Dr. Anna Moro is Associate Professor in the Department of Linguistics and Languages, founding director of the MELD, MERGE and MODEL Programs, director of the Bilingualism Lab in ARiEAL, and former Associate Dean, Academic, in the Faculty of Humanities, McMaster University. In the past several years, she has focused on the development of new programs across disciplines and faculties, on the strengthening of the student experience, and on international student education. Her current research program uses experimental methods to examine and improve language development among university-level second language learners. Dr. Daniel Schmidtke is a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Linguistics and Languages, and is affiliated with the MELD Programs and ARiEAL. He conducts research in experimental psycholinguistics and corpus linguistics. His research has applied the eye-tracking technique to investigate the influence of linguistic, cognitive, and experiential factors on complex word identification, passage reading fluency and text comprehension. His current research uses eye-tracking to examine the development of English reading skill in ESL students enrolled in the MELD programs.

Abstract:
Increasing numbers of EAL (English as an additional language) international students enter university via institution-specific bridging programs, yet there is extremely limited research on the effectiveness of such programs, and on the language gains that are possible for participants. McMaster’s bridging program, MELD, has benefited from a comprehensive quality assurance research program that tracks the within-individual development of language skills across successive cohorts of the program. Drs. Moro and Schmidtke will present three longitudinal studies of reading development among EALs. In the first study, an investigation of word reading behaviour using eye movement measures, the MELD research team presents evidence of a shift from a sub-lexical to a holistic word processing strategy, particularly for students with stronger incoming phonological awareness skills. The second study, a multi-cohort study of ~400 students, focuses on passage reading behaviour and comprehension, with a view to tracking students’ developmental trajectories in relation to incoming reading ability. The final study considers the role that reading experience plays on reading speed across the program. Using weekly reading habits data, the MELD research team examines how individual differences in the number of English readings students complete during the program translate into individual variability in reading speed gains. In the talk, Drs. Moro and Schmidtke will highlight how each study contributes to what we know about second language reading. They will also highlight the full circle relationship that exists between the bridging program and the research program: insights from the research program inform the bridging program and bridging program effectiveness motivates the research program.