[PS-2.14] GraphoGame Flemish: a computerized literacy training for children at cognitive risk for dyslexia

Glatz, T. 1 , Vanden Bempt, F. 2 , Vanderauwera, J. . 2 , Economou, M. 1 , Vandermosten, M. 1 , Wouters, J. 1 & Ghesquière, P. 2

1 ExpORL, KU Leuven, Belgium
2 Parenting and Special Education, KU Leuven, Belgium

GraphoGame is a computerized child friendly learning environment designed to train early literacy skills in children. This tool has been applied in a range of alphabetic languages with mixed results regarding its effectiveness (Richardson & Lyytinen, 2014). In this work we present first results of a newly developed version for Flemish Dutch, which has a focus on training early letter knowledge and phonological awareness skills.
A total of 150 pre-readers (aged 5;3) participated in this study, consisting of 120 children with a cognitive risk for dyslexia who played either a reading game training letter knowledge, phonological awareness and reading skills (N=60), a range of non-educational games (N=30) or acted as passive control group (N=30). Another passive control group was recruited from age matched children without cognitive risk (N=30). The training took place on a tablet at home and lasted 12 weeks, with six weekly sessions of 15 minutes.
We will discuss design, implementation and training fidelity of this unique study with several control groups and a comparatively extensive training period of up to 18 hours across 72 sessions. We will further present first insights from behavioural and in-game data.