Interest in identifying factors influencing educational success is growing. It is often observed that a group of students share the same external variables (school environment) yet have different results, which states that individual variables have more impact on the determination of academic performance. Therefore, the present study aimed to substantiate this fact by investigating the association between non-verbal fluid intelligence and academic performance in a population of schoolchildren in Eastern Morocco. The investigation was a cross-sectional study based on a self-administered questionnaire. Items included the standard Raven’s progressive matrices. Students’ grades were collected from the administrative offices of the visited schools. Significant and positive correlations between the non-verbal intelligence scores and the school results were found: for the general average, the correlation was 0.574; for the school subject French, the correlation coefficient was 0.475; and for mathematics, we found a relatively low coefficient of 0.381. Non-verbal fluid intelligence significantly and positively predicted academic performance (β = .574, p = .000). These results call for policymakers to implement the use of intelligence tests with school directors and teachers as a diagnostic tool to guide support efforts for low-achieving children and even to create pilot classes for the best-performing students.

This quasi-experimental study investigates Moroccan English department university students’ overall mastery of the declarative, procedural, and conditional knowledge of the text-processing strategies that facilitate textual comprehension at both the pre- and post-intervention levels. For examining this postulate thoroughly, two EFL first-semester groups pursuing their studies in English Language and Literature were randomly opted for as the informants for this study. The experimental group (n=63) received explicit training related to the declarative, procedural, and conditional knowledge of reading strategies, whereas the control group (n=50) took their normal classes. The two groups were presented with two reading texts (narrative & expository) at both the outset and the end of the metacognitive strategy intervention. This was accompanied by a ‘retrospective questionnaire’ at each stage (pre-intervention & post-intervention). The results indicate that the experimental group exhibited more substantive enhancement in metacognitive strategy knowledge than the control group did. Thus, the recommendation that instruction in the declarative, procedural, and conditional knowledge of reading heuristics be integrated in the Reading Comprehension Course at the university level is to be imparted utmost value in the sphere of academia.