Engagement and Communication During Shared Storybook Reading: A Comparison of Electronic and Traditional Books for Preschoolers who are At-risk
- ISBN-10
- 0549208615
- ISBN-13
- 9780549208617
- Pages
- 364
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2007
- Author
- Amelia K. Moody
Description
The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which children's reading engagement and communicative initiations differ when they are read storybooks in varying manners (e.g., adult led interactive electronic and child led interactive electronic), and in different mediums (e.g., adult led electronic and adult led traditional). The reading behaviors of 25 3- to- 6-year-old children at risk for academic difficulties were observed during three storybook reading conditions: (1) adult led interactive e-storybook; (2) child led interactive e-storybook; and (3) adult led interactive traditional storybook. An adapted form of the Minnesota Teaching Task (Egeland et al., 1995) was used to quantify children's level of reading engagement, and a coding measure derived from several studies (see Fisch et al., 2002; Lemish & Rice, 1986; Pellegrini et al., 1990) was used to quantify children's type and quantity of communicative initiations. Results showed significantly higher levels of child persistence favoring the adult led interactive e-storybook over the adult led traditional storybook. Additionally, significant differences were found for child labeling references to favor the adult led traditional storybook. No significant differences were found between the adult led and child led e-storybook conditions for any measure. This study showed there to be relatively few differences between e-storybooks when children engage with them on their own or with the guidance of an adult. Traditional storybooks appeared to be more robust than e-storybooks with respect to eliciting children's communicative initiations, namely labeling references. This investigation addressed questions that may assist early childhood concerning instruction in the area of emergent literacy, and promote better understanding of the use of reading technologies with those evidence-based approaches.
