“Mobile app features that scaffold pre‐school learning: Verbal feedback and leveling designs”

Alumna Melissa Callaghan (Ph.D. ’18) and Professor Stephanie Reich publish an article in the British Journal of Educational Technology assessing the scaffolding potential of mobile devices.
 
The title of the article is “Mobile app features that scaffold pre‐school learning: Verbal feedback and leveling designs.”
 
Callaghan is a postdoctoral researcher in Research to Practice Learning Technologies and Infrastructure at Harvard University's Graduate School of Education. Her research interests include digital contributors to academic motivation and engagement, computer games and apps that promote interest in education, game design features that are effective for early childhood to adolescent learning, and methods for testing educational technology. 

Melissa Callaghan

Stephanie Reich

As a doctoral student she specialized Learning, Teaching, Cognition, and Development (LTCD). Reich served as her advisor. 
​​Reich is a community psychologist studying contexts that support children’s development. Her research focuses on children’s direct and technologically mediated interactions with family, peers, and educational settings. She is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association (APA) and the Society for Community Research and Action. Reich is director of UCI's Development in Social Context Lab (DISC) and Associate Dean of UCI’s Graduate Program.
 
Abstract
 
Guiding hints and challenge can help scaffold learners to progress beyond what they would achieve independently. The interactive and adaptive capabilities of mobile devices allow educational applications (apps) to support learning through scaffolding designs. However, little research has tested the effects of scaffolding features in apps on young children’s learning. Using a 3 × 2 between‐subjects design, this study experimentally tests how three types of app feedback (nonverbal sounds, verbal encouragement, or scaffolded verbal hints) and two types of leveling (gradual vs. random‐ordered challenge) influence 4–5‐year‐old children’s learning of novel words (N = 240). Results showed that scaffolded feedback was especially useful when provided at the beginning of app play (p < .01), and scaffolded leveling through gradual increases in difficulty supported faster and more accurate responses than random order challenge (p < .001). Both boys and girls may benefit from texting a friend after experiencing a stressful event.