Education in the app store: using a mobile game to support U.S. preschoolers’ vocabulary learning

ABSTRACT

Despite the prevalence of educational apps for children, there is little evidence of their effectiveness for learning. Here, children were asked to learn ten new words in a narrative mobile game that requires children use knowledge of word meanings to advance the game. Study 1 used a lab-based between-subjects design with middle-SES 4-year-olds and used a receptive vocabulary test to examine whether children learned the game’s words. Children who played the game answered more questions correctly than children who did not play the game. Study 2 used a within-subjects design with low-SES preschoolers who played the game four times as part of a larger classroom intervention. Children showed evidence of learning on both a receptive and an expressive vocabulary measure. The difference between pre- and post-test scores was significantly larger for target words than for five non-exposure control words. Results show that both middle-SES children in the lab and low-SES children in the classroom learned new vocabulary from an interactive mobile game, suggesting that developmentally-appropriate mobile games show promise for vocabulary learning.

KEYWORDS:

• Mobile game
• digital game
• app
• vocabulary
• learning
• preschool
• classroom
• narrative

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to SmartyPal, especially Prasanna Krishnan, Lakshmi Sudarsan, Kirsten St. Peter, and Brian Verdine. Thank you to the administrators, teachers, parents, and children at the Acelero Learning in Philadelphia and the Nashville Public Schools, as well as the parents and children who participated in the lab. We thank members of the Temple Infant and Child Lab, the UD Child’s Play Learning and Development Lab, and David Dickinson’s lab at Vanderbilt University for their assistance in data collection and coding, as well as Nick Rogers for creating the digital receptive vocabulary measure.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Institute of Education Sciences [R305A150435, R305B130012].

Notes on contributors

Rebecca A. Dore

Rebecca A. Dore is a Senior Research Associate at the Crane Center for Early Childhood Research and Policy at The Ohio State University. She received her PhD in Developmental Psychology from the University of Virginia. Her primary research interests are focused on children’s engagement with and learning from play, storybooks, and digital media.

Marcia Shirilla

Marcia Shirilla is a doctoral candidate at the University of Delaware. She holds a master’s degree in Leisure Studies from The Pennsylvania State University and has extensive experience working in the recreation industry. Current projects investigate children’s perceptions of learning and play and the relationship between physical activity and executive function.

Emily Hopkins

Emily Hopkins is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of Scranton. Her research focuses on the role of play and media in early childhood. She is interested understanding which features of play and media lead to optimal learning in order to design experiences that are educational as well as entertaining for young children.

Molly Collins

Molly Collins is a faculty member in the Department of Teaching and Learning, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University.  Her research investigates language and literacy development in young children.  She collaborates on multiple projects, is author of several research and practitioner publications, and teaches courses in language acquisition and linguistics.

Molly Scott

Molly Scottis a doctoral student in developmental psychology at Temple University studying how to improve children's vocabulary outcomes. She is a graduate fellow of the Temple Public Policy Lab.

Jacob Schatz

Jacob Schatz is a graduate student in the Developmental Psychology program at NYU Steinhardt.  He is broadly interested in examining the behavioral components of adult-child interaction that support healthy development and learning. Jacob currently works on an investigation of parent-infant interaction and infant object exploration in naturalistic home environments. He previously worked as a lab coordinator at the Temple University Infant and Child Lab.

Jessica Lawson-Adams

Jessica Lawson-Adams is a doctoral candidate at Vanderbilt University.  She holds a master's degree in Educational Psychology and a bachelor's degree in Music Education from the University of Georgia.  Her current projects examine multimodal approaches to supporting children's vocabulary learning in school settings.

Tara Valladares

Tara Valladares is a doctoral student in quantitative psychology at the University of Virginia. Her research focuses on combining new machine learning techniques with traditional item response models. She is currently focused on developing new methods of emotion detection and topic modeling in unstructured text.

Lindsey Foster

Lindsey Foster is a student at Harvard Law School. She previously worked as a lab coordinator at the University of Delaware Child’s Play, Learning, and Development Lab. Prior to working in the lab, she earned her bachelor’s degree at Bryn Mawr College.

Hannah Puttre

Hannah Puttre is a PhD student at Boston University working with Dr. Kathleen Corriveau.  Prior to beginning her doctoral studies, she earned her bachelor's degree at the University of Rochester and worked as a lab coordinator for the University of Delaware Child's Play, Learning, and Development Lab.  Her current research interests focus on informal learning and ways to capitalize on learning opportunities in everyday settings.

Tamara Spiewak Toub

Tamara Spiewak Toub earned her Ph.D. at the University of Washington and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Temple University. Her research on play and learning has explored the use of sociodramatic play, music, games, or digital apps to support vocabulary, STEM skills, and executive function. Dr. Toub helps translate developmental science into application in children’s lives through projects with organizations such as the Joan Ganz Cooney Center (Sesame Workshop), the LEGO Foundation, Reflection Sciences, and the Affinity Project (developing an app for individuals with autism).

Elizabeth Hadley

Elizabeth Hadley is a an assistant professor of literacy studies and the Anchin Center Scholar in Residence at the University of South Florida. She received her Ph.D in Teaching & Learning from Vanderbilt University. Her work focuses on the connection between oral language and reading comprehension, vocabulary development, and creating language-rich classrooms.

Roberta M. Golinkoff

Roberta M. Golinkoff  has received numerous awards for her contributions to developmental science, including recent selection as a Fellow for the Cognitive Science Society and American Educational Research Association. Funded by federal agencies and foundations, she has written 16 books and dozens of research articles. She is passionate about disseminating psychological science and has made many national media appearances. Her latest book (with Hirsh-Pasek) is Becoming Brilliant: What Science Tells Us About Raising Successful Children.

David Dickinson

David Dickinson is the Margaret Cowan Chair and the Associate Dean for Research at Vanderbilt University.  He studies the association between language and literacy development, has created interventions designed to support early language development, and has presented widely to researchers and practitioners. His new book, Connecting through Talk, published by Brookes Publishing, describes how language supports all aspects of early development and reviews programs that help parents foster its growth.

Kathy Hirsh-Pasek

Kathy Hirsh-Pasek is the Lefkowitz Faculty Fellow in the Department of Psychology at Temple University and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. She is the author of 14 books and hundreds of publications and has won numerous awards in her field. Vested in translating the science of learning for lay audiences, she has made many national media appearances and wrote (with Golinkoff), A Mandate for Playful Learning in Preschool and Einstein Never Used Flashcards.