Repeated E-book Reading and Its Contribution to Learning New Words among Kindergartners

Abstract

The contribution of repeated e-book reading with and without word explanation support and its effect on receptive and expressive word learning among preschoolers was examined. Seventy-eight kindergartners were randomly divided into an experimental and a control group. The experimental group received two individual reading sessions of an e-book with a dictionary that provided word explanations. The children clicked on hotspots which provided the explanation two more times. The children thus heard the meaning of the word three times in each session, with a total of six times. Not all difficult words received a dictionary explanation. The control group received the regular kindergarten program. The children's receptive word learning, word explanation and production of focal words were tested pre and post intervention. An improvement in all dependent measures was found post-intervention, compared to the control group. The dictionary in the e-book supported not only receptive word learning, but also word explanation. Words that received a dictionary explanation supported word learning better than words which were not included in the dictionary. Furthermore, receiving support six times was more effective than three times. Educational implications are discussed.

Digital or Print? A Comparison of Preschoolers’ Comprehension, Vocabulary, and Engagement From a Print Book and an e-Book

“…Reading also provides opportunities for adults to personalize story content by connecting the text to children’s background knowledge, increasing story comprehension as well as language exposure (McKeown, Beck, Sinatra, & Loxterman, 1992). As Korat and colleagues state, “Shared book reading in early childhood is considered a promising context for promoting children’s language, especially vocabulary enrichment” (Korat, Kozlov-Peretz, & Segal-Drori, 2017, p. 60).…”

“…Studies comparing self-reading books on tablets to print books are fewer in number but still find ambivalent results on comprehension, recall, and vocabulary (O’Toole & Kannass, 2018; Reich, Yau, & Warschauer, 2016). However, some studies have observed longer reading times for e-books (Richter & Courage, 2017), more talk about the device than the story with tablets (Chiong, Ree, Takeuchi, & Erickson, 2012; O’Toole & Kannass, 2018; Parish-Morris, Mahajan, Hirsh-Pasek, Golinkoff, & Collins, 2013; Revelle & Bowman, 2017; Richter & Courage, 2017), and both greater distraction (Chiong et al, 2012; Piotrowski & Krcmar, 2017) and learning (Korat et al, 2017) from e-book enhancements/hotspots.…”

The Impact of E-Book Reading on Young Children’s Emergent Literacy Skills: An Analytical Review

“…Four of the reviewed studies reported atypically large ES [ 20 , 21 , 48 , 51 ] if we compare them with the rest of the reviewed studies or previous research [ 12 , 13 , 14 ]. Ioannidis [ 54 ] points out that a single study cannot be seen in isolation and should be compared with the entire prior evidence on the same or similar questions.…”

“…Across the studies, four papers [ 19 , 20 , 21 , 47 ] reported a total of 330 students at risk for learning disabilities. A total of 24 students who were English Language Learners (ELLs) were reported in one paper [ 42 ], and the number of low-SES children reported in one paper was 78 [ 51 ].…”

“…All selected studies were published in English, but conducted in different languages and countries: Six in Israel [ 19 , 20 , 24 , 41 , 47 , 51 ]; three in the US [ 42 , 44 , 45 ]); two in The Netherlands [ 48 , 50 ]; one in Canada [ 43 ]; one in South Africa [ 21 ]; and one in Taiwan [ 46 ].…”