Comprehension monitoring is a meta-cognitive skill that is defined as the ability to self-evaluate one's comprehension of text. Although it is known that struggling adult readers are poor at monitoring their comprehension, additional research is needed to understand the mechanisms underlying comprehension monitoring and their role in reading…

Learning performance data, such as correct or incorrect answers and problem-solving attempts in intelligent tutoring systems (ITSs), facilitate the assessment of knowledge mastery and the delivery of effective instructions. However, these data tend to be highly sparse (80%90% missing observations) in most real-world applications. This data…

The field of Adult Literacy and Numeracy (ALN) has an evidence problem. This paper analyses that problem through the lens of three overarching types of evidence available to researchers and policymakers: Type 1 evidence, which provides descriptions of the scope of social problems; Type 2 evidence measuring the impacts of programmes addressing…

This chapter describes international policy contexts of adult literacy and language assessment and the shift toward standardization through measurement tools. It considers the implications the quantification of learning outcomes has for pedagogy and practice and for the social inclusion of transnational migrants.

The last two decades have seen fast-moving and wholescale changes in the ways that education is now provided in French schools, in the nature of learner assessment, and in the form and scale of system evaluation. Innovation and reform have in part followed international trends, themselves triggered by the global impact of the international…

The field of educational testing has become increasingly important for providing different stakeholders and decision-makers with information. This paper discusses basic standards for methodological approaches used in measuring literacy skills among adults. The authors address the increasing interest in skills measurement, the discourses on how…

This paper argues for the utility of ANT as a philosophical and methodological approach to policy analysis. It introduces the key features of a recent educational policy reform initiative, Skills for Life and illustrates the argument by looking at three "moments" (in Callon's 1986 terminology) in the life of this initiative, applying the…

How can teachers be helped, at relatively little expense, to improve their professional practice? This problem was addressed in "Improving Formative Assessment in Vocational Education and Adult Literacy, Language and Numeracy Programmes"--the IFA project. Adopting a specific problem-based methodology as part of an action research…

This study examined the reliability and validity of administering Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) to adult basic education (ABE) students. Ninety ABE participants were administered DIBELS measures, the Woodcock-Johnson III Broad Reading (WJ III BR) measures, and four orthographic ability tests. Since ABE students are a…

Objective: This primary purpose of this study was to examine cognitive complexity and readability of patient-administered ADHD scales. The secondary purpose was to estimate variation in readability of individual ADHD scale items. Method: Using comprehensive search strategies, we identified eight English-language ADHD scales for inclusion in our…

Spelling is an important, but often overlooked, component of literacy instruction and development. Although it is related to other aspects of literacy, there are independent theories of spelling development as well as assessment and instructional strategies that align with these theories. This article summarizes the rationale for linking…

Background: This study was originally prepared for the African Inter-Ministerial Conference on Literacy (September 2007) with the objective of analysing the costs of successful adult literacy programmes run both by government ministries, as well as international and national non-governmental organisations. Objectives: This study aims to increase…

This article presents the results of a qualitative study into how adult literacy learners perceive reading. Individual interviews and focus groups were used to ask 37 adult literacy learners at a London further education college what reading is. It follows a grounded theory approach to build a model, or narrative, of reading in the form of six…

With the advent of the UN Literacy Decade launched in 2003, there is increased emphasis on monitoring and evaluation of adult literacy around the globe. The present paper presents an overview of the main approaches that have been taken to measure adult literacy within and across countries. A particular focus of the present review is to compare and…

At a time when governments face the challenges of maintaining competitiveness in a global economy, it is necessary to have high-quality comparative information regarding the fundamental skills of the adult population. Such information can help governments to evaluate policies and design more effective interventions. This article describes a…