**3.1 Reading**

*Visual Impairment and Blindness - What We Know and What We Have to Know*

and limitations of the study.

**2. Problem statement**

ated to investigate this reading phenomenon.

eye-movement metrics during such reading.

language, however, could not credibly be categorised using these existing systems, exposing a gap in the literature addressed in this article. This chapter will proceed by giving background on the problem under investigation as well as related studies. This will be followed by a brief discussion on the methodology and an in-depth discussion of the data analysis. The paper will conclude by summarising the significance

The poorest 80% of South African learners possess, on average, reading skills which rank among the worst in the world [8]. For example, 60% of South African grade 6 learners are unable to read with comprehension in any language [9]. Pretorius and Spaull [10] identify inability to decode text accurately as the primary problem, with barking at print being an additional problem among many of those relatively stronger learners who are at least able to undergo text-decoding. Barking at print refers to engaging in decoding with little to no comprehension of what the text means on a global level, although the meaning of individual words or even groups of words may be comprehended [11]. Such a reading style is consistent with the engagement in superficial textual strategies that strongly characterises poor South African learners' multiple-choice answering patterns [12], for example choosing options containing terms common to or with superficial similarity to the question or to terms in an associated comprehension passage. Barking at print is not unique to South African learners, with the term having been coined by Samuels [13] in the United States, and reports on barking at print even including presence among relatively high achieving learners in what could be considered good schools in affluent areas (see, e.g. [14]). However, given the high prevalence of barking at print among poor South African learners, whom we have easy access to due to our engagement in various intervention programmes for such learners, we are well situ-

Despite the firm establishment of barking at print in education literature, the nearest correspondence in eye-tracking literature is mindless reading, researched by observing participants reading nonsense-text, i.e. text having no meaning in any language [15], as well as reading during mind-wandering (e.g. [5]). Both mindless reading of nonsense text and reading during mind-wandering differ in a number of ways from non-mind-wandering barking at print written in a language which the reader does understand, at least to some extent. These differences include motivation, perceived purpose and prior exposure and expectations to perform each of these activities. Therefore, the findings of mindless reading and mind-wandering research may not correspond to barking at print, and if this is found to be the case, then obviously the usefulness of the existing literature, at least for mindless reading, to applications such as intelligent learning technologies, is limited and a new and more useful set of metrics associated with decoding without comprehension is needed. Further, the eye-tracking metric guidelines resulting from research related to mindless reading and mind-wandering are restricted to gaze length, so that even should barking at print prove to be similar to mindless reading or mind-wandering, there is a gap in the literature about other

In this study the eye-movement characteristics of 67 grade 8 and 9 South African learners from financially and educationally impoverished backgrounds were examined during silent reading of science text in English, their second language. Based on their comprehension scores, these participants are divided into three groups: barkers (n = 23), poor readers (n = 25) and moderate readers (n = 19). Statistical

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If one is able to read, it means one can look at a word and process its meaning [16]. Rauding, derived from reading and auding, means the ability of a person to understand most of the thoughts contained within the material they are reading [16]. During rauding the eyes move across the lines of words allowing consecutive words to be perceived without needing to concentrate on where the eyes will move next. There are 5 basic reading processes, referred to as gears 1–5, where rauding or gear 3 is the process used most often. Readers can control the rate of input [17] thus the different gears are characterised by different reading speeds, averaging from 138 wpm to 600+ wpm for college students [16]. The goal of the reader determines the gear they use to process the material [16] which changes the reading behaviour [17]. A person's rauding rate is the fastest speed at which they able to successfully process relatively easily text [16]. The average rauding rate for grade 8 and 9 learners is 205 and 219 wpm respectively [16].

While fluency does not guarantee comprehension, it is essential to be able to comprehend [18]. The four levels of reading which are still applicable today were introduced in 1946 and are as follows: (1) the independent level, (2) the instructional level, (3) the frustration level and (4) the probable capacity level [19]. The fourth level is based on material which is read to a student but the first three are based on the decoding and comprehending ability of the student when reading a text [19], and are therefore focussed on in this article. The word-reading accuracy and comprehension of the first 3 levels are given in **Table 1**. Readers who are able to read at the independent and instructional levels are likely to be able to self-direct their learning through reading, although those at the instructional level would do so sub-optimally unless provided with explicit help. Readers operating at the frustration level are unlikely to engage in voluntary reading activity, given the large amount of effort required.
