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From: Christina Zarcadoolas <Christina_Zarcadoolas@brown.edu>
To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-technology@literacy.nifl.gov>
Subject: [NIFL-TECHNOLOGY:2852] Re: unweaving print vs. web text
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At 06:00 PM 5/13/03 -0400, you wrote:
Fran,
I guess, without sounding overly dramatic, I'd say no - we don't have a
good sense of what makes websites readable based on what we know about
print texts.
Jacob Nielson, Spool and others have very good insights as to what makes a
website "good." However, I don't believe that this is the same thing as
what makes it readable/decodable. What we suggest in the article is that
these principles have yet to be ground truthed with low literate readers.
To your point about what gets read, links, text, etc. You raise a question
I think about a lot - since we know individual readers use any number of
different strategies, one reader foregrounding something another reader
backgrounds until later, how do we design web information to account for
these inevitable and powerful differences in reading strategies and skills.
Here's a mundane example:
I can read a sentence,
" Jane came to school as usual today."
If I'm an anticipatory reader, or if I'm a reader that relies lots
on schemas, then I might infer that Jane is a student. If I'm not
using the sentence as an advance organizer. Then Jane is Jane....until I read
"When she arrived the principal asked her to teach an
extra class."
The same would be true for sentences like:
The king died. The queen died.
vs.
The king died and the queen died of grief.
Or Chomsky's classic example, "Flying planes can be dangerous."
I'd like to know if people know of research ( or are doing research) that
looks at what multiple ways can a web page or site be read and what types
of redundancy we should build into sites for low lit readers that will
improve their chances for getting to meaning?
Thanks,
chris
>Chris, are you saying we know how to make printed text simpler but don't
>have a clue yet with text on the Web?
>
>As for reading by following links, we found from interviews that
>learners with some Internet familiarity seemed to view links as optional
>information (the dominant Internet convention I think) and chose not to
>follow them. We hadn't anticipated this and had put some essential
>information in the linked text. We now have developed a very overt (and
>perhaps bossy) "Read Now" button link when we have a link to essential
>information on another page. (That seems to be working)
>
>Of course it's a very different thing to be building an online
>environment for adult learners and to be building activities or
>instruction around what's already there.
>
>
>Fran Keenan
>PBS Adult Learning Service
>fkeenan@pbs.org
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Christina Zarcadoolas [mailto:Christina_Zarcadoolas@brown.edu]
>Sent: Tuesday, May 13, 2003 9:30 AM
>To: Multiple recipients of list
>
> 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.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>__________________________________________________________________
>
>Give them words to grow by.
>Share a story with a child in your life today.
>pbskids.org/shareastory
>_________________________________________________________________
>
>_________________________________________________________________
>
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>__________________________________________________________________
Christina Zarcadoolas PhD
Center for Environmental Studies
Director, Environmental Literacy Initiative
Brown University
Box 1943
Providence, RI 02912
401-863-7347
caz@brown.edu
www.envstudies.brown.edu
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