Researchers have demonstrated a much-needed shift in pedagogical practices to incorporate literacy strategies. This dissertation provides additional empirical evidence to expand the body of research by utilizing a comparative readability analysis that examines the academic language of a popular calculus textbook. A sample from the published…

Recently, the readability of texts has become the focus of reading research because it is believed to have implications for reading comprehension, which is of utmost importance in the field of English as a foreign language (EFL), particularly in the teaching, learning and assessment of reading comprehension. Unfortunately, the influence of text…

Readability formulae have been used to predict text difficulty, but their construction has been challenged. Previous readability formula designers typically adopted correct responses to reading comprehension questions (RCQs) as dependent variables, but they did not assess the effect of linguistic predictors concerning RCQs in the formula. Thus,…

The purpose of this study is to examine the readability levels of the state departments of education guidance documents regarding COVID-19 protocols for families of students receiving special education services. The authors searched the 50 states and the District of Columbia's departments of education websites for their COVID-19, special…

The effectiveness of English Language Teaching (ELT) materials significantly influences the learning outcomes of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners, positioning these resources as cardinal in the acquisition process. Despite this widely acknowledged significance, there remains a notable gap in research concerning the evaluation of key…

This study aims to determine the effectiveness of Fry readability-based digital storybooks on reading comprehension skills among elementary school students. The method used in this study was an experimental research design with a pretest-posttest control group design to measure students' reading comprehension skills. The sample of this study was…

Purpose: The readability and comprehensibility of Learner's Permit Knowledge Test practice questions and the relationship with test failure rates across states and the District of Columbia were examined. Method: Failure rates were obtained from department representatives. Practice test questions were extracted from drivers' manuals and department…

Readers often struggle to identify the main ideas in expository texts. Existing research and instruction provide some guidance on how to encourage readers to identify main ideas. However, there is substantial variability in how main ideas are operationalized and how readers are prompted to identify main ideas. This variability hinders…

Estimating the difficulty of reading tests is critical in second language education and assessment. This study was aimed at examining various text features that might influence the difficulty level of a high-stakes reading comprehension test and predict test takers' scores. To this end, the responses provided by 17,900 test takers on the reading…

This study examined the extent to which prior beliefs and reading instructions impacted elements of a reader's mental representation of multiple texts. College students' beliefs about childhood vaccinations were assessed before reading two anti-vaccine and two pro-vaccine texts. Participants in the experimental condition read for the purpose of…

Readers often struggle to identify the main ideas in expository texts. Existing research and instruction provide some guidance on how to encourage readers to identify main ideas. However, there is substantial variability in how main ideas are operationalized and how readers are prompted to identify main ideas. This variability hinders…

Though the empirical findings of the past studies in the literature have offered strong support to the significant role of language knowledge and background knowledge in reading comprehension, this issue has not been explored with regard to specific purposes tests in the Iranian higher education context. Therefore, this study aimed at exploring…

Large language models (LLMs) offer an opportunity to make large-scale changes to educational content that would otherwise be too costly to implement. The work here highlights how LLMs (in particular GPT-4) can be prompted to revise educational math content ready for large scale deployment in real-world learning environments. We tested the ability…

Reading comprehension instruction may be critical for students to learn from social studies text, particularly for students who are not yet proficient in reading. Understanding factors that correspond to high levels of student engagement during text-based social studies instruction appears particularly important. Data were collected from 50…

A teacher's ability to read effectively is critical to that individual's ability to teach reading skills. Correspondingly, most state departments of education require that prospective teachers earn a passing score on a standardized reading comprehension test before they can enter university-based teacher education programs or otherwise get a…