e-text and e-books are changing the literacy landscape

Digital technology is beginning to offer an array of multimedia and multimodal devices and applications that promise to help struggling readers and engage all learners.

The digital world is expanding the reading palette, offering readers — especially readers who struggle with printed text — new possibilities to engage in books and text enhanced with media and learning supports. The shift from reading the page to reading the screen heightens the importance of visual and multimodal literacies (Kress, 2003), and options to customize the reading experience increase the student’s need to be strategic (Dalton & Proctor, 2008).

An expanded view of text is consistent with the Common Core State Standards’ vision of a successful learner who can critically read and communicate with text in print and multimodal formats. The National Education Technology Plan highlights the importance of learning from e-text, and the Digital Textbook Collaborative (2012) offers a blueprint for designing and using e-texts. The blueprint calls for e-texts to use Internet connectivity, offer rich, interactive learning experiences, personalize learning, encourage collaboration, provide feedback, and support formative assessment as well as student self-assessment.

This vision of e-texts has yet to be fully realized, but schools are moving to integrate e-texts and digital curricula, and some authors and educational publishers are experimenting with multimodal composition. Further, while the e-text research is limited — partially due to rapid changes in technology and media — there is a reasonable knowledge base about e-text design and instructional strategies to guide us, using what we already know about effective reading instruction.

UDL framework

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a framework for designing learning tools, texts, and environments so that all learners have access to the supports they need to succeed (Rose & Meyer, 2002). Based on the premise that individuals and society as a whole benefit from inclusive learning, it advocates for the design of curricula and texts that are responsive to the needs and interests of the broad range of learners represented in today’s classrooms.  Drawing on research about how the brain learns, UDL offers three design principles:

• Provide multiple means of representation — the “what” of learning, such as recognizing the difference between a news report and an editorial;
• Provide multiple means of action and expression — the “how” of learning, such as knowing how to write or podcast a news report; and
• Provide multiple means of engagement — the “why” of learning, such as setting goals to become a journalist and investing effort in achieving those goals.

For example, e-text can provide multiple means of representation by linking to a multimedia glossary or a bilingual translation. Multiple means of action and expression might be manifested by presenting options for writing, drawing, or audiorecording responses to the text. Multiple means of engagement, which overlap representation and expression, might be supported by allowing readers to choose media for interacting with the text and by giving them access to an e-text support system.

Research on universally designed e-texts has shown that students benefit from embedded reading supports for word recognition, vocabulary, and comprehension strategies (Dalton et al., 2002; Dalton et al., 2011; Dalton & Palincsar, 2013; Coyne et al., 2012). However, a randomized control trial with middle school students found no comprehension growth differences between students who read enhanced e-books and those who continued their usual instruction, raising issues about the challenges of integrating e-book instruction (Drummond et al., 2011). In general, the positive effects of universally designed e-texts are consistent with other e-text studies. Experimental studies are few, but the results of a meta-analysis of e-book reading in preK through 5th grade yielded small to moderate comprehension effects (Zucker, Moody, & McKenna, 2009).  Positive comprehension effects for middle school students were also found in a meta-analysis of e-text and other technology enhanced reading (Moran et al., 2008).

Students benefit from embedded reading supports for word recognition, vocabulary, and comprehension strategies.

Word recognition and fluency

Jonas, an 8-year-old with significant intellectual disabilities, reads an enhanced e-book version of Peanut Butter Rhino, listening to the audio narration and watching as each word highlights on his computer screen. Occasionally he clicks on an individual word and watches as the word animates to break itself down into decodable chunks. At the end of the page, he grabs the microphone and starts recording his own reading of the page, listening and rerecording several times before he is satisfied. He proudly plays his oral reading for his teacher, who gives him a high five.

This vignette, drawn from the Literacy By Design project (Coyne et al., 2012), illustrates how text can be transformed to support students’ oral reading. In this case, the e-text offers both text-to-speech (TTS) and human voice narration. Readers control their tool use, clicking on just one word to hear it read aloud or to listen to a sentence or passage. They can also listen to a text selection and replay it when needed. However, since TTS does not yet match the expressive reading of a human voice, this e-text also offers human audio narration to show readers how words should sound when spoken.

This e-text goes two steps further in supporting word recognition. First, all of the decodable words are linked to an animation that breaks the word into decodable chunks and then puts it back together with accompanying pronunciation. This helps the beginning reader develop a way of seeing words as containing letters and letter strings that represent sounds that work together to make a word. For example, “sat” includes the onset ‘s’ and the rhyme ‘at.’ This type of support shows the reader how to decode, in addition to providing the pronunciation. Second, the e-text offers an easy “record yourself” tool that lets students record and listen to themselves reading the e-text, engaging them in the repeated reading that we know contributes to fluency (Rasinski, 2003).

Today, TTS is a default option on e-reader devices like the Kindle and Nook and is typically included as a program feature on laptops and tablets. Knowing how to use TTS (and the synchronized highlighting feature that is sometimes included as a reading feature) is part of becoming a strategic e-reader and should be part of literacy instruction.

Tradebook and educational publishers are increasingly including human audio narration in e-books, although it is more expensive and time-consuming to produce. This not only provides a fluent reading model but adds an emotional overlay that can further entice a reader into the world of stories, poetry, and nonfiction. Music and sound effects sometimes accompany the narration, and they may add another layer of meaning to the text. Just as with TTS, it’s important to teach students how this e-book feature works so they can enhance their learning benefits. Having students critique the quality of the narration and sound track is an authentic way to engage in critical analysis of a multimodal text, a goal of the Common Core.

Vocabulary, comprehension, and engagement

Fifth-grader Arielle reads a digital African folktale, “Hungry Spider and Turtle,” clicking on the multimedia glossary links for unfamiliar words like “hospitality” and “Ashanti.” After a few screens of illustrated text, a pedagogical avatar prompts her to respond with one of the comprehension strategies that she has been learning — visualization — and offers a model response. Arielle listens to the agent speak in English and Spanish before typing a vivid description of the muddy turtle into her online work log. Later, she talks to her teacher about her progress, and they set goals for the next round of reading.

In another classroom, Sean reads an interactive e-text “How Do We See” (see below), going back and forth between reading the text and watching embedded animations that illustrate key concepts in the text. To better understand how light is reflected, he clicks on an interactive diagram and manipulates the darkness of two objects to see the difference in how light rays are reflected to the eye. Sean explains to the researcher sitting next to him what is happening, talking as he continues to manipulate the objects on screen to show as well as tell his understanding.

Arielle and Sean often have difficulty reading grade-level text. However, changing the text from print to a multimodal, interactive e-text enables Arielle to productively read and listen to e-books enhanced with multimedia vocabulary, comprehension strategy features, and Spanish translations (Dalton et al., 2011; Proctor et al., 2011). Sean reads across modes, using the animated diagram to help him understand the written explanation of the science phenomenon (Dalton & Palincsar, 2013).

E-book design is rapidly evolving, with many e-readers and e-texts now offering vocabulary and comprehension support. Some e-books show a brief explanation or synonym when you mouse over the word. More frequently, the reader clicks on a word to access the glossary, which may provide a definition, a multimedia representation consisting of graphics, animation, and/or video, pronunciation, and language translation. Comprehension supports range from hyperlinks to background information, question and strategy prompts, highlighted key information, and summaries (Dalton & Proctor, 2008).

E-books with illustration hotspots are very popular. When the sound effects and animations are connected to the storyline and content, the media tend to support vocabulary learning and comprehension (Labbo & Kuhn, 2000; Zucker, Moody, & McKenna, 2009). When hotspots are irrelevant or contradictory, they can be distracting and interfere with readers’ understanding and recall of important details. Imagine reading an enhanced e-book of The Wheels on the Bus. A click on the wheels animates them to spin around; a click on the bus driver makes him call out, “Move on back, children, take your seats so I can safely drive the bus!” These enhancements reinforce the written text and thus are more likely to aid readers’ understanding of the concept ‘around’ and the bus driver’s command to ‘move on back!’ In contrast, a click on the wheels to hear a funny honking sound effect is more likely to distract the reader from making sense of the text.

Selecting and teaching with e-books and e-text

1. Use e-text with audio narration to provide access to the general education curriculum and grade-level text.

Every child has the right to access the general education curriculum. The Common Core standards also require that students engage with grade-level text. For students reading below grade level, this can be quite frustrating. Providing struggling readers with e-texts that offer TTS or human voice narration allows them to read, listen, and learn from the text without worrying about decoding or fluency issues. Their e-book reading might also contribute to vocabulary and comprehension development.

2. Select e-books with meaningful enhancements for vocabulary and comprehension.

The e-book market is rapidly expanding in the popular press and educational publishing markets. When it comes to selecting effective e-texts, it is definitely a case of buyer beware. It can be useful to consider the e-text in relation to the three UDL principles (Rose & Meyer, 2002). Does the e-text offer effective support for multiple means of representations, of action and expression, and of engagement? It doesn’t have to be strong in all areas, since other digital tools and offline strategies can complement the e-book enhancements.

Be alert for distracting media enhancements, such as illustration hotspots that conflict with, are irrelevant to the story line, or contain unrelated games. Research consistently shows that these kinds of media experiences can interfere with students’ comprehension. They may also influence how parents and children read these enhanced e-books together, decreasing the story-related talk (Chiong et al., 2012). The potential of games for learning has been demonstrated in other contexts; it is only when the games are irrelevant to the story and taken up during the reading process that they have the potential to interfere with comprehension.

E-reading media are not one-size-fits-all.

3. Teach students how to use e-text features.

Although students — especially struggling readers — may be more motivated to read e-books, they will still need instruction in how to take advantage of the various e-reader and e-text features. For example, when teaching students how to strategically use TTS, follow the same gradual release model effective for other reading process instruction. First, introduce students to the purpose and value of TTS, model how to use it in varied ways depending on your purpose, and then have students try the tool with a partner and on their own, sharing their experiences and strategies. E-books are not one-size-fits-all. Asking students to use supports they don’t need can get in the way of comprehension and may decrease motivation. Further, individual readers will vary in their e-reading processes, depending on the difficulty of the text, the genre, and what they are being asked to do with the text. The goal is for students to personalize their reading experience with e-text supports.

4. Create an e-reader community

Establish a collaborative e-reader community where students take pride in becoming strategic e-readers with expertise and skills to share with one another, along with recommendations for “good reads” of particular e-texts and e-books. Holding brief e-reader strategy and book share meetings is useful, as is creating an online space such as a class wiki to post strategies, pitfalls, and e-book recommendations. Some students will enjoy partner reading e-books, and others will prefer to read on their own so they can control the pace and use of enhancements.

5. Use professional development and get technical assistance.

Numerous studies have shown that professional development and technical assistance are key to successful technology integration. Administrator support and buy-in are essential, since they will have access to resources. (For guidance in how to integrate technology effectively, see http://powerupwhatworks.org.)

Teachers need time to collaborate with colleagues on developing grade-level plans to integrate e-book reading into the curriculum and standards. There is a rich array of online communities and Internet resources including tools for reading e-text and authoring customized e-books (Dalton, 2014).

Conclusion

Teaching children to become successful readers means teaching them to become successful e-readers. Although there is still much to be learned about how to design e-texts that offer rich reading experiences that can be customized on the fly to support readers’ needs and interests, we know enough to move forward. Every child should be reading e-books as part of his or her literacy curriculum. As literacy researchers and educators, we should be collaborating with one another and with digital designers, programmers, students, and publishers to advance the theory and practice of e-book/e-text design so that eventually the construct of “struggling reader” disappears.

References

Chiong, C., Ree, J., Takeuchi, L., & Erickson, L. (2012). Comparing parent-child coreading on print, basic, and enhanced e-book platforms. New York, NY: Joan Ganz Cooney Center. www.joanganzcooneycenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/jgcc_ebooks_quickreport.pdf

Coyne, P., Pisha B., Dalton, B., Zeph, L., & Cook Smith, N. (2012). Literacy by design: A universal design for learning approach for students with significant intellectual disabilities. Remedial and Special Education, 33 (3), 162-172.

Dalton, B. (2014). DIY e-books: Designing enhanced e-texts. The Reading Teacher, 67 (7), 543-546.

Dalton, B. & Palincsar, A. (2013). Investigating text-reader interactions in the context of supported e-text. In R. Azevedo, & V. Aleven (Eds.), International Handbook of Metacognition and Learning Technologies (pp. 533-544). New York, NY: Springer.

Dalton, B., Pisha, B., Eagleton, M., Coyne, P., & Deysher, S. (2002). Engaging the text: Reciprocal teaching and questioning strategies in a scaffolded learning environment. Final report to the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs. Wakefield, MA: CAST.

Dalton, B. & Proctor, C.P. (2008). The changing landscape of text and comprehension in the age of new literacies. In J. Coiro, M. Knobel, C. Lankshear, & D. Leu (Eds.), Handbook of research on new literacies (pp. 297-324). Mahweh, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Dalton, B., Proctor, C.P., Uccelli, P., Mo, E., & Snow, C.E. (2011). Designing for diversity:  The role of reading strategies and interactive vocabulary in a digital reading environment for 5th-grade monolingual English and bilingual students. Journal of Literacy Research, 43 (1), 68-100.

Digital Textbook Collaborative. (2012). Digital textbook playbook. Washington, DC: Federal Trade Commission. www.fcc.gov/encyclopedia/digital-textbook-playbook

Drummond, K., Chinen, M., Duncan, T.G., Miller, H.R., Fryer, L., Zmach, C., & Culp, K. (2011). Impact of the Thinking Reader software program on grade 6 reading vocabulary, comprehension, strategies, and motivation (NCEE 2010-4035 report). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education.

Kress, G. (2003). Literacy in the new media age. New York, NY: Routledge.

Labbo, L.D. & Kuhn, M.R. (2000). Weaving chains of affect and cognition: A young child’s understanding of CD-ROM talking books. Journal of Literacy Research, 32, 187-210.

Moran, J., Ferdig, R.E., Pearson, P.D., Wardrop, J., & Blomeyer, R.L. (2008). Technology and reading performance in the middle-school grades: A meta-analysis with recommendations for policy and practice. Journal of Literacy Research, 40 (1), 6-58.

Proctor, P., Dalton, B., Uccelli, P., Biancarosa, G., Mo, E., Snow, C.E., & Neugebauer, S. (2011). Improving comprehension online: Effects of deep vocabulary instruction with bilingual and monolingual 5th graders. Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 24 (5), 517-544.

Rasinki, T.V. (2003). The fluent reader. New York, NY: Scholastic.

Rose, D. & Meyer, A. (2002). Teaching every student in the digital age: Universal design for learning. Alexandria, VA: ASCD. www.cast.org/teachingeverystudent/

Zucker, T.A., Moody, A.J., & McKenna, M.C. (2009). The effects of electronic books on prekindergarten-to-grade 5 students’ literacy and language outcomes: A research synthesis. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 40 (1), 47-87.

CITATION: Dalton, B. (2014). E-text and e-books are changing the literacy landscape. Phi Delta Kappan, 96 (3), 38-43.