[NIFL-TECHNOLOGY:2844] RE: are there reading "truths"

From: Virginia Tardaewether (tarv@chemeketa.edu)
Date: Tue May 13 2003 - 12:10:20 EDT


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From: "Virginia Tardaewether" <tarv@chemeketa.edu>
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Subject: [NIFL-TECHNOLOGY:2844] RE: are there reading "truths"
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Personally, I did not learn to read in a linear fashion.  I have not
found that students have a lot of trouble with the techno-language of
the internet.  Instead they are facinated and ask lots of questions and
spend hours writing and reading in chat rooms.  IS the language there
proper English?  No but are they learning to read and write? Yes

-----Original Message-----
From: Christina Zarcadoolas [mailto:Christina_Zarcadoolas@brown.edu] 
Sent: Tuesday, May 13, 2003 06:30
To: Multiple recipients of list
Subject: [NIFL-TECHNOLOGY:2843] are there reading "truths"


At 12:48 AM 5/13/03 -0400, you wrote:
Steve,
Thanks for the resource site.

I'd like to think about Tom's question about linearity.

I too keep getting back to print (sorry - the linguist beast rears its
head 
to often) - but as I read these interesting posts I'm reminded of a
major 
issue about what we know and don't know about low lit readers.  Both
NALS 
and the clear language movement have been important in putting literacy
on 
the radar screen in some spheres.  But the by-catch, if you will, has
been 
a tenacious movement to simplify vocabulary and sentence structure.  So
we 
talk about easy to read materials highlighting these aspects of the 
content/message.  And then we test these materials, and lo and behold,
our 
patient focus group or cognitive testing participants demonstrate that, 
indeed, they can read the revised material with more comprehension. But 
then along comes this wonderful format - hypertext) that in some ways,
more 
accurately mimics what real people do in real reading settings.  They
jump 
forward and loop back; they scan; they read on until things make sense.
( 
Long established as fluent reading strategies among reading educators in

the 60s and 70s.

If we begin with overly narrow assumptions about the linearity of print
and 
try to accommodate them in hypertext - seems like we come to no 
good.  Anybody else suspicious about this?

Chris



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