowledge which has a significant impact on their ability to understand written and spoken text. Greater emphasis on language development is therefore needed in the school curriculum to attempt to address the limited language skills of children learning EAL.

The role of Emotional Intelligence in the decision to persist with academic studies in HE

Failure to adapt to the demands of higher education (HE) is often cited as a cause of withdrawal from the course. Parker and others (Parker, J.D.A., L.J. Summerfeldt, M.J. Hogan, and S.A. Majeski. 2004. Emotional intelligence and academic success: Examining the transition from high school to university. Personality and Individual Differences 36: 163–72) considered the role of individual differences in Emotional Intelligence (EI) and demonstrated a link between EI, withdrawal/retention and measures of academic achievement. In this study we ask whether EI mediates withdrawal in a UK HE institution and whether an EI‐based intervention might improve retention rates. Study 1 considers the effects of EI upon retention, revealing that students with higher levels of EI are more likely to progress to Year 2 of study. Study 2 evaluates an EI‐based intervention programme, demonstrating that students who show an increase in EI are more likely to persist with their studies. These findings are discussed in the light of current theoretical work. The prospects for EI‐based intervention programmes are also considered.

Using email for teaching

Abstract An account is given of a three-year study of the use of email for teaching purposes within two courses forming part of a psychology degree, in order to compare course delivery via email with delivery via ‘traditional’ lectures. The courses were a first year ‘Psychology and IT’ course, which was taught entirely via email and a second year ‘Cognitive Psychology’ course, parts of which were taught by email and part by lectures, some of which were supported by emailed summaries. Although there were drawbacks to the use of email for teaching, the email method was felt to have been successful, as was confirmed by generally positive student feedback. The examination performance of two successive student cohorts on an multiple-choice question (MCQ) paper was studied. In one cohort the poorest part-time students performed better on material taught by email than by lectures, while in the other cohort there was some evidence for lectures supported by emailed 1000-word summaries producing better performance. However, in this second cohort MCQ performance deriving from emailed lectures was worse than that deriving from other delivery formats.

Relationships between ADHD and Dyslexia Screening Scores and Academic Performance in Undergraduate Psychology Students: Implications for Teaching, Learning and Assessment

The impact of dyslexia and ADHD characteristics on study in higher education has been relatively neglected. This study investigates the prevalence of self-reported dyslexia and ADHD characteristics in 1182 undergraduate psychology students at four universities. Findings suggest that there is a high incidence of undiagnosed students in the ‘at risk’ categories for both dyslexia and ADHD. Whilst no relationship was found between achievement data and dyslexia scores, there were strong negative associations between ADHD subscale scores (inattention, hyperactivity or impulsivity and overall ADHD) and academic grades, indicating that those who score higher on ADHD rating scales are performing more poorly in academic tests than their lower scoring peers. Assessment results indicate that specific modes of assessment (multiple choice questions) may pose particular problems for high inattentive or ADHD scorers. The study suggests a need to focus on the identification and provision of support for students with problems related to ADHD characteristics, and indicates that many students, other than those who ‘declare’ a learning difficulty, would benefit from further support.

The representation of nonstructural information in visual memory: Evidence from image combination

Two experiments investigated the differential representation of the figure and ground of a picture in visual short-term and long-term memory. It is known (Hitch, Brandimonte, & Walker, 1995) that subjects find it more difficult to combine mental images of two separately presented pictures in order to identify a novel form when the two pictures are incongruent in color (i.e., when a black-on-white line drawing has to be combined with a white-on-black drawing). In the present experiments, thefigures were depicted in solid form to allow color congruity to be varied independently for figure and ground. Results showed a clear impairment in image combination when the to-be-combined figures were incongruent in color (black-on-gray and white-on-gray) but not when theirgrounds were incongruently colored (gray-on-black and gray-on-white). In this way, image combination was seen to be supported by a representation of the object depicted in the picture rather than by a literal representation of the picture itself (i.e., a pictorial code). In line with previous findings, the same representation was seen to support image combination based on short-term memory (Experiment 1) and long-term memory (Experiment 2), provided that in the latter case verbal recoding was precluded. When verbal recoding was allowed, image combination based on long-term memory was insensitive to color congruity, implying the involvement of a more abstract structural representation.

The use of tinted lenses to alleviate reading difficulties

An increasing number of optometrists are offering assessments using the Intuitive Colorimeter (Wilkins, Nimmo-Smith and Jansons, 1992) to determine whether children who have reading difficulties might benefit from the use of tinted lenses. Suggestions have been made in the media that tinted lenses may provide a ‘cure’ for developmental dyslexia, and there have been many anecdotal accounts of improvements in reading following their use (e.g. Brace, 1993). However, such extreme claims are not typical of the scientific literature supporting the use of tinted lenses. This article provides an overview of the research into the use of tinted lenses for the amelioration of reading difficulties. The electronic databases searched for this review were BIDS, MEDLINE, PsychInfo, PsychLit and Science Direct. Key search terms used were coloured (colored) lenses, Irlen lenses, scotopic sensitivity and visual deficits in combination with the term ‘reading difficulties’.

The activation of multiletter units in visual word recognition

A growing body of evidence supports a multi-level view of visual word recognition incorporating representations at an intermediate level where multiletter units can be activated directly by supraletter features (e.g. Drewnowski & Healy, 1977). In the present study, priming in an alphabetic decision task was exploited to investigate the existence of directly activated multiletter units. Subjects were required to make a discrimination response to test stimuli that could be targets or foils. Targets were single letters or consonant-bigrams that were present or absent in an immediately preceding word, and foils were single keyboard characters or a character plus a letter. Experiment I verified an earlier finding that responses to consonantbigrams are facilitated when they appear in a prime word, whereas responses to the constituent letters of those bigrams are not facilitated (Greenberg & Vellutino, 1988). In addition, responses to primed bigrams were faster than responses to primed single letters. Experiments 2 to 4 revealed that bigram priming in the absence of letter priming occurs only when both primes and targets appear in lower-case type. It is concluded that separable multiletter units are represented in the visual word recognition system and are directly activated by supraletter visual features. The findings are discussed in the context of current theories of visual word recognition.