By: Inas Essa

When asked to embody the learning environment in a sketch, our minds usually pick a scene in which a child is sitting in a classroom, reading or writing in an open book. Our minds normally link learning with physical classrooms; however, the pandemic has changed several concepts in different domains. In learning, while online learning has become a norm, virtual classrooms have replaced real ones in the space and the role they play.

As a result, students of all ages shifted to remote learning; while it seems manageable for high schoolers, it may seem very difficult for preschoolers. However, a new study from the University of Washington's Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences has shown that kindergarten students could acquire reading skills in virtual classrooms.

The Reading Camp

Authors of the new study highlight that the “Reading Camp” program they have developed serves two important goals: promoting learning and reaching larger numbers of students remotely, worldwide. "Children are ready to learn to read at the age of 5. But the pandemic robbed children of the opportunity for in-person reading instruction," said faculty author Patricia Kuhl, co-director of I-LABS and a UW professor of speech and hearing sciences.

The study, which is published in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, involved a two-week reading program, the “Reading Camp”, which teachers provided remotely to 5-year-olds beginning in the fall of 2020. Reading skills acquisition involves several steps:

• Phonological awareness: Recognizing distinguished sounds in a language;

• Letter-sound knowledge: Identifying the names of individual letters and how they sound;

• Decoding words and their meanings.

In the recent study, the research team highlighted that, by attending the camp, the participants gained specific reading skills, like phonological awareness and letter-sound knowledge. Before starting the camp, researchers sent parents a kit of materials that included headphones, worksheets, and books, besides Play-Doh, toys, and other fun items like colored plastic eggs from the kit for use in the lessons for better engagement.

Using the Right Methodology Is Key

During the camp, children were divided into six-person classrooms, each with two instructors trained in the specific skills lessons. To make it easier for children to concentrate on the lessons, the three hours session per day was interspersed with several breaks, as short lessons were broken up by activities, and ended with a story time. Also, during the lesson, the classrooms were broken into smaller ones; three-student breakout rooms, each with a teacher to focus more on the lessons and games.

"This shows that we can actually teach kids online if we are using the correct methodology, keeping them engaged, and they are interacting socially with their peers and teachers," said Yael Weiss-Zruya, a research scientist at I-LABS and the study's first author; "combining all of this made it successful".

Results of the tests conducted at the end of the camp demonstrated that children improved in all of the reading skills measured, and their phonological awareness and knowledge of lowercase letters and sounds. These results were even surprising for the research team as they noticed how kids were interacting while using the material, provided by them, as their social connections to each other were obvious and their learning was incredible.

References

> washington.edu

> frontiersin.org