Public Fiscal Administration Essay

Fiscal Institutions and Fiscal Performance shifts emphasis away from narrow economic factors to more broadly defined political and institutional factors that affect government policy and national debt. This collection brings together new theoretical models, empirical evidence, and a series of in-depth case studies to analyze the effect of political institutions, fiscal regulations, and policy decisions on accumulating deficits. It provides a fascinating overview of the political and economic issues involved and highlights the role of budgetary institutions in the formation of budget deficits. While our roundtable considered differences between two states as points of departure, we believe the principles identified in our exchanges apply to other state environments as well. In fact, a major objective of this paper is to encourage other states to consider these questions in light of their own policies and performance. These are the key questions our roundtable participants suggested that any state should ask as it seeks to improve the performance of its higher education institutions in advancing public priorities. 1. To what extent has a state defined the public purposes it expects higher education institutions to help accomplish? Are the purposes a state seeks to achieve through its colleges and universities clearly articulated? Do institutional leaders and policymakers share a common understanding of those purposes? A first step for any state that seeks to improve the performance of its higher education system is to pose and publicly debate a core set of questions concerning that system: What is the rationale that justifies a state’s spending for institutional appropriation, capital construction, or financial aid? Is that rationale clearly defined? Is it consciously examined, debated, and reaffirmed at regular intervals in the arenas of public policy? Or have the arguments that justify a state’s expenditures for higher education become vestiges of a distant past, subject to differing memories and interpretations? A state needs the political will to set the public agenda-to form ulate clear definitions of the public purposes it expects higher education institutions to help attain. As the needs of society itself evolve, the ends a state seeks to achieve through its colleges and universities can also change. For this reason, the question of higher education’s role in advancing the public weal needs to be  revisited periodically. At the same time, a state needs to assess how well the policies and programs currently in place actually achieve their intended goals. In the absence of such periodic reviews, states tend to increase their expectations of higher education institutions-to add new expectations-without considering how the new expectations relate to those in place from an earlier time. States must also work to maintain a balance between the evolution of their own public purposes on the one hand and the evolution of institutional goals on the other. A state that allows unspoken and implicit priorities to prevail over principles that are publicly debated and affirmed effectively accords more autonomy to institutions in pursuing their own directions. Ultimately, states that do not articulate their purposes may find themselves maintaining institutions for reasons that are increasingly vague and ambiguous. 2. How well do a state’s fiscal appropriation practices align with the mandates of its higher education policies? What combination of policy mandate and incentives is most effective in motivating institutions toward the achievement of public purposes? Providing a rationale and framework for supporting higher education institutions is half the task confronting state policymakers. Through a combination of statutory authority and resource allocation, a state must work to ensure that institutions fulfill the public purposes its policymakers have identified. The authority of educational policy derives from the constitutional power of a state’s elected representatives. While respecting the operational flexibility of higher education institutions, these officials help determine institutional priorities by establishing state policies. Beyond the mandate of policy, however, a state must be willing to appropriate the resources needed to achieve given purposes. A state’s budgetary appropriation to institutions is a most telling statement of public policy with regard to higher education; by the amount and the kind of funding it provides, a state sends an explicit or implicit signal about its priorities for higher education. For reasons beyond its control, a state may sometimes fail to provide sufficient funding for institutions to carry out its public purposes to the extent or at the level of quality it desires. While unforeseen shortfalls in the budget are inevitable in some years, a state that systematically underfunds its higher education system loses some ability to influence institutions in terms of quality or direction. Ultimately, a state and its higher education system need to define what constitutes a reasonable exchange of product for price. While some institutions prefer formula-driven or incremental increases in the funding they receive, public officials have occasionally sought to link a portion of an institution’s funding to the achievement of a particular objective, such as enrollment, retention, or degree completion. A state must exercise caution to ensure that the funding incentives it establishes in fact motivate the behaviors it desires in institutions. The international perspective of our roundtable provided a telling example of the need for policymakers to ensure that the fulfillment of a public purpose falls within the interests of institutions themselves. South Africa, until recently, used the technique of penalizing institutions whose students did not achieve acceptable levels of performance. Rather than spurring institutions to foster heightened achievement in their existing student bodies, this policy often caused higher education institutions to seek higher-achieving students in order to avoid incurring penalty, in effect heightening the barriers to access for many students. The country is now finalizing a new funding system with incentives to institutions that improve the performance of lower-achieving students. Fiscal strategy is not the only means by which a state can influence institutional behavior. If designed carefully, with an awareness of what motivates institutions, however, the alignment of funding with the achievement of public purposes can be an effective means of improving a state’s higher education performance. 3. To what extent do a state’s tuition and financial aid policies contribute to increased higher education participation and completion? The amount of tuition charged at public institutions, in addition to state programs of financial aid and assistance, are central elements of a state’s fiscal policy. It sometimes occurs that a state’s public officials have not formulated an explicit policy regarding tuition, and in such instances, the very lack of specificity constitutes a policy decision. A primary lesson from the AIHEPS research and from experience in many other settings is the importance of need-based programs of financial aid and assistance to foster higher education participation and completion among the most needy. Financial aid is the area in which a state’s higher education policy intersects most substantially with federal programs; the kinds of financial aid a state  makes available in conjunction with Pell Grants and other federal aid programs define the contours of affordability for students in that setting. Both New Jersey and New Mexico exemplify a strong commitment to access, and both take substantial steps to ensure that financial need does not become a barrier to enrolling and completing a degree program in a college or university. In addition to its need-based programs of financial aid, New Mexico’s commitment to access results in a remarkably low tuition at the state’s public institutions of higher education. The experience of many state policy environments makes clear, however, that low tuition in itself does not guarantee access for students. Particularly in sparsely populated settings, where higher education institutions may be a considerable distance from a student’s home, the decision to attend college entails a number of financial commitments that low tuition in itself cannot help a student to meet. Need-based financial aid is a critical element for any state that seeks to enhance the participation of students who have limited financial means. One of the most notable developments during the past several years is the growth in programs that award aid on the basis of academic merit without regard for financial need. Georgia’s merit-based program of financial aid, Helping Outsta nding Pupils Educationally (HOPE), has proven to be a model for similar programs in other states. In New Mexico, the merit-based Lottery Success Scholarship Program has become enormously popular with voters, policymakers, and institutions alike. As with many other aspects of public policy, merit-based programs of financial aid tend to provide greatest benefit to members of the middle class. No elected public official can fail to perceive the political benefit of programs that are popular with the largest block of voters in a state. Merit-based aid programs exemplify a different policy objective from that of providing financial assistance to the most needy. A state’s motivation in providing such aid is to encourage more of its highest-achieving students to remain in the state-first by enrolling in its higher education institutions, and then, ideally, by choosing to live and work in the state after graduation, thus enhancing a state’s educational capital. Merit-based programs have certainly succeeded in attracting more of the highest-achieving students to pursue their baccalaureate degrees in their home state; in doing so, they have relieved many high-achieving, mostly middle-class students and their parents of  substantial costs they might otherwise have incurred in attending institutions out of state. Students of this type tend to have considerable mobility after graduation, however, and it is less clear whether merit-based programs encourage more of them to remain in a state after completing their degrees. Much of the controversy centers on the question of whether a state’s investment in merit-based financial aid occurs at the expense of its commitment to need-based aid. Most of those states that have invested in merit-based programs of aid during the past several years did not have strong historical commitments to need-based aid. In those cases, the introduction of merit-based aid has done no harm to students with greater financial need; in fact, some needy students have benefited because they qualify for the merit-based programs. In states that have begun to blend merit-based with need-based commitments, however, it often appears that the appeal of merit aid has diminished the perception of importance attached to need-based programs. Beyond the obvious political popularity of merit-based aid, a state must ask whether such programs yield a long-term benefit of encouraging more of the best and brightest to remain in the state as workers and citizens. If the answer is no, the question then becomes whether the dollars expended in merit-based programs might be more effectively spent enhancing programs that enable more of those with greatest financial ne ed to attend college. 4. What role does the state interface agency-typically either a higher education governing or coordinating board-play to ensure that a state’s higher education institutions contribute effectively to the achievement of public purposes? To what extent is institutional mission a factor in determining the responsibilities of institutions in fulfilling public purposes? Nearly every state in the United States has one or more agencies that serve as intermediaries between a state’s lawmakers and its higher education institutions. The level of authority vested in a state interface agency varies: some states have a governing board with regulatory authority over public institutions, others a coordinating board that serves in primarily steering and oversight capacities. The notable exception to this rule is the four-year sector in Michigan, which has no formal interface agency. Michigan’s public universities rely on a council of presidents to achieve a unified approach in de aling with the state’s lawmakers. While presidents of four-year universities stand in accord on many issues, each  institution appeals individually to the Legislature and governor in the state’s budget process, and the amount of funding each institution receives is a direct function of its historical allocation, modestly adjusted by lobbying efforts. A state higher education interface agency can help reduce the inherent competition among public colleges and universities. In addition, an effective governing or coordinating board can play a vital role in making a state’s system of higher education more efficient, more successful, and more accountable in terms of educational performance. The interface agency itself must be accountable both to the public purposes a state has defined and to the needs of higher education institutions within the system it serves. An effective interface agency can encourage collaboration among institutions; it can work in behalf of all colleges and universities to influence s tate government; and it can gather and provide information that documents changes in performance. One of the key roles a governing or coordinating board plays is that of providing information that influences decision making both in state government and in individual institutions. The information disseminated by an interface agency can contribute substantially to the effectiveness of the state’s higher education system, helping to sustain the interest of institutional leaders and policymakers in performance. The periodic distribution of comparative data helps sharpen and renew public officials’ understanding of the purposes a state seeks to achieve through its higher education institutions, while also reminding institutional leaders of the criteria that measure an institution’s performance. Indeed, the international perspective of the AIHEPS project makes clear that the presence or absence of information in a given environment is itself a policy issue. One of the major differences between higher education environments in the United States and Mexico is the availability of information for evaluative or strategic purposes. In Mexico, the scarcity of information and the fact that most data are controlled by institutions often impede the work of improving the performance of higher education systems. While the gathering and distribution of information are important functions of an interface agency, these roles in themselves will not ensure improvement in the performance of a state’s higher education system. An interface agency cannot be effective if it is a political weakling; it needs some measure of authority to motivate the behavior of  institutions toward desired ends, whether in the form of incentives or simply the consistent support of sensible decisions by the governor and Legislature. Certainly, the amount of resources available to an interface agency is an important part of the equation; no statewide board can hope to be effective if it lacks sufficient funding and staff. Ideally, the effectiveness of an interface agency rests on its power to influence elected policymakers and to craft policies and incentives that make the achievement of a state’s policy goals fall within the self-interest of institutions themselves. The interface agency often plays a central role in devising appropriate measures of institutional accountability that help to ensure compliance with a state’s policy objectives for higher education. Even though expenditures for higher education now constitute a smaller share of state budgets, state support of higher education has grown in real dollars during the past two decades, and public officials naturally seek to ensure that the dollars invested yield discernible results. In some settings, a state’s drive for institutional accountability has led to confrontations over such matters as faculty productivity or the assessment of student learning. The interface agency plays a critical role in any successful effort to conjoin public officials’ press for accountability with higher education’s traditions of autonomy in the means of fulfilling its educational mission. An interface agency can help create accountability measures that provide a meaningful index of progress in meeting a state’s goals for higher education. It can also ensure that credible reports of performance reach legislators and the general public on a timely basis. A state governing or co ordinating board is by definition an agency that provides both support of and guidance to institutions as they pursue their individual strategic goals. Governing boards of individual colleges and universities can easily become captives of an institution’s own ambitions, advocating those particular interests even at the expense of achieving broader state policy objectives. While affording institutions some measure of protection from the fluctuations of state politics, the interface agency helps ensure that individual institutions evolve in directions that are consistent with state policy goals. One of the issues an interface agency can help address is the degree to which institutional mission should be a factor in the question of accountability to a state’s public purposes.  Successful degree completion, for example, is a goal that has meaning to every higher education institution. But should every institution be held equally accountable to a single graduation rate? Because institutions with different missions may serve different kinds of student populations, holding every institution equally accountable to a particular measure may prove neither efficient nor desirable. At the same time, institutional mission can easily come to reflect an institution’s aspiration to grow in directions that do not meet the greatest public need. Just as a state’s expectations of higher education change over time, mission often becomes a moving target, changing to accommodate the institution’s internally driven goals-such as implementing more selective undergraduate admissions, establishing graduate programs, or expanding sponsored research programs-even if those purposes are fulfilled elsewhere in a state’s higher education system. The interface agency plays a critical role in facilitating a sustained interaction between a state’s policymakers and its higher education institutions. In so doing, it helps ensure the continued strength and adaptability of policies to which all institutions are held accountable. No higher education institution that benefits from public funding should get an automatic â€Å"pass† on its obligation to help fulfill the public agenda, but a state should not expect every institution to achieve particular purposes in the same way. Finally, it is fitting that a state should seek to hold institutions accountable for the â€Å"what† but certainly not the â€Å"how† of achieving public purposes. 5. What steps has a state taken to build the infrastructure and encourage higher education institutions to collaborate-with one another, with K-12 schools, with business and industry-in order to foster the goal of improved preparation as well as economic development? State policymakers play a key role in creating an environment that fosters collaboration between higher education institutions and other agents in areas that effect economic and civic vitality. As major stakeholders, colleges and universities contribute to and depend on the educational and economic well-being of a state’s population. The development of more concerted partnerships between these institutions and K-12 schools is a key element in improving students’ preparation for higher education study-and ultimately in increasing the number of students who pursue postsecondary education. By the same token, higher education’s partnerships with business and industry can contribute  substantially to th e benefits that a higher education confers. States in attractive geographic locations with fair climates can reap an educational and economic advantage simply because they draw many of the best and brightest from other settings. States that do not enjoy this advantage, however, must develop strategies to encourage higher education institutions to work with schools and other agencies, helping to maximize both college participation and the economic benefits higher education provides to a state’s population. Colleges and universities have the capacity to improve both measures by working in conjunction with a state’s primary and secondary schools as their principal supplier of students, as well as with business leaders, who employ substantial numbers of their graduates. A state’s most promising strategy in fostering collaboration is to create a framework and statewide incentives that help coordinate local initiatives. In this, as in other dimensions of achieving a state’s public purposes, the levers of policy can help make collaboration with other stakeholders seem to be in the best interests of higher education institutions themselves. Part of a state’s challenge in promoting collaboration between higher education and K-12 institutions is to overcome substantial cultural barriers that exist between the two domains. Finally, the incentives a state creates for increased collaboration must be built on both sides, so that public schools and higher education institutions find their own interests served by working together. In general, it is community colleges as well as comprehensive universities with strong commitments to training teachers that are most highly attuned to the challenges of K-12 schools, and to the evolving set of skills that business and industry leaders seek in their workforce. It is also true that the more numerous the expectations a state places on its higher education institutions, the easier it becomes for institutions to escape responsibility for those goals they find less conducive to their own ambitions. States must create conditions that make it compelling for higher education institutions to work with K-12 schools in improving students’ preparation for college. Equally important is a state’s role in fostering institutional partnerships with business and industry to help maximize the benefits that higher education confers to a state’s residents. If institutions choose not to participate in the achievement of such purposes, states must devise means of encou raging compliance. A state that lacks the  means or the will to define and pursue its public priorities effectively accords its public institutions open license to pursue goals of their own choosing, with minimal regard to a state’s public purposes.

Study into English Courseware for Slow Learners

Abstract- Current tendency indicate that larning through the usage of application and courseware had become of import instruction method. However, it is different instance for slow scholars. As most schools easy accommodating the more effectual instruction method, they can non maintain up with the flow. Even though there are courseware developed for the slow scholars, the courseware is far from carry throughing their specific demands. Statistic shows that in a US typical schoolroom there will be 3 or 4 slow scholars. In countries of poorness and many low-income urban countries, the kids per schoolroom who could be characterized as slow scholars might be twice that figure. The feature of the slow scholars are frequently described as immature in dealingss, find it hard to work out complex job, work really easy, can easy lose path of clip, unable to execute long-run ends, and have hapless concentration accomplishments. However, they are really good with hands-on stuffs. This paper will show the development of courseware made to learn English for the slow scholars. Keywords-component: courseware ; slow scholars ; English ;IntroductionBackgroundSlow scholars are no longer rare instances in Malaysia. However, they are non categorized as people with particular demands. Some might confound the slow scholars with dyslexia. However, both footings are different. Dyslexic will hold troubles in larning to read and compose despite holding same learning procedure and attempt with others. For slow scholars, they do non make good at schools or undertaking that require extended reading, authorship, and mathematic but they perform great outside category particularly in hands-on undertakings. They will necessitate excess clip in finishing the undertakings given. Because of their features, slow scholars are ever left behind as they can non catch up with the larning procedure gone through by other childs. Even though new engineering has been developed to heighten larning procedure, they are left out because it is non suited for their acquisition demands. This undertaking is intend to heighten the English courseware specifically for the slow scholars in manner that will function their acquisition demands which is different from other childs. The courseware will be focus on non-linear techniques to do it flexible and more contributing for the slow scholars. As there is non much of courseware developed for slow scholars, the merchandise of the undertaking will significantly convey the acquisition procedure for the slow scholars into new degree and lighten up the hope for them to larn like normal childs.Problem StatementTeaching slow scholars is n't same like learning normal childs. Teaching them require different methods and attacks because of their features. As larning procedure traveling on taking advantage of computing machines and cyberspace, slow scholars are left behind because there are no specific acquisition applications for them that will accommodate their demands particularly in critical topics such as Science and Mathematic. There are tonss of courseware in the market out at that place but it is excessively small in Numberss and it is far from perfect. This new courseware to be developed will be a great tool for instructor to learn English to the slow scholars because it will heighten what ‘s already in the courseware a nd do it better.Aims and Scope of SurveiesAimsThe aim of this undertaking is to heighten the current English courseware from Mohd Izzat Helmi Bin Yahya ‘s English Courseware for Slow Learners undertaking and will be specifically designed for the slow scholars so that the acquisition procedure will accommodate their demands. Because of their features, the courseware will necessitate careful designation.. The courseware will enrich English larning procedure which already in the current courseware and do it more synergistic and flexible.Scope of SurveiesThe undertaking will affect the survey of slow scholar behaviour and courseware development. The consequence of the survey so will be analyzed to develop and heightening cognitive accomplishments developing that will be integrated with the courseware so that the mark to learn slow scholars can be achieved. Target group of the courseware will be primary school pupil in Standard 4 to Standard 6 ( 10-12 old ages old ) . The coursewar e will be developed as a game to learn General English.Literature ReviewGame-Based LearningMarc Prensky ( 2003 ) says that since Pong is introduced in 1974, the alone expertness that game interior decorators have honed to a superfine border is participant battle: the ability to maintain people in their seats for hr after hr, twenty-four hours after twenty-four hours, at ecstatic attending, actively seeking to make new ends, shouting with hilarity at their successes, determined to get the better of their failures, all the piece imploring for more. Along with the new engineering that had been developed in recent old ages, games had become more than merely amusement, it had evolve to go the medium of larning. In Digital Game-Based Learning ( Prensky, 2001 ) , explain that kids presents are different from old coevals where they grow up with digital engineering and their heads are altering to suit the engineerings with which they spend more clip. From at that place, it is clear that most kids today from different gender, ages and societal groups spends most of the clip with video games. Many experts see the values in video games as a medium of larning. Its true that this kids love games more than schools but their attitudes toward games is the attitude of the scholars ; passionate, concerted, and actively affect in problem-solving. Research by Zyda ( 2007 ) argue that computing machine games are an piquant medium for acquisition, since games can excite cognitive procedures such as reading explicit and inexplicit information, deductive and inductive logical thinking, problem-solving, and doing illations from information displayed across a figure of screens To specify game based acquisition will be rather complicated because there are several different sentiment on the affair. Kirjavainen ( 2009 ) specify game-based acquisition as field of research and game design based on observations that play, structured or unstructured, conditions the human encephalon for transmutation and acquisition. Wee Hoe Tan ( 2008 ) defines game-based acquisition as signifier of learner-centered acquisition that uses electronic games for educational intents. However, the construct of game-based acquisition is still the same ; the usage of game with the defined acquisition results for the intent of acquisition. Kasvi ( 2000 ) lists the seven demands for effectual acquisition environment as: Supply a high strength of interaction and feedback ; Have specific ends and established processs ; Be motivational ; Supply a continual feeling of challenge, non excessively hard to be frustrating nor excessively easy to make ennui ; Supply a sense of direct battle on the undertaking involved ; Supply the appropriate tools that fit the undertaking ; and Avoid distractions and breaks that destroy the subjective experience. Kasvi ( 2000 ) suggests that computing machine games fulfill all of these demands and believes that they â€Å" satisfy them better than most other larning mediums † . By looking at how the Western universe had utilised game as larning faculty in schoolroom, it proves that the statement is true. R.V. Eck ( 2006 ) explain that games like Civilization, SimCity 4, Cruise Ship Tycoon, and Roller Coaster Tycoon had already been implemented in schoolroom. Peoples might be disbelieving at first glimpse. All these games have prove them incorrect. For illustration, in Roller Coaster Tycoon pupils build roller-coasters to different specifications, which is what applied scientists should make. By widening the gameplay with basic larning procedure like calculus physic cognition, it will do a valuable acquisition experience.Slow Learners in MalayaIn Malaysia, dyslexic kids had begin to have attending when MyLexics, a courseware to assist the dyslexic learn basic Malay linguistic communicat ion is introduced ( Haziq, 2009 ) . However, it ‘s a different narrative for the slow scholars. In fact, there are instances reported where slow scholars are left behind in the categories ( NST, 2008 ) . Cases like this should n't go on because even though they are weak in survey they are decidedly really good in other facets. Even worse, One in every three juvenile delinquent in unity school in prison or detainment centres shows larning troubles including being slow scholars. ( The Star, 2008 ) Many believe that if these young person non identified and helped will do them to stop up as felons. Most of them tend to drop out of schools and vulnerable to negative influence because of the job they facing.Get the better ofing the FailingsResearch by LearningRX ( 2006 ) argue that weak cognitive accomplishments are the cause of larning disablements such as dyslexia and decelerate acquisition. Important accomplishments such as concentration, perceptual experience, memories and logical thought are non every bit good as other normal people which make reading, authorship, and believing more hard. However, this failing can be improved through specific preparation and testing. Mel Levine ( 2008 ) explain that how Kitty Hawk Elementary School in North Carolina America had implied School Attuned Program utilizing the N eurodevelopmental Profiles where all pupils with different cognitive accomplishments can larn. Lisa Galleli, a instructor at Kitty Hawk describes her direction program for one such pupils as â€Å" He had important graphomotor failings with spelling and authorship. But he truly shined in his societal accomplishments and that made all the difference in the universe. He was besides good at math and job resolution. We use his strength who keep him motivated with success while undertaking his authorship job. † The consequence had proved that it is non impossible to get the better of the failing. Neurodevelopmental Profile is researched and synthesized by Mel Levine and his co-workers consist of 8 concepts that are: Table 1: 8 concepts of Neurodevelopmental Profiles Attention This includes the ability to concentrate, concentrate on one thing instead than another, finish undertakings, and command what one says and does Temporal-sequential ordination Whether it ‘s being able to declaim the alphabet or forcing a response button on Jeopardy, being able to understand the clip and sequence of pieces of information is a cardinal constituent of acquisition. Spatial ordination The ability, for case to separate between a circle and square or to utilize images to retrieve related information Memory Even if people are able to understand, form, and construe complex information at the minute, their inability to shop and subsequently remember can dramatically impact their public presentation. Language Developing linguistic communication maps involves luxuriant interaction between assorted parts of the encephalon that control such abilities as pronouncing words, understanding different sounds and groking written symbols Neuromotor maps The encephalon ‘s ability to organize motor or musculus map is cardinal to many country of acquisition, including authorship and keyboarding. Social knowledge One of the most unmarked constituents of acquisition is the ability to win in societal relationship with equal force per unit area. Higher-order knowledge This involve the ability to understand and implement the stairss necessary to work out jobs, attack new countries of acquisition and believe creatively. By recognizing that every homo have some strong maps and some weak 1s, Mel Levine found that it is possible to depict each person ‘s alone mix of strength and failings. Using the right method in developing the courseware and the right attack for the slow scholars, it is non impossible that this courseware will be decidedly assist them.Formative VS Summative EvaluationIn order to garner informations for the sweetening of the courseware, an appraisal demand to be done. There are two methods to be used ; formative rating and summational rating. Harmonizing to H.L Roberts ( 2009 ) , formative ratings besides known as developmental or execution rating assess what works and what does non work about a peculiar activity or undertaking as it is go oning. It is used to measure the value of a undertaking as it is taking topographic point to find how it can be improved. The method usage in formative rating is the same like other appraisal which include study, interview or informations aggregation. This type of rating relies on qualitative informations that is how participants felt about the procedure every bit good as quantitative informations, such as charts or trial tonss. Formative rating typically involves a little group of users and participants in the undertaking being evaluated. Participants in formative ratings look non merely at the ends of the procedure and whether those ends are achieved but besides at the procedure itself and where that procedure is a successful one or non. Even though this type of appraisal is rather co mplex, there are benefit in it. It allow early designation of possible job in the topic of appraisal. Furthermore, it can be a good manner of gage the user perceptual experience on the topic because it rely on user feedback. As for summational rating, Fox Valley Technical College ( 2007 ) depict it as procedure that concerns concluding rating to inquire if the undertaking or plan met its ends. It is cumulative in nature. It concentrates on scholar results instead than merely the plan of direction where the purpose is to find the user ‘s command and apprehension of information, construct, accomplishment or procedure. Ongoing summational appraisal represents of import tools for supervising the advancement across clip. There are assorted method of summational appraisal such as presentation, licensing, internship, portfolio or clinical. Summational rating is typically quantitative, utilizing numeral tonss or missive classs to measure learner accomplishment. In a sense, it lets the scholar know â€Å" how they did † and â€Å" how good they are † However, there ‘s more to it. By looking at how the scholar ‘s did, it helps to cognize whether the merchandise teaches what it is su pposed to learn and how efficient it is. Here the courseware will be utilizing formative rating method. By utilizing formative rating, the current English courseware functionality can be assessed to happen out whether its working to absolutely or not.. Even if the courseware is working decently, it wo n't carry through its aims if the user ( in this instance pupil ) do n't wish it or holding job in utilizing it. By utilizing formative rating method, user feedback can be recorded and country of betterment can be found. In decision, formative rating method will measure the courseware from two positions ; the courseware functionality and user feedback. Both will greatly assist in the enhancement procedure of the current courseware.MethodologyThrow-Away PrototypingThe methodological analysis chosen for the undertaking would be Throw-Away Prototyping. Dummy paradigm, which is presentational merely will be developed. Thorough analysis will be done before first silent person paradigm is developed to guarantee the paradigm have eno ugh inside informations stand foring existent working system. From at that place, the silent person paradigm will be shown and tested with the user to acquire feedback and identify extra demand. The following paradigm will be developed until it truly visualise existent working system. When it is ready and all issues are resolved, it will be implemented as fully-functional system. Figure 1: Throw-Away PrototypingPlaningThe planning stage is the important 1 in developing the undertaking. First thing to be considered is how the undertaking will be developed. For that, the Gantt Chart for the undertaking is build so that each undertaking milepost during the one twelvemonth of the undertaking can be tracked. Other than that, research is made to happen suited tool to be used for the development of the undertaking. As the undertaking intended to heighten the current courseware, research besides made to place suited trial topic to seek the current courseware.Initial AnalysisDuring this stage, the trial scenario is developed and interview every bit good as questionnaire is build to acquire informations from the mark school. Data is gathered every bit much as possible which besides include slow scholar course of study in school and from there thorough analysis is done. The intent is to place strengths, failings, country of betterment and what to be done for the enhance ment procedure.Prototype BuildingAfter all analysis has been done, the design of the courseware begins. A study is done to acquire the overview of new courseware to be developed. The study will gone through polish to incorporate the content and multimedia elements ( lifes, flow of information, etc ) . The inside informations of the design will be recorded. After all inside informations completed, the development of the paradigm Begin. When the silent person paradigm is complete with all needed characteristics, it will so prove at the school to happen whether it visualise all the issue that should be addressed. If farther polish is required, the silent person paradigm will continuously be build until all demands is complete.ExecutionAfter all demands had been fulfilled and the silent person paradigm is truly visualising the courseware, it will be declared to be complete and existent working courseware will be implemented.Research MethodologiesTo acquire all the information required, two research methodological analysiss will be chosen that are: Interview: An interview is conducted with the several instructor of the school. A trial scenario will be deployed to the pupil utilizing the current courseware along with the interview. This is portion of formative rating that will prove the functionality of the courseware and estimate the user on how they use the courseware. The aim is to place the strengths and failings of the current courseware and happen the country of betterment. Questionnaire: The interview and questionnaire will be done with the several instructor to derive in deepness inside informations of how slow scholars learn and gain all relevant informations which will be mention in developing the new courseware.Result & A ; DiscussionRequirement GatheringInterviewIn the manner of garnering informations required for the sweetening of the English courseware, an interview is conducted with Pn Khadijah, Coordinator of Special Education for Sekolah Kebangsaan Sultan Yusuf who is besides the English instructor for Particular Education Department. Using the current courseware made by Mohd Izzat Helmi B Yahya, a trial scenario is deployed where the end is to place the strengths and the failings of the courseware so that the consequence found can be implemented during the development of new English courseware. The trial scenario will verify the conditions and stairss taken in utilizing the courseware sample to acquire the consequence for farther analysis. Three slow scholar pupils from Sekolah Kebangsaan Sultan Yusuf take portion in the trial scenario. Below are the inside informations of the three pupils: Answering 1 – A 12 old ages old male child and is fixing for his UPSR following twelvemonth. He falls into the class of normal slow scholar. His public presentation in the category is really good. He has the basic accomplishments of utilizing computing machine which make him able to utilize the sample courseware decently. Answering 2 – A 12 old ages old male child. He falls under the class of slow scholar and Syndrom Down. He has the basic accomplishments of utilizing computing machine which make him able to utilize the sample courseware decently. Answering 3 – A 7 old ages old male child. He merely started his school early this twelvemonth. He is the most ambitious pupil because he falls under the ICU slow scholars class. Furthermore, he does n't hold basic accomplishments of utilizing computing machine which make the trial scenario more hard to be performed. The intent of taking these three pupils is to detect how different classs of slow scholars make usage of and respond to the courseware. Basically, all the pupil use the courseware in the same manner depends on their cognition and accomplishments about computing machine. Below is the sum-up of consequence from the trial scenario done with all three pupils. Table 2: Summary of trial Scenario Result No Simulation Date Action and Data Expected Consequence Actual Consequence 1 12 Apr 2010 Establish the courseware interface Courseware interface appear successfully 2 12 Apr 2010 Establishing subject 1 Subject 1 launched successfully 3 12 Apr 2010 Launch ‘Learn ‘ from subject 1 bill of fare Learning faculty appear successfully 4 12 Apr 2010 Checking sound for subject one Audio working successfully 5 12 Apr 2010 Checking synchronism of audio and ocular flows. Audio and ocular is synchronized Flow of audio and ocular is excessively fast 6 12 Apr 2010 Click the button ‘Play Again ‘ for subject 1 acquisition faculty Audio and ocular rematch 7 12 Apr 2010 Launch ‘Exercise ‘ for subject 1 Exercise launched successfully Exercise for Topic 3 about colourss appear 8 12 Apr 2010 Performing exercising about Numberss Exercise done successfully Exercise can non be performed because exercising for colourss appear 9 12 Apr 2010 Click the button ‘Play Again ‘ for subject 1 exercising Exercise can be redo Exercise appear is non for subject 1 10 12 Apr 2010 Establishing subject 2 Subject 2 launched successfully 11 12 Apr 2010 Launch ‘Learn ‘ from subject 2 bill of fare Learning faculty appear successfully 12 12 Apr 2010 Click and hover on the images of the organic structure parts Audio and visuals working to depict the images Audio working merely if pointer is hovered on the image. When image clicked, nil happened 13 12 Apr 2010 Launch ‘Exercise ‘ for subject 2 Exercise launched successfully 14 12 Apr 2010 Drag the words into the several organic structure portion Wordss dragged successfully Because there are some input of the exercising non in the acquisition faculty of subject 2, pupil get confused easy 15 12 Apr 2010 Click the button ‘Play Again ‘ for subject 1 exercising Exercise can be redo 16 12 Apr 2010 Establishing subject 3 Subject 1 launched successfully 17 12 Apr 2010 Launch ‘Learn ‘ from subject 3 bill of fare Learning faculty appear successfully 18 12 Apr 2010 Click and hover on the images of the colour. Audio and visuals working to depict the images Audio appear when the image is clicked. When it is hovered nil happened 19 12 Apr 2010 Launch ‘Exercise ‘ for subject 3 Exercise launched successfully 20 12 Apr 2010 Draging each colour into the several jar. Each colour dragged successfully 21 12 Apr 2010 Tax return to courseware interface from any point of the courseware Courseware interface appear successfully Other that that, Pn Khadijah says that, the instruction course of study and method are different from the mainstream course of study. They use preschool course of study in their acquisition faculties However, if they show good public presentation the instructor will fix them to be in national scrutiny like UPSR. More information about the interview will be explained in the following subdivision below.QuestionnaireIn order to acquire in-depth inside informations of demands of the courseware to be developed, interviews and questionnaire is conducted with the several instructors of the schools. This is of import because non all required informations can be acquired through the trial scenario appraisal. The instructor replying the questionnaire is Pn Khadijah, Coordinator of Special Education for Sekolah Kebangsaan Sultan Yusuf. She has old ages of experience in learning slow scholars particularly in English topic. Pn Khadijah is given the overview of the current English courseware and s o she is given the questionnaire. Below is the consequence of questionnaire answered by the instructor:Datas AnalysisFrom the interview and questionnaire conducted with pupils and instructor of Sekolah Kebangsaan Sultan Yusuf, there are several issue should be addressed about the current English courseware and besides what can be improved for the courseware to be developed: Flow of audio and ocular must be synchronized and non excessively fast because slow scholars could n't catch up if it ‘s excessively fast For unknown ground, exercising for Topic 1 that should cover about Numberss is replaced with exercising from Topic 3 which is about colorss consequences in holding two exercisings about colorss and the absences of exercising about figure. The direction is different than what can be done in the acquisition faculty. For illustration the direction of subject 2 says to snap the image to hear the sound. But alternatively, the sound merely look when pointer is hovered on the image. Nothing happened when it is clicked. Input signal of the exercising should be the same as what it appears in the acquisition faculties to avoid confusion for slow scholars. For illustration, the input of the exercising for subject 2 includes the tummy portion even though it is non taught in the acquisition faculties. Input of larning faculties should n't be more than 5 in a subject because slow scholars could easy bury what they learn if there ‘s excessively many input. Slow scholars in Malaysia are familiar with the Malaysia English. Using U.S English or Britain English in the courseware would confound them. Students particularly childs like larning utilizing computing machine. Slow scholars are non excluded. So the courseware to be developed must be visually attractive.Proposed System ArchitectureFigure 2: Proposed System Architecture The courseware will incorporate usage suited multimedia elements that will back up synergistic acquisition environment either for the usage at school or at place. This will do the acquisition procedure will be more piquant and entertaining. The courseware will dwell of 3 faculties chiefly developed for pupils of Standard 4 to Standard 6. All this faculties will be developed based on larning course of study for slow scholars from Sekolah Kebangsaan Sultan Yusuf. After the application is launched, pupils will be accessing the courseware interface. To guarantee the flexibleness of the acquisition procedure, pupils will be given freedom to take which faculty they want to utilize. After each faculty there will be exercising that will prove the pupil ‘s understand of the current subject. However, pupils are free to take whether they want to make the exercising or non. If they do n't desire to make the exercising, they can continue to following faculty or return to the courseware interface to take other faculties. In turn toing that slow scholars can non get by with excessively much input at a clip, each faculty will dwell of two parts. This will enable the pupils to enrich their acquisition without taking excessively much input at a clip. They have the freedom to take which portion they want to utilize in a faculty. The three faculties are: Numbers, Reading Skills, Body Parts.Faculty 1: NumbersThe first faculty will learn the pupils the fou ndation of acknowledging Numberss. The first portion will learn about how to place ordinal and central Numberss and what ‘s the difference about them. The 2nd portion will learn the pupil how to distinguish between uneven Numberss and even Numberss utilizing the same faculties in current English courseware with sweetening made on it.Faculty 2: Reading SkillsThis faculty is intended to heighten the reading accomplishments of the students.. The activity in the first portion will be focus on duplicate image. Each clip a image from two sets of images will be shown to the pupil and from there the pupils will be asked to fit the image with the image from the set which is non shown. The 2nd portion will concentrate on duplicate missive and words. The construct will be the same like in the first portion.Faculty 3: Body PartssThis faculty will learn the pupil the foundation of placing organic structure parts. The first portion will learn the pupil about chief organic structure parts in general. The 2nd portion will learn the pupil specifically about parts on caput The tools chosen for the development of the undertaking will be Gamemaker 8. The ground to utilize this tool is because it is easy to be used compared to most of other tools. It allow the user to utilize aggregation of freeware images and sound for starting motors like the writer to do a game looking courseware which will embrace on drag-and-drop action utilizing the mouse. This tool will be used along with other tools like Adobe Photoshop CS3 and Macromedia Flash where necessary to do the courseware more synergistic and rich.DecisionCurrent English courseware is utilizing basic construct of uniting sound with ocular in the instruction. Even though, it is still non perfect. There is tonss of country for betterment can be made for the courseware. The writer ‘s undertaking will take the chance to do sweetening on the courseware to maximise its possible. The new courseware to be developed will be more synergistic and rich piece in the same clip turn toing the issue of current cour seware. With aid from assorted parties such as the writer ‘s supervisor, Miss Elaine, instructors of Sekolah Kebangsan Sultan Yusuf every bit good as other people, this undertaking will win.RecognitionThe current courseware mentioned in this paper is developed by Mohd Izzat helmi B Yahya where his work had been base for the writer ‘s English courseware developed for slow scholars. Here the writer besides would wish to thank Ms. Elaine Chen Yoke Yie as the supervisor for the undertaking, Pn Khadijah, Coordinator of Special Education for Sekolah Kebangsaan Sultan Yusuf, and all other parties who had contribute to the undertaking whether straight or indirectly.

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Comparative Media Analysis - Research Paper Example The first article is on the report that was presented by Chymlley Organization. According to the article, they had a perception that the use of pests is not effective given the fact that this is another way that reduces the insects that are in the environment. According to the organization, their view in regard to the pests, they view them with an aesthetic perception and not in a layman’s way. This is the benefits accrued o having diverse types of animals (Mtsiva, 2003). The National Environment Management Authority, (NEMA) of the republic of Singapore however encourages this natural suggestion in controlling pests. According to the organization, they view this as an environmental friendly method owing to the fact that there is no chemical that is discharged on to the ground. The organization considers this method in mind environmental conservation (Khopkar, 2007). The weakness of these two articles is that in the first article, it focuses on the aesthetic benefits of the pests and insects but not mentioning the adverse effects of the pests on productivity. The second article on the other hand focuses on the environmental conservation measures but not mentioning the ecological balance in terms of biodiversity (Bharuch,

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South Africa Apartheid - Essay Example "the doctrine of Marxian socialism" is one "which aims at the establishment of a despotic system of government" and "which aims at bringing about any political, industrial, social, or economic change within the Union by the promotion of disturbance or disorder, by unlawful acts or omissions or by the threat of such acts or omissions or by means which include the promotion of disturbance or disorder, or such acts or omissions or threats."4 Besides outlawing the Communist Party, the Act authorized the outlawing of "any other organization . . . which engaged in activities calculated to further the achievement of any of the objects of Communism."5 The end of 1950s marked a difficult period for the ANC. The South African government stepped up banning and imprisonment to restrict action and protest. In a long, drawn-out trial set up by the government, many Congress leaders were charged with treason. Although the trial ended with acquittals for all who had been charged, it used up many of the resources of the Congress in terms of money and lawyers, and diverted the Congress from its principal mission. Before the massacre, On March 18, Sobukwe called a press conference, announcing that two weeks earlier he had written Lutuli, inviting the ANC to join in the campaign under the banner "service, sacrifice, suffering." 6 On March 20, 1960, Sobukwe announced a national 'anti-pass" campaign to be held on March 21, 1960, in which his followers were to surrender themselves at police stations without passes under the slogan "no bail, no defense, no fines." It was hoped that by insisting on arrest, the defiers would clog the jails, halt industry by their absence as workers, and thus force the government to accede to their demands. The leaders were to be in the... Besides outlawing the Communist Party, the Act authorized the outlawing of "any other organization . . . which engaged in activities calculated to further the achievement of any of the objects of Communism." The end of 1950s marked a difficult period for the ANC. The South African government stepped up banning and imprisonment to restrict action and protest. In a long, drawn-out trial set up by the government, many Congress leaders were charged with treason. Although the trial ended with acquittals for all who had been charged, it used up many of the resources of the Congress in terms of money and lawyers, and diverted the Congress from its principal mission. Before the massacre, On March 18, Sobukwe called a press conference, announcing that two weeks earlier he had written Lutuli, inviting the ANC to join in the campaign under the banner "service, sacrifice, suffering." On March 20, 1960, Sobukwe announced a national ‘anti-pass† campaign to be held on March 21, 1960, in which his followers were to surrender themselves at police stations without passes under the slogan "no bail, no defense, no fines." It was hoped that by insisting on arrest, the defiers would clog the jails, halt industry by their absence as workers, and thus force the government to accede to their demands. The leaders were to be in the forefront, inspiring the masses by their example of sacrifice. The PAC felt that the ANC's leaders had hung back at critical times, when the masses were prepared to forge ahead .

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Criminal justice- diversion - Essay Example This way, the non-standard provision of remedy may have the outcomes sought in flexible manner that potentially assures sensible change in the offender’s well-being through possible adjustments with the other capacities over mere focus on pertinent sanctions. (2) What do you think about the use of diversion in the criminal justice system? In my opinion, diversion if properly administered would attain to the principal goal of leading the involved parties at fault towards psychological renewal or even emotional reorientation for their own sake and the society that is directly impacted by their reformed attitude. Such desired end as characterized by a gradual change of heart in the process truly signifies relief for the system of justice given the number of other major cases or concerns in need of serious attention, however, some questions of equivalent weight inevitably tag along when this approach is brought to realistic as well as extensive implementation. A critique I think m ight readily necessitate raising certain levels of doubt regarding whether diversion means would be effective at length and to what degree and how conducive the settings are in facilitating the treatment of each offender. Moreover, it is further logical to ask how the financial investment would figure in covering the procedures necessary and if properly trained workers come in sufficient quantity and proportion with the erring subjects since handling the latter is such a sensitive task that requires inherent humanitarian values besides patience, time, thorough education, and specialized skills. (3) List 3 reasons with an explanation for the use of diversion, and discuss why it would be beneficial to the criminal justice system. In the U.S., one ground being examined for utilizing diversion is the quest for a solution on easing burdened courts off overcrowded detentions. This is meant to be sustained by case management whereby files of a detainee are technically organized to determin e essential needs on health, social, and other relevant aspects of development by which the person may learn to outgrow crime-prone attributes. Consequently, justice framework would be more systematized and versatile in dealing with a range of conflicts pertaining to criminal act. Another good cause for advocating diversion is that most youth in offense acquire the opportunity the opportunity of a 24-hour monitoring within aftercare duration that allows them exposure to a variety of educational and recreational activities that improve their stages at cure. Such was the case in the Key Program Inc. primarily held on Boston, MA in which a group of juvenile delinquents under diversionary supervision were taken to Harvard University and the visit to different parts of the campus paid off through interaction with the university students who conducted tutorial sessions in return while participation to motivational programs were also encouraged. With this fashion, justice administration ga ins direction in pursuit of enhanced objective at classifying how should the status for each culpable person settle according to the progress assessed in that event. Criminal justice system may also derive the advantage of minimizing expenditure on technologically advanced facilities for securing offenders since the use of diversion may possibly become a better substitute for the conventional means of

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Unit 2 HA499 Capstone Project Research On A Real-Life Healthcare Organization - Essay Example population, as of February 15, 2012, 25% of this actually belong to the so-called baby boom generation, which has already reached retirement (Rogers, 2012). In 2009, the number of American individuals aged 65 and above was almost 40 million, and this statistics is projected to become 72.1 million in 2030 based on the numbers released by the U.S. Census Bureau (Rogers, 2012). With the increasing number of the aging population, the medical wing of the U.S. faces a great challenge of addressing this proliferating number, which needs to be prioritized in terms of therapies, medicines, and other forms of medical support. In improving access to health care, there are lots of factor to be considered, such as addressing contextual and individual determinants (Andersen et al., 2011). The contextual determinant refers to the â€Å"circumstances† and â€Å"environment† in which healthcare is accessible, such as the availability of healthcare organizations including medical research facilities (Andersen et al., 2011, p. 4). On another perspective, writing theoretical research concerning the health care industry only generates solutions to problems that may or may not be applied in actuality. For instance, a research published by Anderson, Crabtree, Steele, and McDaniel, Jr. (2005) posed a question regarding the practicality of suggested solutions generated by hundreds of researches to the medical practice. Simply saying, the results earned out from prolific researchers remain abstract and a theory all throughout because physicians, nurses, and other health care workers failed to institute and implement those suggestions (Anderson et al., 2005). A lot of researches characterized the health care industry as a â€Å"mechanistic† organization (Anderson et al., 2005, p. 670). This means that the industry is a simple structure and can be predicted using a relational approach that a particular action is predicted to cause this effect (Miller, 1993 as cited in Anderson

A Review on Reading Theories and Its Implication to the Teaching of Reading Essay Example for Free

A Review on Reading Theories and Its Implication to the Teaching of Reading Essay Abstract Opini dan masukan untuk peningkatan pengajaran membaca kepada pembelajar bahasa Inggris sebagai bahasa asing, baik yang didasarkan pada hasil penelitian maupun pengalaman, tersedia sangat banyak dalam kepustakaan pengajaran bahasa. Tulisan ini merupakan sebuah rangkuman atas berbagai teori, temuan dan pendapat tentang pengajaran membaca. Pemahaman terhadap topik-topik tersebut, terutama tentang teori top-down, bottom-up, dan meta-cognitive, diharapkan dapat dijadikan landasan untuk meningkatkan teknik pengajaran membaca. Dengan demikian, kemahiran membaca para pembelajar bahasa Inggris sebagai bahasa asing dapat ditingkatkan secara signifikan. Kata Kunci: top-down, bottom-up, schemata, meta-cognitive, pre-reading, during-reading, after-reading Introduction Among the four language skills, reading is possibly the most extensively and intensively studied by experts in the field of language teaching. The results of the researches conducted for many decades on nature of reading—how people learn to process textual information—have contributed contrasting theories about what works best in the teaching of reading. As a result, language educators can choose among a wide variety of teaching methods and techniques for students learning to read in their second language (SL) or foreign language (FL). For students who are learning a SL/FL reading is the most crucial skill to master due to several reasons. First, students can usually perform at a higher level in reading than in any other skills. They can quite accurately understand written materials that they could not discuss orally or in writing with equivalent accuracy or thoroughness. Such condition will undoubtedly enhance their motivation to learn. Second, reading necessitates very minimum requirements. Different from speaking which requires opportunities to interact with sparring partner, or from writing which needs a lot of guidance and time to practice, reading necessitates only a text and motivation. Third, reading is a service skill. After learning how to read effectively, students will be able to learn effectively by reading. Realizing how crucial reading is for our students, we can see the great importance of developing their reading ability. To achieve it, we should improve our reading lessons by implementing the best method and techniques provided by theories. This article aims to describe principal theories of reading and examine some tips and guidelines for implementing a theory of reading which will help us develop our learners abilities. Theories of Reading So far, there are three main theories which explain the nature of learning to read. First, the traditional theory, or bottom up processing, which focused on the printed form of a text. (2) the cognitive view, or top-down processing enhanced the role of background knowledge in addition to what appeared on the printed page. Third, the metacognitive view, which is based on the control and manipulation that a reader can have on the act of comprehending a text, and thus, emphasizes the involvement of the reader’s thinking about what he is doing while reading. 1. The traditional bottom-up view. The traditional bottom-up approach to reading was influenced by behaviorist psychology of the 1950s, which claimed learning was based upon â€Å"habit formation, brought about by the repeated association of a stimulus with a response† and language learning was characterized as a â€Å"response system that humans acquire through automatic conditioning processes,† where â€Å"some patterns of language are reinforced (rewarded) and others are not,† and â€Å"only those patterns reinforced by the community of language users will persist† (Omaggio 1993, 45-46). Behaviorism became the basis of the audio-lingual method, which sought to form second language â€Å"habits† through drilling, repetition, and error correction. Today, the main method associated with the bottom-up approach to reading is known as phonics, which requires the learner to match letters with sounds in a defined sequence. According to this view, reading is a linear process by which readers decode a text word by word, linking the words into phrases and then sentences (Gray and Rogers, cited in Kucer 1987). According to Samuels and Kamil (1988: 25),  the emphasis on behaviorism treated reading as a word-recognition response to the stimuli of the printed words, where â€Å"little attempt was made to explain what went on within the recesses of the mind that allowed the human to make sense of the printed page†. In other words, textual comprehension involves adding the meanings of words to get the meanings of clauses (Anderson 1994). These lower level skills are connected to the visual stimulus, or print, and are consequently concerned with recognizing and recalling. Like the audio-lingual teaching method, phonics emphasizes on repetition and on drills using the sounds that make up words. Information is received and processed beginning with the smallest sound units, and proceeded to letter blends, words, phrases, and sentences. Thus, novice readers acquire a set of hierarchically ordered sub-skills that sequentially build toward comprehension ability. Having mastered these skills, readers are viewed as experts who comprehend what they read. The bottom-up model describes information flow as a series of stages that transforms the input and passes it to the next stage without any feedback or possibility of later stages of the process influencing earlier stages (Stanovich, 1980). In other words, language is viewed as a code and the reader’s main task is to identify graphemes and convert them into phonemes. Consequently, readers are regarded as passive recipients of information in the text. Meaning resides in the text and the reader has to reproduce it. The ESL and EFL textbooks influenced by this perspective include exercises that focus on literal comprehension and give little or no importance to the reader’s knowledge or experience with the subject matter, and the only interaction is with the basic building blocks of sounds and words. Most activities are based on recognition and recall of lexical and grammatical forms with an emphasis on the perceptual and decoding dimension. This model of reading has almost always been under attack as being insufficient and defective for the main reason that it relies on the formal features of the language, mainly words and structure. Although it is possible to accept this rejection for the fact that there is over-reliance on structure in this view, it must be confessed that knowledge of linguistic features is also necessary for comprehension to take place. To counteract over-reliance on form in the traditional view of reading, the cognitive view was introduced. 2. The Cognitive View (top-down processing) In the 1960s a paradigm shift occurred in the cognitive sciences. Behaviorism became somewhat discredited as the new cognitive theory represented the mind’s innate capacity for learning, which gave new explanatory power to how humans acquired their first language; this also had a tremendous impact on the field of ESL/EFL as psycholinguists explained â€Å"how such internal representations of the foreign language develop within the learner’s mind† (Omaggio, 1993: 57). Ausubel (cited in Omaggio, 1993: 58), made an important distinction between meaningful learning and rote learning. An example of rote learning is simply memorizing lists of isolated words or rules in a new language, where the information becomes temporary and subject to loss. Meaningful learning, on the other hand, occurs when new information is presented in a relevant context and is related to what the learner already knows, so that it can be easily integrated into one’s existing cognitive structure. A learning that is not meaningful will not become permanent. This emphasis on meaning eventually informed the top-down approach to L2 learning, and in the 1960s and 1970s there was an explosion of teaching methods and activities that strongly considered the experience and knowledge of the learner. These new cognitive and top-down processing approaches revolutionized the conception of the way students learn to read (Smith, 1994). In this view, reading is not just extracting meaning from a text but a process of connecting information in the text with the knowledge the reader brings to the act of reading. In this sense, reading is a dialogue between the reader and the text which involves an active cognitive process in which the reader’s background knowledge plays a key role in the creation of meaning (Tierney and Pearson, 1994). Reading is not a passive mechanical activity but purposeful and rational, dependent on the prior knowledge and expectations of the reader. It is not merely a matter of decoding print to sound but also a matter of making sense of written language (Smith, 1994: 2). In short, reading is a psycholinguistic guessing game, a process in which readers sample the text, make hypotheses, confirm or reject them, make new hypotheses, and so forth. Schema Theory Another theory closely related to top-down processing called schema theory also had a major impact on reading instruction. It describes in detail how  the background knowledge of the learner interacts with the reading task and illustrates how a student’s knowledge and previous experience with the world is crucial to deciphering a text. The ability to use this schemata, or background knowledge, plays a fundamental role in one’s trial to comprehend a text. Schema theory is based on the notion that past experiences lead to the creation of mental frameworks that help a reader make sense of new experiences. Smith (1994: 14) calls schemes the â€Å"extensive representations of more general patterns or regularities that occur in our experience†. For instance one’s generic scheme of an airplane will allow him to make sense of airplane he has not previously flied with. This means that past experiences will be related to new experiences, which may include the knowledge of â€Å"objects, situations, and events as well as knowledge of procedures for retrieving, organizing and interpreting information† (Kucer, 1987: 31). Anderson (1994: 469) presents research showing that recall of information in a text is affected by the reader’s schemata and explains that â€Å"a reader comprehends a message when he is able to bring to mind a schema that gives account of the objects and events described in the message†. Comprehension is the process of â€Å"activating or constructing a schema that provides a coherent explanation of objects and events mentioned in a discourse† (Anderson, 1994: 473). For Anderson and Pearson (1988: 38), comprehension is the interaction between old and new information. They emphasize: â€Å"To say that one has comprehended a text is to say that she has found a mental ‘home’ for the information in the text, or else that she has modified an existing mental home in order to accommodate that new information†. Therefore, a learner’s schemata will restructure itself to accommodate new information as that information is added to the system (Omaggio, 1993). Content and formal schemata. Schema theorists differentiate formal schemata (knowledge about the structure of a text) from content schemata (knowledge about the subject matter of a text), and a reader’s prior knowledge of both schemata enables him to predict events and meaning as well as to infer meaning from a wider context. Formal schemata refers to the way that texts differ from one another; for example, a reading text could be a fictional work, a letter to the editor, or a scientific essay, and each genre will have a different structural organization. Knowledge of these genre structures can aid reading comprehension, as it gives readers a basis for predicting what a text will be like (Smith 1994). For example, if a reader knows that the typical format of a research article consists of sections subtitled Introduction, Theoretical Basis, Methods, Results, Discussion, and Conclusion, that knowledge will facilitate their interaction with the article and boost comprehension. On the other hand, if he is not familiar with this formal schema, teaching it to him could lead to improved reading ability with lasting and beneficial effects. Content schemata refers to the message of the text. One’s familiarity with the content will make more productive and efficient. As Anderson (1994: 469) explains, â€Å"a reader comprehends a message when he is able to bring to mind a schema that gives account of the objects and events described in the message†. Activating and building schemata Since the reader plays a fundamental role in the construction of meaning, his age, gender, experience, and culture are important considerations for teachers who want to select readings that will motivate their students. Anderson (1994) notes that when readers cannot locate a schema that fits a text, they may find it incomprehensible. In some cases readers may not have a schema that is significant to the text, or they may need help to activate the pertinent schema to be able to comprehend the text. In such cases it may not be possible for the reader to understand the text, and the teacher must be ready to engage in â€Å"building new background knowledge as well as activating existing background knowledge† (Carrell, 1988: 248). In parallel with this, Bransford (1994) points out that difficulties in comprehension may be caused by the lack of background knowledge presumed by the text, and he sees the responsibility of instructors as being twofold: to activate preexisting schemata and to help students to integrate isolated â€Å"parcels† of knowledge into a schema or to build a new one. If the texts to be read contain a cultural context that is different from the student’s, the issues of formal and content schemata become even more important. McDonough (1995), explains that, to a higher extent, this is the reason why ESL and EFL students find it difficult to read in a second language with texts that contain cultural assumptions of the target culture. They may lack the culture-specific background knowledge necessary to process the text in a top-down manner. His reports on several studies demonstrate how people outside a given culture may misunderstand events with unfamiliar cultural connotations. (Students from different cultural backgrounds taking standardized tests which assume common schemata for will also face the same problem.) Applying schema theory to L2 reading Based on the aforementioned ideas, it is obvious that in order to teach reading effectively, the teacher’s role to activate and build schemata is paramount. To achieve it, he should in advance select texts that are relevant to the students’ needs, preferences, individual differences, and cultures in order to provide meaningful texts so the students understand the message, which entails activating existing schemata and helping build new schemata. Then, after selecting the text, he needs to do the following three stages of activities to activate and build the students’ schemata. (1) Pre-reading activities, in which the teacher have students think, write, and discuss everything they know about the topic, employing techniques such as prediction, semantic mapping, and reconciled reading. The objective is to make sure that students have the relevant schema for understanding the text. (2) During-reading activities, in which the teacher guide and monitor the interaction between the reader and the text. One important skill teachers can impart at this stage is note-taking, which allows students to compile new vocabulary and important information and details, and to summarize information and record their reactions and opinions. (3)Post-reading activities which facilitate the chance to evaluate students’ adequacy of interpretation, while bearing in mind that accuracy is relative and that â€Å"readership† must be respected as long as the writer’s intentions are addressed (Tierney and Pearson, 1994). Post-reading activities focus on a wide range of questions that allow for different interpretations. While schema activation and building can occur in all three stages, the pre-reading stage deserves special attention since it is here, during the students’ initial contact with the text, where their schemata will be activated. Pre-reading activities Pre-reading activities is aimed to activate existing schemata, build new schemata, and provide information to the teacher about what the students know. In their report on the positive effect various pre-reading activities had on reading comprehension, Chen and Graves (1995, 664), define them as â€Å"devices for bridging the gap between the text’s content and the reader’s schemata†. Various activities and materials can help the teacher introduce key vocabulary and reinforce concept association to activate both formal and content schemata. Formal schemata will be activated by employing devices such as advance organizers and overviews to draw attention to the structure of a text. The content schemata will be activated by using various pre-reading activities to help learners brainstorm and predict how the information fits in with their previous knowledge. One of the most important pre-reading activities proposed by schematic theorists is prediction. According to Goodman (1988: 16), prediction is important because â€Å"the brain is always anticipating and predicting as it seeks order and significance in sensory inputs†. Smith (1994, 19–20) defines prediction as â€Å"the prior elimination of unlikely alternatives†. According to him, predictions are questions the readers ask the world and comprehension is receiving the answers. He emphasizes that it is prediction that makes skilled readers effective when reading texts that contain familiar subject matter. â€Å"Prediction brings potential meaning to texts, reducing ambiguity and eliminating in advance irrelevant alternatives. Thus, we are able to generate comprehensible experience from inert pages of print† (Smith 1994, 18). Another pre-reading activity is previewing, where students look at titles, headings, and pictures, and read the first few paragraphs and the last paragraph; these activities can then help students understand what the text is about by activating their formal and content schemata and making them familiar with the topic before they begin reading in earnest. Semantic mapping is another pre-reading activity that Carrell, Pharis, and Liberto (1989: 651) describe as a useful way to pre-teach vocabulary and to â€Å"provide the teacher with an assessment of the students’ prior knowledge or schema availability on the topic†. This activity asks students to brainstorm about the reading topic as the information is displayed on a graphic â€Å"map. † As students make associations, the map becomes a thorough summary of the concepts and vocabulary that they will encounter in the reading. It can also help build schemata and vocabulary that students do not yet possess. Again, it is important to know something about the students so the selected texts contain the type of material that is likely to be familiar and interesting to them. Reutzel (1985) proposes another type of pre-reading activity called reconciled reading lesson, which reverses the sequence presented by many textbooks where the text is followed by questions. Instead, the teacher develops pre-reading questions from the questions that appear at the end of the reading. Smith (1994) criticizes comprehension exercises presented at the end of a reading because they are like memory tests. He argues that using prior knowledge efficiently contributes to fluent readers, and he believes that there is a reciprocal relationship between visual and non-visual (prior knowledge) information; the more the readers have of the latter, the less they need of the former. Although not all the post-reading questions can be easily turned into pre-reading ones, this strategy can be invaluable to activate schemata. 3. The metacognitive view According to Block (1992), there is now no more debate on whether reading is a bottom-up, language-based process or a top-down, knowledge-based process. It is also no more problematic to accept the influence of background knowledge on readers. Research has gone even further to define the control executed by readers on their trial to understand a text. This control is what Block has referred to as meta-cognition. In the context of reading, meta-cognition involves thinking about what one is doing while reading. Strategic readers do not only sample the text, make hypotheses, confirm or reject them, and make new hypotheses while reading. They also involve many activities along the process of reading, whose stages can be divided into three, i.e. before reading, while reading, and after reading. The activities the readers involve before reading are to identify the purpose of the reading, identify the form or type of the text. In the second stage (while reading), they think about the general character and features of the form or type of the text—such as trying to locate a topic sentence and follow supporting details toward a conclusion, project the authors purpose for writing the text, choose, scan, or read in detail, make continuous  predictions about what will occur next based on information obtained earlier, prior knowledge, and conclusions obtained within the previous stages. Finally, in the last stage, they attempt to form a summary, conclude, or make inference of what was read. Guidelines for Effective Teaching of Reading After discussing the ideas and concepts presented in the three reading theories, we are now on the position of arranging tips and guidelines for implementing a theory of reading which will help to develop our learners abilities. These tips are arranged in three sections which are parallel with the three consecutive reading stages: before reading, during reading, and after reading. Pre-Reading Tips Before the actual act of reading a text begins, some points should be regarded in order to make the process of reading more comprehensible. First, teachers need to make sure that the texts to read contain words and grammatical structures familiar to the learners. If the texts contain unfamiliar vocabulary, teachers can introduce key vocabulary in pre-reading activities that focus on language awareness, such as finding synonyms, antonyms, derivatives, or associated words. Second, teachers should make sure that the topics of texts chosen are in accordance with the age range, interests, sex, and background culture of the students for whom they are intended. If they are not, it is necessary to provide the necessary background information to the reader to facilitate comprehension. This activity could be carried out by letting the class members brainstorm ideas about the meaning of a title or an illustration and discuss what they know. The followings are some activities teacher can use during the pre-reading stage. These activities will not take a very long time to carry out. However, they are very effective in overcoming the common urge to start reading a text closely right away from the beginning. 1. Teacher-directed pre-reading, in which some key vocabulary, ideas in the text, and the type of the text are explained. In this approach the teacher directly explains the information the students will need, including key concepts, important vocabulary, and appropriate conceptual framework. The text types are also necessary to introduce because texts may take on different forms and hold certain pieces of information in different places. The students’ familiarity with the types of the text they are reading will develop their understanding of the layout of the material. Such familiarity will, in turn, enable them to focus more deeply on the parts that are more densely compacted with information. Even paying attention to the year of publication of a text, if applicable, may aid the reader in presuppositions about the text as can glancing at the name of the author. 2. Interactive activities, in which the teacher leads a discussion in which he/she draws out the information students already have and interjects additional information deemed necessary to an understanding of the text to be read. Moreover, the teacher can make explicit links between prior knowledge and important information in the text. 3. Reflective activities, in which students are guided to make themselves aware of the purpose and goal for reading a certain piece of written material. At the beginning stages this can be done by the teacher, but as the reader becomes more mature this strategy can be left to the readers. For instance, the students may be guided to ask themselves, Why am I reading this text? What do I want to do or know after finished reading this? Being aware of their purpose and goal to read, later—in during reading activities—they can determine what skill(s) to employ: skimming, scanning, reading for details, or critical reading. During-reading tips The activities carried out in during-reading stage consist of taking notes, reacting, predicting, selecting significant information, questioning the writer’s position, evaluating, and placing a text within one’s own experience. These processes may be the most complex to develop in a classroom setting, the reason being that in English reading classes most attention is often paid to dictionaries, the text, and the teacher. The followings are tips that encourage active reading. Practicing them will help the students be active readers. 1. Making predictions: The students should be taught to be on the watch to predict what is going to happen next in the text to be able to integrate and combine what has come with what is to come. 2. Making selections: Readers who are more proficient read selectively, continually making decisions about their reading. 3. Integrating prior knowledge: The schemata that have been activated in the pre-reading section should be called upon to facilitate comprehension. 4. Skipping insignificant parts: A good reader will concentrate on significant pieces of information while skipping insignificant pieces. 5. Re-reading: Students should be encouraged to become sensitive to the effect of reading on their comprehension. 6. Making use of context or guessing: Students should not be encouraged to define and understand every single unknown word in a text. Instead they should learn to make use of context to guess the meaning of unknown words. 7. Breaking words into their component parts: To keep the process of comprehension ongoing, efficient readers analyze unfamiliar words by break them into their affixes or bases. These parts can help them guess the meaning of a word. 8. Reading in chunks: To ensure reading speed, students should get used to reading groups of words together. This act will also enhance comprehension by focusing on groups of meaning-conveying symbols simultaneously. 9. Pausing: Good readers will pause at certain places while reading a text to absorb and internalize the material being read and sort out information. 10. Paraphrasing: While reading texts, it may be necessary to paraphrase and interpret texts sub-vocally in order to verify what was comprehended. 11. Monitoring: Good readers monitor their understanding to evaluate whether the text, or the reading of it, is meeting their goals. After-reading tips Post-reading activities basically depend on the purpose of reading and the type of information extracted from the text. Barnett (1988) states that post-reading exercises first check students comprehension and then lead students to a deeper analysis of the text. In the real world the purpose of reading is not to memorize an authors point of view or to summarize text content, but rather to see into another mind, or to engage new information with what one already knows. Group discussion will help students focus on information they did not comprehend, or did comprehend correctly. Accordingly, attention will be focused on processes that lead to comprehension or miscomprehension. Generally speaking, post-reading can take the form of these various activities: (1) discussing the text: written/oral, (2) summarizing: written/oral, (3) making questions: written/oral, (3) answering questions: written/oral, (4) filling in forms and charts (5) writing reading logs (6) completing a text, (7) listening to or reading other related materials, and (7) role-playing. Conclusion Researches, opinions, and suggestions regarding the teaching of the reading exist in extensive amount, and this summary of reading theories is by no means exhaustive. However, with a basic understanding of the theoretical basis of top-down and bottom-up processing, teachers can better take advantage of the most useful methodologies associated with the different approaches. What is important to bear in mind is that relying too much on either top-down or bottom-up processing may cause problems for beginning ESL/EFL readers; therefore, to develop reading abilities, both approaches should be considered, as the meta-cognitive approach suggests. Considering my own experience in teaching reading to Indonesian students, I have found that the students who managed to read English text effectively are those who approach texts in a painful, slow, and frustrating word-by-word manner. By improving their decoding skills, they are freed to concentrate on global meanings. So, both the psycho and the linguistic† aspects must be emphasized in EFL reading classes. Bibliography Barnett, M. A. 1988. â€Å"Teaching Reading in a Foreign Language. † ERIC Digest. Anderson, R. 1994. â€Å"Role of the reader’s schema in comprehension, learning, and memory. † In Ruddell, Ruddell, and Singer 1994, 469–82. Anderson, R. , and P. D. 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