Our objectives in conducting this study were to generate information about the range and depth of research undertaken into the use of digital storytelling4 in the language classroom, to identify gaps in the body of existing research, to promote its effectiveness as a pedagogical tool, thereby encouraging a greater use of digital storytelling amongst practitioners.
Mindful that what was required needed to be “systematic, explicit, comprehensive and reproducible” (Fink, 2014) we adopted a systematic review approach for this study. Systematic
3 Digital Literacy, Global Literacy, Technology Literacy, Visual Literacy and Information Literacy
4 Digital storytelling encompasses activity that includes the use by researchers of previously created digital stories
review is a well-established approach in the field of health research where is it has been used to summarise evidence on given health conditions to establish for example the efficacy and safety of certain treatments, to facilitate a wider understanding of developments thereby encouraging the dissemination and application of those developments. Systematic review has also usefully identified lacunae in existing research and, because of its systematic nature can serve to eliminate, to some degree, the risk of bias. For these reasons it appeared that this approach might also be usefully applied to the subject of digital storytelling where there is a burgeoning body of research. Adopting a systematic review approach would therefore satisfy our objectives. Having determined to adopt a systematic review approach we implemented the following process:
Step 1:
We selected Web of Science as the online database from which to identify research that had been published between 2007 and 20017, using the following criteria:
▪ Digital Storytelling
▪ Language
▪ Teaching
and conducted a search in late October 2017 in the following categories:
▪ Education
▪ Language
▪ Linguistics
Step 2:
We stored those publications identified in Step 1 in a Mendeley Library created for the purpose of this study and, during November and early December 2017 supplemented our database search with those items suggested by Mendeley. A list of 65 publications was
▪ who the participants are;
▪ what the proficiency levels are;
▪ which skills are being addressed;
▪ what the approach to storytelling is;
▪ what storytelling tools are used; and
▪ what was the duration and location of the study.
A final list of 18 publications was identified at the end of Step 3.
Step 4:
Using the following parameters, the list identified in Step 3 was organised in a rubric created in an Excel spreadsheet. This supported the subsequent analysis of the information discussed in the Findings section below.
Analysis of the rubric data established the following:
Location - Geographical
The majority of research was conducted in Spain and Turkey (Table 1). Of that research conducted in Spain three studies were based in Valencia (Torres, Ponce and Pastor, 2012;
5 Scopus was used to identify those publications that had been peer reviewed on the basis that Scopus is described as being the largest abstract and citation database of peer-reviewed literature.
Pardo, 2014; Diaz, 2016) whilst the fourth was in Madrid (Verdugo and Belmonte, 2007). In Turkey two studies were based in rural locations (Yıldırım, Torun and Pınar Torun, 2014;
Yamaç and Ulusoy, 2016) and the third in a city location (Ciğerci and Gultekin, 2017). We would suggest that a preponderance of research in a particular location suggests that factors exist which have encouraged an interest in computer assisted learning, certainly in Turkey there is an initiative that seeks to support the use of technology in the classroom which may provide an explanation.
Age of Participants
Whilst research was conducted across the whole age spectrum from very young learners to adults the majority of participants were adults (Table 2).
• Very Young Learners (Verdugo and Belmonte, 2007; Papadimitriou et al., 2013)
• Young Learners (Yıldırım, Torun and Pınar Torun, 2014; Hwang et al., 2016; Yamaç and Ulusoy, 2016; Ciğerci and Gultekin, 2017)
• Young Adults (Yang and Wu, 2012; Tahriri, Tous and Movahedfar, 2015; Towndrow, 2015; Batsila and Tsihouridis, 2016)
• Adults (Torres, Ponce and Pastor, 2012; Kim, 2014; Lee, 2014; Pardo, 2014; Thang, Mahmud and Tng, 2015; Diaz, 2016; Nishioka, 2016; Leshchenko, Ruban and Tymchuk, 2017).
very young learners young learners young adults adults
TABLE 2: AGE TABLE 3: VENUE
Location - Venue
Unsurprisingly, given that the majority of participants were adults most of the research was conducted in a university or college as is shown in Table 3. Three of these university based studies were conducted in Spain with participants who were enrolled on undergraduate courses for students intending to become Primary School Teachers (Torres, Ponce and Pastor, 2012;
Pardo, 2014; Diaz, 2016). The venue for two studies, one conducted online with independent learners (Kim, 2014) and the other in a private language institute (Tahriri, Tous and Movahedfar, 2015) was categorized as “other”.
Language Focus
The overwhelming number of studies related to second language learning. Participants in the three studies relating to first language classrooms (Papadimitriou et al., 2013; Yamaç and Ulusoy, 2016; Ciğerci and Gultekin, 2017) were native speakers as indicated in Table 4.
Proficiency Levels
Whilst it is notable that for a significant number of studies proficiency levels were not identified it is evident that research has been conducted across the whole spectrum of proficiency from beginner to upper intermediate, although no research was undertaken with participants at an advanced level (Table 5). It is noteworthy that in two studies research was undertaken with groups with mixed proficiency levels (Lee, 2014; Nishioka, 2016).
Duration of Study
No consistent description of the duration of the studies was identified consequently duration was analysed in terms of the period described, the number of weeks and number of hours.
Periods were variously described as sessions, terms and years without necessarily defining what constituted a session nor how long a term was or whether a year was calendar or academic.
For these studies it was not possible to define the duration with any degree of precision (Torres, Ponce and Pastor, 2012; Lee, 2014; Pardo, 2014; Diaz, 2016; Leshchenko, Ruban and Tymchuk, 2017). These are identified as Imprecise in Table 6. Three studies described duration in terms of the number of weeks but did not specify how much time was spent during those weeks (Papadimitriou et al., 2013; Thang, Mahmud and Tng, 2015; Ciğerci and Gultekin, 2017). These studies are identified in Table 6 as Unclear. Nine studies are described as Clear in Table 6, these studies defined duration in terms of weeks and hours. Duration was unspecified in one study (Nishioka, 2016).
Size of Study
Study size varied considerably as is shown in Table 7. The largest study contained 220 participants (Verdugo and Belmonte, 2007) and the smallest 3 (Nishioka, 2016). The most
22%
78%
TABLE 4: LANGUAGE FOCUS
1st language 2nd language
beginner elementary pre intermediate intermediate upper intermediate advanced native speaker unknown mixed
TABLE 5: PROFICIENCY
common study size was one with participants numbering between 20 and 49 and in this category the largest studies (Diaz, 2016; Leshchenko, Ruban and Tymchuk, 2017) had 48 participants and the smallest 21 (Pardo, 2014).
Focus of Research:
Research focus was categorised as being on:
1. Skills:
▪ reading
▪ writing
▪ speaking
▪ listening
2. Motivation /
Engagement
3. Other:
▪ critical thinking and digital literacy skills
▪ the interaction between participants;
▪ the opinions and perceptions of participants and teachers
▪ methods and processes The majority of studies had a single focus6 (Table 8) and the principle focus was on skills (Table 9). Of those studies that focussed on skills the majority were concerned with speaking skills and in only one study was the focus on writing (Batsila and Tsihouridis, 2016)
6Of those studies with a single focus (Table 8) the majority related to skills.
TABLE 6: DURATION
2
4
7 165 5
57.5 34.8
10.40 50 100 150 200
0 2 4 6 8
100+ 50-99 20-49 1-19
TABLE 7: SIZE OF STUDY
Number of studies
Average number of students
Storytelling Approach and Choice of Storytelling Tools
In the overwhelming majority of studies, the storytelling approach was student led, that is the participants were responsible for developing and creating their own digital stories, having had some initial pre-instruction from a teacher (Table 12).
In only four studies was the storytelling approach teacher led, that is the teacher was responsible for the selection of existing digital stories which were then used by participants during the study. Of those that were student led in one (Diaz, 2016) the student participants were pre service teacher who developed and created digital stories for use by them in their teaching placements.
There is a vast and diverse array of tools available for use in the creation of digital stories and to some degree this diversity was reflected in the choice of digital storytelling tools used in these studies as illustrated in Table 13. It should be noted that some studies made use of multiple tools. One study made use of unspecified Web 2.0-based applications (Nishioka, 2016) and two did not specify the tool(s) used (Ciğerci and Gultekin, 2017; Leshchenko, Ruban and Tymchuk, 2017). Microsoft products were the most popular - of the eighteen studies discussed in this paper six made use of Microsoft Photo Story 3 and of those six, three also made use of Microsoft Movie Maker.
TABLE 13: STORYTELLING TOOLS
Tool Description
Microsoft Photo Story 3 User-friendly requiring basic computer skills. Can upload and customise images, record voice and add music.
It can be accessed offline
Microsoft Movie Maker Video editing software used to create, edit and publish videos.
Now discontinued Vegas Pro 11 Video editing software
Pow Toon User-friendly, intuitive animation software.
skill engagement / motivation
other
TABLE 9: RESEARCH FOCUS
reading writing speaking listening
TABLE 10: SKILL FOCUS
TABLE 12: STORYTELLING APPROACH
Student Led Teacher Led
“Storyboard” A sequential display of text and graphics used to support the creation of an interactive media sequence.
BBC Stories in full multimedia format, with sound, music, and animation selected from BBC website (2007)
www.storyarts.org Website providing a Story Library, Lesson Plans & Activities and a Story Arts Theatre
‘Up and Away’ Digital storytelling software developed by Oxford University Press.
Kindersite Website with links to games, songs and stories.
VoiceThread Interactive and multimedia online slide show program.
Vocaroo Online recording program
vozMe Text-to-Speech program
Digital camera / webcam
Blog http://elmer-project.blogspot.com/2011/01/blog-post_9004.html Developed by the
researchers for the purposes of the study.
Web-based multimedia system with 2 main functions: Story Editor and Story Player.