Annotating digital text with phonemic cues to support decoding in struggling readers

Abstract

An advantage of digital media is the flexibility to personalize the presentation of text to an individual’s needs and embed tools that support pedagogy and practice. The goal of this study was to develop a tablet-based reading tool, grounded in the principles of phonics-based instruction, and determine whether struggling readers could leverage this technology to improve their decoding skills. The tool presents a small icon below each vowel to represent its sound. Forty struggling child readers were randomly assigned to an intervention or control group to test the efficacy of the phonemic cues. We found that struggling readers could leverage the cues to improve pseudoword decoding: after two weeks of practice, the intervention group showed greater improvement than controls. This study demonstrates the efficacy of a text annotation, grounded in intervention research, to help children decode novel words. These results highlight the opportunity for educational technologies to support and supplement classroom instruction.

A symbolic annotation of vowel sounds for emerging readers

“…Initial, proof-of-concept research into Sound it Out revealed limited, yet promising effects of the cue on reading performance (Donnelly et al 2020). In a small-scale randomized controlled trial (RCT), with a short practice period (two-weeks), our research group found that the cue had a significant impact on pseudo word decoding but no significant impact on connected-text reading or real word decoding.…”

“…In order to capture a heterogeneous sample the classification of 'struggling readers' was based on performance 1 SD below the standard norm on either the Woodcock-Johnson IV Test of Achievement Basic Reading Skills (WJ BRS) or the Test of Word Reading Efficiency-2 (TOWRE Index) composite measures, and above 1 SD below the mean on the Wechsler Abbreviated Scales of Intelligence Full Scale-2 (WASI FS2) composite measure. This was the same criteria as our previous work (Donnelly et al 2020). Twenty participants had a diagnosis of developmental dyslexia.…”

“…If a child clicks on the house, the web-app will announce, "house, ou". A more detailed description of the app used can be found in our previous work (Donnelly et al 2020).…”

“…The protocol involved demonstration of proficiency in identifying the image names, associated target vowel sounds, and accessing the voice cue within the app. A more detailed description of the training protocol can be found in the previous work (Donnelly et al 2020).…”

“…All lists were unique, rated as similarly difficult and were administered in a counterbalanced order and cue condition during the study. Further information about validity and reliability can be found in (Donnelly et al 2020).…”