# Spelling training in 1st grade with the digital application ECRIMO: The impact of tablet use and of gamification on children's spelling performance.

Cynthia Boggio, Maryse Bianco, Marie-Line Bosse

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Cynthia Boggio, Maryse Bianco, Marie-Line Bosse. Spelling training in 1st grade with the digital application ECRIMO: The impact of tablet use and of gamification on children's spelling performance.. 22nd conference of the European Society for Cognitive Psychology, Aug 2022, Lille, France. . hal-03811725

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Submitted on 12 Oct 2022

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Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
# SPELLING TRAINING IN 1ST GRADE WITH THE DIGITAL APPLICATION ECRIMO:
The impact of tablet use and of gamification on children's spelling performance

Cynthia Boggio¹, Maryse Bianco² & Marie-Line Bosse¹

¹ Univ. Grenoble Alpes, CNRS, LPNC, 38000 Grenoble, France; ² Univ. Grenoble Alpes, LaRAC, 38000 Grenoble, France.

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## Introduction

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New technologies have a positive small effect on learning (e.g., Chauhan, 2017; Haßler et al., 2016; Jamshidifarsani et al., 2019; Sung et al., 2016).

* But very few studies compared the effectiveness of an application to its paper equivalent.

*Does the tablet device add value to spelling training?*

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Educational applications are often gamified.

* But the moderate positive effect of gamification on learning (Bai et al., 2020; Sailer & Homner, 2020) has been rarely tested with young children.

*Does gamification bring a gain to spelling training?*

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## Method

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### Participants

* 25 first grade classes, N = 311 students, Mean age = 7.27 years

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### Measure

* Student performance in spelling (word dictation task with a score per correct letter)

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## Results

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* **No significant effect** of the tablet on spelling performance.

* → Training on tablet = training on paper

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* **Interaction effect** between gamification and students' initial level. ($\beta$ = -0.28, $p$ = .02)

* → For low initial level students:

* **gamified** > **basic** (F = 4.89, $p$ = 0.029)

* → For medium and high level students:

* **gamified** = **basic**

<figure><img src="image_12.png" /><figcaption>Students' spelling scores on Test 2, depending on their level on Test 1 and the version (gamified or basic) they used.</figcaption></figure>

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## Conclusion

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*Does the tablet device add value to spelling training?*

Comparable effect of the training on tablet *in autonomy* and on paper with the teacher.

*Does gamification bring a gain to spelling training?*

The gamified version *reduces the gap* between weak and strong students compared to the basic version. It seems to be more favorable to low initial level students.

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## Acknowledgment:

Funding for this project was provided by

Les Editions Hatier and we thank them for their support. We sincerely thank Ahmed ZAHER for data analysis. Finally, we are very grateful to all the teachers and students who agreed to participate in this study. We would also like to thank the Academy of Grenoble for agreeing to support us in this project.

## References:

Chauhan, S. (2017). A meta-analysis of the impact of technology on learning effectiveness of elementary students. Computers & Education, 105, 14-30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2016.11.005

Haßler, B., Major, L. & Hennessy, S. (2016). Tablet use in schools : A critical review of the evidence for learning outcomes. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 32 (2), 139-156.

Jamshidifarsani, H., Garbaya, S., Lim, T., Blazevic, P. & Ritchie, J. M. (2019). Technology-based reading intervention programs for elementary grades : An analytical review. Computers & Education, 128, 427-451. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2018.10.003

Sung, Y.-T., Chang, K.-E. & Liu, T.-C. (2016). The effects of integrating mobile devices with teaching and learning on students' learning performance : A meta-analysis and research synthesis. Computers & Education, 94, 252-275.

Bai, S., Hew, K. F. & Huang, B. (2020). Does gamification improve student learning outcome ? Evidence from a meta-analysis and synthesis of qualitative data in educational contexts. Educational Research Review, 30, 100322. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.edurev.2020.100322

Sailer, M. & Homner, L. (2020). The gamification of learning : A meta-analysis. Educational Psychology Review, 32, 77-112. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-019-09498-w