U. (2009). In search of a science-based application: A learning tool for reading acquisition. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 50,[668][669][670][671][672][673][674][675] This is a story about the fate of a psychological application: from its conception to the optimistic vision surrounding its future. We hope that this application -an enjoyable learning game (www or mobile phone-based, available free of charge to the end users) for children -can at best help millions of children in their reading acquisition in the future. Its basis was created by following intensively the development of children with (N = 107) and without (N = 92) genetic (familial) risk for dyslexia from birth to puberty in the Jyväskylä Longitudinal study of Dyslexia (JLD)-project. We summarize some of the major findings of the JLD in order to facilitate understanding of the reasons and logic behind the development of the game. Originally intended as a research tool for reading acquisition, its potential for prevention of reading difficulties was quickly recognized.

GraphoGame (GG) is originally a technology-based intervention method for supporting children with reading difficulties. It is now known that children who face problems in reading acquisition have difficulties in learning to differentiate and manipulate speech sounds and consequently, in connecting these sounds to corresponding letters. GG was developed to provide intensive training in matching speech sounds and larger units of speech to their written counterparts. GG has been shown to benefit children with reading difficulties and the game is now available for all Finnish school children for literacy support. Presently millions of children in Africa fail to learn to read despite years of primary school education. As many African languages have transparent writing systems similar in structure to Finnish, it was hypothesized that GG-based training of letter-sound correspondences could also be effective in supporting children’s learning in African countries. In this article we will describe how GG has been developed from a Finnish dyslexia prevention game to an intervention method that can be used not only to improve children’s reading performance but also to raise teachers’ and parents’ awareness of the development of reading skill and effective reading instruction methods. We will also provide an overview of the GG activities in Zambia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Namibia, and the potential to promote education for all with a combination of scientific research and mobile learning.

Associative learning has been identified as one of several non-linguistic processes involved in reading acquisition. However, it has not been established whether it is an independent process that contributes to reading performance on its own or whether it is a process that is embedded in other linguistic skills (e.g., phonological awareness or phonological memory) and, therefore, contributing to reading performance indirectly. Research has shown that performance on tasks assessing associative learning, e.g., paired-associate learning (PAL) tasks, is lower in children with specific reading difficulties compared to typical readers. We explored the differential associations of two distinct verbal-visual PAL tasks (the Bala Bbala Graphogame, BBG, and a Foreign Language Learning Task, FLLT) with reading skills (word reading and pseudo-word decoding), controlling for phonological awareness, rapid naming, and letter and digit span in children at risk for reading disabilities and their typically developing peers. Our study sample consisted of 110 children living in rural Zambia, ranging in age from 7 to 18 years old (48.1% female). Multivariate analyses of covariance were used to explore the group differences in reading performance. Repeated-measures ANCOVA was used to examine children’s learning across the PAL tasks. The differential relationships between both PAL tasks and reading performance were explored via structural equation modeling. The main result was that the children at risk for reading difficulties had lower performance on both PAL tasks. The BBG was a significant predictor for both word reading and pseudo-word decoding, whereas the FLLT—only for word reading. Performance on the FLLT partially mediated the association between phonological awareness and word reading. These results illustrate the partial independence of associative learning from other reading-related skills; the specifics of this relationship vary based on the type of PAL task administered.

This study investigated the comparative efficacy of a phonics based reading program and a language experience approach based literacy program to develop reading skills among Zambian early childhood school learners. The learners (n=1,986; Grade 2 level, (females =50.1%) took either the phonics based reading program (n=1,593) or the alternative language experience approach based program (n=393). They were all assessed for reading skills utilizing the Early Grade Reading Assessment test (EGRA) in four languages (Cinyanja, Icibemba, Kiikaonde and Silozi). Results suggest that learners in phonics based literacy program were significantly better in letter-sound knowledge in all the four languages and in reading skills (non-word reading, oral passage reading and reading comprehension) only in Icibemba and Silozi compared to those who took the alternative program. Results reveal that children in PLP had significantly better performance in most reading skills than in PRP, but the effect sizes were small or medium. The high floor effect in all directly reading-related measures is an indication that most children in Zambia have not acquired even the basic reading skill of the transparently written language they are familiar with in neither PRP nor PLP and thus are in urgent need of better instruction. The implementation of the phonics approach is not effective enough. Instruction of the sounds of letters requires special attention where digital training tools (such as GraphoGame) may provide the most effective help to both teachers and children.

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GraphoGame Teacher Training Service is a mobile-based solution for providing teachers with scientifically validated pedagogical training in literacy instruction. In many African countries teachers currently have insufficient knowledge to teach literacy in local languages and learning materials are scarce, especially for children with learning difficulties. As part of the GraphoWorld network, CAPOLSA/University of Zambia is developing new mobile-based method for providing in-service training for teachers in literacy instruction and assisting children with learning difficulties. GraphoGame Teacher Training Service was piloted in October 2014 in rural Zambia. An orientative workshop was given to 24 teachers who learned about literacy instruction methodology and then organized a GraphoGame intervention to randomly selected 2 nd grade children either at home or in a school environment. Parents of the children in the home intervention group were also encouraged to play GraphoGame. GraphoGame learning analytics shows that both the children and their parents improved their word reading skills. Children who played GraphoGame performed better than their non-playing classmates in the EGRA letter-sound knowledge test at the end of the intervention. Teachers, parents and children were all motivated to use ICT-based literacy learning tools and their literacy skills levels show high demand for support services for literacy instruction.Literacy Framework which gives detailed guidance on how literacy teaching should be implemented in primary schools based on a program called Primary Literacy Program (PLP) that uses a phonics-based approach for teaching reading. While these new advancements will be included in the college of education curriculum for student teachers, there are still thousands of teachers across Zambia who have had few chances of participating in literacy instruction trainings With the mobile technology, it is now possible to disseminate information on science-based literacy instruction methods in a quick and cost-effective way. Mobile technology allows teachers to self-study materials, which decreases the time spent in workshop trainings.GraphoGame has been developed for providing learning support for children with reading difficulties [3]. For this purpose its effectiveness has been studied in four African countries (Zambia [4], Namibia [5], Kenya [6] and Tanzania [7]). Our previous research focus in Zambia has been the decoding skill [4] and how to help teachers [8] and parents [9] to support children in the very early stages of learning to read . In Kenya, GraphoGame is available in Kikuyu and Kiswahili and children's letter-sound knowledge, word recognition and spelling improved after a minimum exposure of 3 hours [6]. Kiswahili GraphoGameversion is also being studied in Tanzania at Sebastian Kolowa University with promising results [7]. In Namibia GraphoGame was translated into Afrikaans and programmed to follow the literacy curriculum in grades 1 and 2. In the first validation study in 2013, 83 first grade l...

The widespread persistence of illiteracy across the world deprives millions of citizens of the economic and political opportunity to secure their basic human rights. Out of 650 million children of primary school age, at least 250 million are not learning the basics in reading and mathematics (Education for All Global Monitoring Report Team, 2014)(hereafter EFA). Out of these children, 130 million had attended school for several years. In sub-Saharan Africa, one in five children was out of school in 2011 (EFA, 2014), and across Africa fewer than half of the children reach the end of primary school (Heugh, 2011). In 17 sub-Saharan countries, fewer than half of the children are learning the basics, and they are poorly prepared for transition to secondary education (EFA, 2014). Such outcomes are the rule in Africa, not the exception (as documented in several reports of the Africa Progress Panel until the end of this forum, 2017) and pose a great risk to the continent. It has, after all, a rapidly growing population of young people, all of whom need to find employment and livelihoods. The promotion of literacy in Africa faces challenges at many levels. Universal access to education was an important objective of the decolonization movements and, indeed, these movements did trigger dramatic rises in enrolment for basic schooling across many African nations, among them Zambia. But with rapid demographic growth and economic recession, the proportion of primary-schoolage children out of school began to rise again in the 1990s. By 2014 it had reached 21% in sub-Saharan Africa, with about half of the children affected not expected to ever enter school (UNESCO, 2016). In Zambia, the net enrolment ratio for primary schooling remained quite high, estimated by the World Bank as 95% in 2014 (FHI, 2016).