Effects of 8 Weeks with Embodied Learning on 5–6-Year-Old Danish Children’s Pre-reading Skills and Word Reading Skills: the PLAYMORE Project, DK

Abstract

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of embodied learning on children’s pre-reading and word reading skills. We conducted a three-armed randomized controlled trial including two intervention groups and one control group. One hundred forty-nine children from grade 0 (5–6 years old) who had just started school were recruited from 10 different classes from four elementary schools. Within each class, children were randomly assigned to receive teaching of letter-sound couplings and word decoding either with whole-body movements (WM), hand movements (HM), or no movements (CON) over an 8-week period. Children were evaluated on pre-reading, word reading, and motor skills before (T1), immediately after (T2), and after 17–22 weeks of retention period (T3) following the intervention. Between-group analysis showed a significant improvement in children’s ability to name letter-sounds correctly from T1 to T2 (p < 0.001) and from T1 to T3 (p < 0.05) for WM compared to CON. HM and WM improved significantly in naming conditional letter-sounds from T1 to T2 (p < 0.01, p < 0.01) compared to CON and from T1 to T3 for the HM group compared to CON (p < 0.05). We did not find an effect on word reading or a correlation between motor skill performance and reading. Results from the present study suggest that there are beneficial effects of using whole-body movements for children. Hand motor movements indeed also had a performance effect on letter-sound knowledge; however, the whole-body movements had longer-lasting effects. We do not see an effect on whole word reading.

Improving literacy development with fine motor skills training: A digital game-based intervention in fourth grade

“…In line with this idea, previous studies have shown that handwriting interventions are more efficient when they involve letter tracing compared with only perceptuo-motor training (Hoy et al, 2011;Santangelo & Graham, 2016). In addition, recent studies have reported that the addition of gross and fine motor activities during letter and word learning improves letter knowledge more than traditional instruction in kindergarteners and first graders (Bara & Bonneton-Botté, 2017;Botha & Africa, 2020;Damsgaard et al, 2022). These studies support the added value of motor interventions combined with language intervention.…”

The Cognitive Benefits of Embodied Learning in the Context of Early School Literacy

“…So, to observe a transfer effect from T1 to T2 on word reading, the children participating in the 8-week intervention would have had to acquire letter-sound knowledge proficiency and translate their newly gained knowledge into a basic word reading strategy. However, only 4% of all children acquired basic word reading skills during the intervention period and at T3, 7-8 months after school starts, the proportion had risen to 29% (Damsgaard et al, 2022). This pattern could explain why a transfer effect to word reading were only seen at T3.…”

“…This would involve the use of movements to represent the learnt letter forms and sounds. Such approach has been found to be more beneficial for letter recognition and letter-sounds knowledge compared to the standard school curriculum for 6-7-year olds (Damsgaard et al, 2020(Damsgaard et al, , 2022. However, the cognitive mechanisms behind the advantages of embodied learning for pre-reading skills are not yet clear.…”

Learning by Doing or Doing Without Learning? The Potentials and Challenges of Activity-Based Learning

“…The types of interventions categorized under the label motor activity-based learning have the goal of using the motor system to (1) learn procedures and (motor) skills (e.g., Rabattu et al, 2023; for an overview, see Mavilidi et al, 2018) and (2) to use the motor system to enact, understand, or mentally connect otherwise abstract content (e.g., Amico & Schaefer, 2021;Cherdieu et al, 2017;Damsgaard et al, 2022;Parrill et al, 2023;Smyrnis et al, 2022;Yohannan et al, 2022;. Often, embodied learning interventions are designed to convey declarative knowledge, but can be targeted at motor learning.…”