Effects Of Illustration Types And Presenting Locations On Primary School Students’ Cognitive Load And Reading Performance In English Reading Materials

Reading,as an important approach to obtain knowledge and information,is one of the most essential components in all levels of English examinations,which has been greatly valued by teachers and students.Reading material is the fundamental basis for reading instruction.Thus,the exploration of reading instruction is inseparable from the study of reading materials.It is widely acknowledged that using proper illustrations to help readers improve their comprehension of the article content is a common method.The present study focuses on investigating the effects of illustrations on Primary School students’ Cognitive Load and reading performance from two aspects:the illustration types and the presenting locations of illustration and text.The following research questions are addressed in this thesis:1)What are the effects of different illustration types on Primary School students’Cognitive Load and reading performance in English reading materials?(1)What are the effects of Decorative Illustration on Primary School students’ Cognitive Load and reading performance in English reading materials?(2)What are the effects of Descriptive Illustration on Primary School students’ Cognitive Load and reading performance in English reading materials?(3)What are the effects of Interpretative Illustration on Primary School students’Cognitive Load and reading performance in English reading materials?2)What are the effects of different presenting locations of an illustration in English reading materials on Primary School students’ Cognitive Load and reading performance?(1)What are the effects of the presenting location of Text Following Illustration on Primary School students’ Cognitive Load and reading performance in English reading materials?(2)What are the effects of the presenting location of Illustration Following Text on Primary School students’ Cognitive Load and reading performance in English reading materials?(3)What are the effects of the presenting location of Illustration-Text Comparison on Primary School students’ Cognitive Load and reading performance in English reading materials?The quantitative method is mainly adopted in this study,which involves two English reading tests and the cognitive load self-rating scale adapted from Paas’ scale with nine degrees.Its whole internal reliability reaches.866.Two experiments are designed for sixty Primary School students to respectively explore the effects of different illustration types and presenting locations on the students’ Cognitive Load and reading performance.In the experiment for illustration types,sixty students are randomly divided into three groups with twenty students in each group to complete two tasks.The first task is an English reading test with three different types of illustrations which are Decorative Illustration,Descriptive Illustration and Interpretative Illustration.The second task is a cognitive load self-rating scale.In the experiment for different presenting locations of illustrations,the reading test materials are replaced by another English article matched with the same type of illustrations.The illustrations are separately presented in three different locations which are Text Following Illustration,Illustration Following Text and Illustration-text Comparison.The remaining experimental steps are the same as the experiment for illustration types.All the testing papers are validly collected after the participants finish the tests as required.Last,detailed quantitive analyses are conducted in accordance to the results of data processing by means of SPSS 18.0(Statistical Package for Social Science 18.0).Detailed analyses of quantitive research yield the following findings:First,the type of Interpretative Illustration is more effective than the types of Decorative Illustration and Descriptive Illustration for Primary School students to read English articles.The Interpretative Illustration group reports the lowest scores in Cognitive Load and the highest scores in reading performance,which are followed by the Descriptive Illustration group.The Decorative Illustration group reports the highest scores in Cognitive Load and the lowest scores in reading performance.The differences among the three groups are significant(p=.000).In summary,the type of Interpretative Illustration can help decrease Primary School students’ Cognitive Load when reading English articles and to a certain degree promote their reading performance.Second,the presenting location of Illustration-text Comparison is more effective than the presenting locations of Text Following Illustration and Illustration Following Text for Primary School students to read English articles.The Illustration-text Comparison group reports the lowest scores in Cognitive Load and the highest scores in reading performance,which are followed by the Illustration Following Text group.The Text Following Illustration group reports the highest scores in Cognitive Load and the lowest scores in reading performance.The differences among the three groups are significant(p=.000).In brief,the presenting location of Illustration-text Comparison can positively reduce Primary School students’Cognitive Load when reading English articles and enhance their reading abilities and performance.In light of the findings,this thesis makes some pedagogical implications for the arrangement of illustrations and texts in English textbooks and teachers to design teaching materials.Firstly,the type of Interpretative Illustration should be configured as many as possible.The number of Descriptive Illustration can be the secondary choice.Secondly,the presenting locations of Illustration-text Comparison should be the most prior choice.In general,in the course of designing and compiling teaching materials,the illustration types and the presenting locations should be both taken into consideration to achieve a proper arrangement.