1- Farhangian University
Abstract: (501 Views)
Background & Objective: Phonological awareness, as one of the pre-literacy skills, appears in children in the preschool years and develops and evolves in children until the beginning of elementary school, and is one of the most important pre-literacy skills and Predictors of success in reading. Also, early stimulation of phonological awareness prevents learning disabilities by facilitating the process of learning to read. This prevention is particularly important because learning disabilities have negative consequences not only in the academic field (such as dropping out of school), but also in social-emotional dimensions (such as self-esteem), and behavioral dimensions (such as maladaptive behaviors). Based on this, several interventions and strategies were designed by researchers to help develop and improve the phonological awareness of preschool children. Although the positive effect of storytelling activities on skills such as children's comprehension and attention span, children's language skills, and children's literacy was shown in previous studies, but its effect on children's phonological awareness has not been studied until this research. Based on this, the present research was conducted with the aim of determining the effectiveness of storytelling activities on the phonological awareness of preschool children.
methods: The research method was an experimental type with a pre-test/post-test/follow-up design. From the statistical population of children aged 4 to 6 years in pre-school centers in the 12th district of Tehran, 30 eligible volunteer children were randomly assigned to the study and randomly assigned to two experimental and control groups. Informed consent of parents and managers of preschool centers, interest of the child, age range between 4 and 6 years, not having any disease or mental and physical disorders were considered as inclusion criteria. Exclusion criteria were the absence of more than 3 sessions of children in storytelling activities, occurrence of any physical and mental problems, simultaneous participation of children in any other related educational programs, and the willingness of parents, managers or children to withdraw from the research.Children in the intervention group participated in storytelling activities for 8 weeks, three one-hour sessions per week (24 sessions in total). There was no intervention for the control group. The data was collected using the phonological awareness scale (Soleimani and Dastjerdi Kazemi, 2015). In the study of the creators of this tool, the reliability of this test was calculated using Cronbach's alpha method, which was calculated as 0.98 for the whole test. Also, the results of factor analysis using the principal components method confirmed the three-factor structure of this questionnaire. The data were analyzed using repeated measures analysis of variance and Bonferroni's post hoc test at a significance level of 0.05 and through SPSS22 statistical software.
Results: Analysis of variance test with repeated measurement showed that storytelling activities significantly increased the phonological awareness of experimental group children in all three dimensions of syllabic awareness, awareness of intrasyllabic units and phonemic awareness (P<0.001). Also, the results of the Bonferroni test showed that the effectiveness of storytelling activities on all dimensions of phonological awareness continued until the follow-up stage (P<0.001).
Conclusion: Despite the effect of using direct teaching methods on children's phonological awareness, these effects are short-term because they are not compatible with the developmental and developmental characteristics of young children . As a result, they cannot be successful enough in attracting children's attention, concentration and listening, which are very important in the development of phonological awareness. Therefore, story-telling activities helped children to learn the structure and phonetic structure of words and how to pronounce them correctly by attracting the attention, concentration and active listening of children. The present study showed that participation in storytelling activities increases phonological awareness in preschool children. Considering the important role of phonological awareness in the future success of children in academic fields, language skills and especially reading skills, as well as the role of early interventions in the early years of life and preschool period in development. This skill, the purposeful integration of storytelling activities in the preschool curriculum, can be useful and beneficial in the development and strengthening of the phonological awareness of preschool children, along with its other advantages for children.
methods: The research method was an experimental type with a pre-test/post-test/follow-up design. From the statistical population of children aged 4 to 6 years in pre-school centers in the 12th district of Tehran, 30 eligible volunteer children were randomly assigned to the study and randomly assigned to two experimental and control groups. Informed consent of parents and managers of preschool centers, interest of the child, age range between 4 and 6 years, not having any disease or mental and physical disorders were considered as inclusion criteria. Exclusion criteria were the absence of more than 3 sessions of children in storytelling activities, occurrence of any physical and mental problems, simultaneous participation of children in any other related educational programs, and the willingness of parents, managers or children to withdraw from the research.Children in the intervention group participated in storytelling activities for 8 weeks, three one-hour sessions per week (24 sessions in total). There was no intervention for the control group. The data was collected using the phonological awareness scale (Soleimani and Dastjerdi Kazemi, 2015). In the study of the creators of this tool, the reliability of this test was calculated using Cronbach's alpha method, which was calculated as 0.98 for the whole test. Also, the results of factor analysis using the principal components method confirmed the three-factor structure of this questionnaire. The data were analyzed using repeated measures analysis of variance and Bonferroni's post hoc test at a significance level of 0.05 and through SPSS22 statistical software.
Results: Analysis of variance test with repeated measurement showed that storytelling activities significantly increased the phonological awareness of experimental group children in all three dimensions of syllabic awareness, awareness of intrasyllabic units and phonemic awareness (P<0.001). Also, the results of the Bonferroni test showed that the effectiveness of storytelling activities on all dimensions of phonological awareness continued until the follow-up stage (P<0.001).
Conclusion: Despite the effect of using direct teaching methods on children's phonological awareness, these effects are short-term because they are not compatible with the developmental and developmental characteristics of young children . As a result, they cannot be successful enough in attracting children's attention, concentration and listening, which are very important in the development of phonological awareness. Therefore, story-telling activities helped children to learn the structure and phonetic structure of words and how to pronounce them correctly by attracting the attention, concentration and active listening of children. The present study showed that participation in storytelling activities increases phonological awareness in preschool children. Considering the important role of phonological awareness in the future success of children in academic fields, language skills and especially reading skills, as well as the role of early interventions in the early years of life and preschool period in development. This skill, the purposeful integration of storytelling activities in the preschool curriculum, can be useful and beneficial in the development and strengthening of the phonological awareness of preschool children, along with its other advantages for children.
Type of Study: Original Research Article |
Subject:
Psychology
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