Purpose: This study aims to investigate the impact of the lexico-phonological diglossic distance of story reading (a scaffolded storybook intervention, informed by Vygotsky’s theory of scaffolding and fading) on Arabic-speaking preschool children’s comprehension and receptive and productive vocabulary.
Method: The participants were 139 Israeli-Palestinian kindergartners: 71 composed an intervention group and 68 composed a comparison group. The intervention group heard stories gradually from the SpA, identical, cognate, and unique word forms, whereas the comparison group heard traditional stories unrelated to their lexico-phonological distances. Story 1 was read in unique spoken Arabic (SpA) form, stories 2 and 3 were read in 58 and 45% identical and cognate word forms, respectively, and story 4 was read in 70% unique word forms.
Results: The results clearly showed that children’s vocabulary and story understanding was significantly higher after the intervention, especially noticeable in stories that contained a higher proportion of Standard Arabic (StA). Interestingly, the stories told entirely in Spoken Arabic (SpA) were the most effective, yielding the highest scores in both comprehension and vocabulary. Stories that mixed different word forms also performed well, though not as strongly as the SpA stories, while those solely in StA were the least effective.
Conclusion: The findings of the study suggest that scaffolded storybook intervention may enhance the receptive vocabulary and comprehension skills of children. This study shows that, in the context of diglossia, stories should be read to children systematically and gradually according to the lexical-phonological distance of words in the stories.
Just like in many countries around the world, there is a multicultural society in Northern Cyprus. As migrations to the island continue to increase, the phenomenon of multiculturalism has begun to be discussed in the education system. This research was conducted with the aim of determining the attitudes and views of primary school teachers in Northern Cyprus towards multicultural education. Mixed methods strategy was used in this research. In the research, the concurrent triangulation strategy from mixed methods strategies was used. Data collection tools the Teacher Multicultural Education Attitude Scale and developed interview form were used. In the quantitative part of the research, the Teacher Multiculturalism Attitude Scale was applied to 111 randomly selected teachers. According to the survey results, no significant difference was detected depending on the variables of gender, nationality, professional seniority, branch, graduation degree and graduated school. However, significant differences were identified in the multiculturalism scores age and based on the region where the teachers were employed. In the qualitative part of the research, interviews were conducted with 12 participant teachers. According to the qualitative findings, teachers perceived multiculturalism as diversity in terms of nationality, ethnic background, language, and religion. Further, teachers indicated that education in Northern Cyprus does not cater to a multicultural structure, leading to various problems experienced by students and parents, primarily related to communication. The teachers attributed this situation to the unpreparedness of the Ministry of Education (MEB) and the reluctance to change education policies due to an exclusive society. Subsequently, teachers expressed that they did not consider themselves competent in multicultural education and expressed a willingness to participate in in-service training programs if provided.
The educational context in the Peruvian Amazon is moderately complex because of the interaction between students from 23 indigenous peoples, with a preponderance of Shipibo-Conibo, Ashaninka, Awajun, Shawi, Yanesha, Wampis, Quechua, and Cacataibo, among the most representative and in that order, with culturally different knowledge and worldviews. Thus, the university becomes a center of tolerance, recognizing and accepting the identity of others and coexisting with mestizo students from urban areas. This study aimed to determine the sociocultural and educational factors influencing academic performance in a virtual teaching context for intercultural university education in the Peruvian Amazon. A neural network model was applied to a sample of 162 students from a population of 1,835 students at an intercultural university in the Peruvian Amazon. Furthermore, 54% of the students are of mestizo origin, and 46% belong to the indigenous population. It was concluded that economic dependence on the family, failing midterm exams, feeling isolated and alone, and conflicts with a family member influence academic performance.