Periodic Reporting for period 1 - iRead4Skills (Intelligent Reading Improvement System for Fundamental and Transversal Skills Development)
Okres sprawozdawczy: 2023-03-01 do 2024-02-29
Reading skills are essential for acquiring technical and scientific knowledge, especially in formal education, Adult Learning (AL) and Vocational Educational Training (VET), as well as in work contexts, such as when companies provide written information and instructions to their workers. However, promoting and motivating reading habits and skills in low literacy adults is quite challenging due to the lack of dedicated and/or adequate reading materials.
Supporting the adoption of innovation, the iRead4Skills project aims to promote the development of reading skills through an intelligent system that evaluates texts complexity and suggests reading materials adequate to the user's reading level. The system can also be used by trainers to create or adapt texts with the appropriate level of complexity for their students.
By assembling an interdisciplinary team covering different expertise fields such as Linguistics, Education Sciences, Computer Science, Socioeconomics (including Behavioural and Experimental Economics) and ICT, along with partners from various fields of activities (academic, corporate, public administration), the project aims to provide groundbreaking research and innovation on text complexity measures and analysis. This includes developing technology directly with end-users, promoting the use of Literature and Culture to develop fundamental and transversal skills, and assessing the response to specific needs from the AL and VET communities involved and devising ways to evaluate results to inform proposals for employers and policy makers, surpassing the current state of the art in several key areas, and demonstrating the contributions of Social Sciences and Humanities research to solving societal challenges.
iRead4Skills activities and progress can be consulted in the project website: https://iread4skills.com/.
Supporting the adoption of innovation, the iRead4Skills project aims to promote the development of reading skills through an intelligent system that evaluates texts complexity and suggests reading materials adequate to the user's reading level. The system can also be used by trainers to create or adapt texts with the appropriate level of complexity for their students.
By assembling an interdisciplinary team covering different expertise fields such as Linguistics, Education Sciences, Computer Science, Socioeconomics (including Behavioural and Experimental Economics) and ICT, along with partners from various fields of activities (academic, corporate, public administration), the project aims to provide groundbreaking research and innovation on text complexity measures and analysis. This includes developing technology directly with end-users, promoting the use of Literature and Culture to develop fundamental and transversal skills, and assessing the response to specific needs from the AL and VET communities involved and devising ways to evaluate results to inform proposals for employers and policy makers, surpassing the current state of the art in several key areas, and demonstrating the contributions of Social Sciences and Humanities research to solving societal challenges.
iRead4Skills activities and progress can be consulted in the project website: https://iread4skills.com/.
In the first 12 months, the technical and scientific activities of the iRead4Skills project were mainly developed under the scope of the work packages (WP) described below.
- WP2 "Skills surveys: needs, skills, and gaps" assessed low literacy adult learners and trainers in AL and VET centres, focusing on training activities, motivation, reading skills, habits, and preferences. Surveys included:
i) Reading Skills survey for adults and trainers in Portugal, Belgium, France, and Spain.
ii) Overall skills and gaps survey examined how reading difficulties affect employment access and well-being, covering personal confidence, other skill acquisition, and impacts on various life aspects. Survey results informed a final literature review and report on literacy's impact on skills and work life.
- WP3 "Complexity classification and data" identified the relevant complexity levels for low literacy adult learners to guide data collection for the analysis system. Tasks included:
i) Defining complexity levels based on proficiency descriptors for Spanish, French, and Portuguese texts.
ii) Compiling and annotating text datasets for French, Portuguese, and Spanish, with ongoing enhancement and validation by end-users.
iii) Defining lexicons per complexity level for each language, using available resources and expertise.
The achievement of these stages corresponds to the first milestones of the project, Milestone 1: Skills and needs data, and Milestone 2: Data sets (whose last result will be fully accomplished in month 15).
- WP4 "Intelligent complexity analysis" activities included:
i) Defining features for complexity analysis and implemented readability predictors.
ii) Investigating different approaches for encoding text information and developing python APIs for each target language to automatically extract features were key tasks. The APIs use NLP processing tools tailored to each language and include additional lexico-semantic features derived from word embeddings. The intelligent complexity analysers provide the basis for computing larger sets of readability variables and annotating linguistic phenomena related to reading difficulties in the text.
- WP2 "Skills surveys: needs, skills, and gaps" assessed low literacy adult learners and trainers in AL and VET centres, focusing on training activities, motivation, reading skills, habits, and preferences. Surveys included:
i) Reading Skills survey for adults and trainers in Portugal, Belgium, France, and Spain.
ii) Overall skills and gaps survey examined how reading difficulties affect employment access and well-being, covering personal confidence, other skill acquisition, and impacts on various life aspects. Survey results informed a final literature review and report on literacy's impact on skills and work life.
- WP3 "Complexity classification and data" identified the relevant complexity levels for low literacy adult learners to guide data collection for the analysis system. Tasks included:
i) Defining complexity levels based on proficiency descriptors for Spanish, French, and Portuguese texts.
ii) Compiling and annotating text datasets for French, Portuguese, and Spanish, with ongoing enhancement and validation by end-users.
iii) Defining lexicons per complexity level for each language, using available resources and expertise.
The achievement of these stages corresponds to the first milestones of the project, Milestone 1: Skills and needs data, and Milestone 2: Data sets (whose last result will be fully accomplished in month 15).
- WP4 "Intelligent complexity analysis" activities included:
i) Defining features for complexity analysis and implemented readability predictors.
ii) Investigating different approaches for encoding text information and developing python APIs for each target language to automatically extract features were key tasks. The APIs use NLP processing tools tailored to each language and include additional lexico-semantic features derived from word embeddings. The intelligent complexity analysers provide the basis for computing larger sets of readability variables and annotating linguistic phenomena related to reading difficulties in the text.
In this 12-months period, the project successfully achieved its planned results. These concerned:
- Identifying reading skills and needs of the target audience and studying the relation of reading skills to overall skills and skills gaps.
- Establishing a relevant complexity framework (with descriptors tables and examples for each language) for low-literacy adults, validated by experts, encompassing three levels: Very Easy, Easy, and Plain.
- Compiling and processing base datasets for complexity analysis systems, including textual corpora, basic lexicons, and annotated corpora by complexity level samples for the three languages.
- Defining features complexity analysis and implementing readability predictors in the base complexity analysers for each languages.
- Producing and disseminating the first Policy Brief concerning the compiled data, analyses, as well as the lessons learned in the cooperative process.
The iRead4Skills project established contacts and cooperation protocols with AL and VET centres and professionals in the relevant geopolitical intervention areas, namely, Belgium, France, Portugal, and Spain, having also reached AL centres in Argentina. We have also secured cooperation bridges with relevant national and international stakeholders dedicated to skills, adult training, and reading and literacy promotion.
All open access results are available on Zenodo (https://zenodo.org/communities/iread4skills/) and in https://iread4skills.com/.
- Identifying reading skills and needs of the target audience and studying the relation of reading skills to overall skills and skills gaps.
- Establishing a relevant complexity framework (with descriptors tables and examples for each language) for low-literacy adults, validated by experts, encompassing three levels: Very Easy, Easy, and Plain.
- Compiling and processing base datasets for complexity analysis systems, including textual corpora, basic lexicons, and annotated corpora by complexity level samples for the three languages.
- Defining features complexity analysis and implementing readability predictors in the base complexity analysers for each languages.
- Producing and disseminating the first Policy Brief concerning the compiled data, analyses, as well as the lessons learned in the cooperative process.
The iRead4Skills project established contacts and cooperation protocols with AL and VET centres and professionals in the relevant geopolitical intervention areas, namely, Belgium, France, Portugal, and Spain, having also reached AL centres in Argentina. We have also secured cooperation bridges with relevant national and international stakeholders dedicated to skills, adult training, and reading and literacy promotion.
All open access results are available on Zenodo (https://zenodo.org/communities/iread4skills/) and in https://iread4skills.com/.