Open Educational Resources (OER) aim to provide equal access to education. Yet, as the language level used in OER presents a barrier to many learners, there is a need to make these resources more comprehensible. This study combined eye‐tracking methodology and comprehension assessment to explore the effect of text simplification on English second language (L2) users, while also accounting for text organizational structure and individual predispositions. A total of 37 adult English L2 users took part in the study. They had to read either an authentic narrative, authentic expository OER or their linguistically simplified versions. The analysis showed that simplification led to better text comprehension, and text narrativity facilitated text recall, particularly at lower English proficiency levels. Eye‐tracking measures revealed that text simplification led to an increase in processing time during the initial reading of the text and a decrease in processing time during text re‐inspection. These findings have strong practical applications for online teaching with OER.

中文翻译：

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简化还是不简化？通过简化文本，促进英语二等用户对英语开放式教育资源的理解和处理

开放式教育资源（OER）旨在提供平等的教育机会。但是，由于OER中使用的语言水平为许多学习者带来了障碍，因此有必要使这些资源更容易理解。这项研究结合了眼动追踪方法和理解力评估，以探讨文本简化对英语第二语言（L2）用户的影响，同时还考虑了文本组织结构和个人倾向。共有37位成人英语L2用户参加了该研究。他们必须阅读真实的叙述，真实的说明性OER或他们的语言简化版本。分析表明，简化导致更好的文本理解，而文本叙事则促进了文本回想，尤其是在英语水平较低的情况下。眼动仪显示，简化文本会导致在最初阅读文本时增加处理时间，并在重新检查过程中减少处理时间。这些发现对于OER在线教学具有很强的实际应用价值。