A recent Educational Testing Services report (2016) found that international graduate students with a TOEFL score of 80--the minimum average TOEFL score for graduate admission in the United States--usually possess reading subscores of 20, equating to a 12th-grade reading comprehension level. However, one public flagship university's international…

The research genre has specific communicative purposes which require students to understand the tone, generic and disciplinary conventions. The present study explored the potential of thematic progression (TP) to contribute to research argument readability. TP concerns how clauses encode information and how that information is carried forward.…

The assessment of learning in large online courses requires tools that are valid, reliable, easy to administer, and can be automatically scored. We have evaluated an online assessment and learning tool called Knowledge Assembly, or Knowla. Knowla measures a student's knowledge in a particular subject by having the student assemble a set of…

This study aimed to explore inference strategies necessary to successfully read journal articles. Eighty-eight graduate students read a set of texts on education and economic growth and answered comprehension questions. Twenty-four of these participants also volunteered for an in-depth interview. The findings revealed that students usually relied…

Texts are a group of letters which are printed or displayed in a particular style and size. In the course of the fast speed of technological development everywhere and expanding use of computer based instruction such as online courses, students spend more time on a computer screen than printed media. Texts have been the main element to convey…