The Effect of Digital Storytelling as an Instructional Technique in Improving Fifth Grade Students’ English Reading Comprehension Skills

Abstract

This study aimed at investigating the effect of digital storytelling in developing fifth grade students' achievement in reading comprehension skills. The target skills were prediction, skimming, scanning, guessing the meaning through context and Inference. A quasi- experimental approach was used in this study. The total number of participants was 60 in a Private school in Damascus city in the first semester of the academic year 2021-2022. The sample consisted of two groups: the control group (30) students, and the experimental group (30) students. The instruments of the study were an achievement reading comprehension test of five scopes with (15) items and a digital story. The SPSS statistical program was used to analyze the study data and the hypotheses were tested at the level of significance (α= 0.05). The results indicated that there were statistically significant differences between both groups in favour of the experimental one, in prediction, skimming, scanning, guessing the meaning of words through context and inference skills due to the digital storytelling technique. Effect size technique indicated a large effect of this technique in improving reading comprehension skills collectively and in guessing the meaning of word through context skill. Whereas, it indicated a medium effect in improving prediction, skimming and scanning skills and had a low effect in improving the inference skill for the experimental group.

Based on those findings, the study recommended the necessity of implementing the digital storytelling technique in teaching English to bring better outcomes in students' achievements. It was also suggested that further research should be conducted on the effect of digital storytelling in learning different skills of English language and other school subjects.