DigiHand

DIGIHAND

Objective

DigiHand is a research group which aims to investigate how the use of tablets and various writing tools affect first grade students' handwriting and writing development over 2 years. Another aim is to conduct competence building in our teacher educations at Volda University College and at the Reading Center at the University of Stavanger. In 2018 we were granted almost 10 million NOK from The Research Council of Norway to conduct the research project “DigiHand – The emergence of handwriting skills in the digital classrooms”. The study period is from 2018-2022. 

Researchers in DigiHand:

Project leader of DigiHand: Professor Wenke Mork Rogne, VUC
Research leader: Professor Siv M. Gamlem, VUC
Mentor: Professor Per Henning Uppstad, UiS
Associate Professor Vibeke Rønneberg, UiS (Post Doc)
Associate Professor Pernille Fiskerstrand, VUC
Associate Professor Birgitte Fondevik, VUC
Associate Professor Liv Ingrid A. Håberg, VUC
Associate Professor Gudrun K. Juul, VUC
Associate Professor Marit Wadsten, VUC
Assistant Professor Lina R. Kobberstad, VUC

Ph.d. Candidates

Eivor Finset Spilling, VUC
Camilla Fitjar, UiS
Liv Kristin B. Øvereng, VUC

Activities

The members of the research group have made a strong contribution to the development of the design and collection of data in the DigiHand project at the schools. Furthermore, they have been involved in coding and analysis, as well as writing articles on the data. The meeting activity is determined by the progression and milestones in the project. The members arrange webinars for teachers and researchers nationally and internationally, we arrange writing seminars for the members, and help to arrange and contribute to national and international conferences. We also have PhD candidates and master students in the project.

DigiHand – Project description

The Norwegian curriculum requires teachers of early grade classrooms to involve digital tools in literacy instruction, without any specification of how and to what extent digital tools should be used. Consequently, Norwegian classrooms display a large variation in how letters and handwriting are explicitly taught and trained. Over recent years, teacher training institutions have faced a new phenomenon; elementary schools dismissing pen and paper until the second grade for the benefit of writing applications with advanced text/letter-to-speech synthesis on digital tablets. Research on the gains and pitfalls of these new practices is lacking. There is a need for knowledge and understanding on how these practices give implications for different groups of disadvantaged students as well as for general learning outcome.

DigiHand is a longitudinal natural experiment investigating how the use of different writing tools influence teachers' practice and students’ handwriting and letter knowledge, word reading, spelling, and student’s text writing competence from 1st to 2nd grade (students 6 yrs in 1st grade).The mainstay of the design is a logging handwriting and other literacy measures supplemented with systematic video observation using classroom assessment scoring system (CLASS) combined with qualitative case-studies. 33 schools (n=585 students) were recruited from three actually occurring conditions. Students in these conditions either: 1) learn to write on a tablet while postponing handwriting, 2) learn both to handwrite and write on a tablet, 3) learn to handwrite. This design allows us to investigate the effects of the use of different writing tools in beginning writing instruction. Effect analyses will be conducted on three main domains of measures i) Students’ letter knowledge, spelling competence and word reading competence, ii) Students’ handwriting fluency, and iii) Students’ text writing competence. DigiHand is a joint effort of Volda University College (VUC) and the University of Stavanger (UIS). In addition to the innovative initiative to current societal changes inherent in DigiHand, the formal competency building at VUC is a central goal of the project. This approach has the potential of providing a comprehensive knowledge base for early literacy instruction and a new research base to investigate the ongoing keyboard/pen controversy.
 

Publications

Fitjar, C., Rønneberg, V., Nottbush, G., Torrance, M. (2021).  Learning handwriting: Factors Affecting Pen-Movement Fluency in Beginning Writers. Frontiers in Psychology.

Gamlem, S.M., Rogne, W.M, Rønneberg, V. og Uppstad, P.H. (2019): Protocol Article: The Emergence of writing skills in the digital classroom. Nordic Journal of Literacy Research.

Kobberstad, L. og Gamlem, S.M. (2021). Feedback for læring 1. klasse – tre     lærarar sitt arbeid i begynneropplæringa. Kognition & Pædagogik, 31(120), s.80-88.

Kobberstad, L., Gamlem, S.M, & Rogne, W.M. (2020). Begynneropplæring i skriving med og utan nettbrett – lærarar sitt utgangspunkt for tilpassa opplæring. I: L.J. Halvorsen, R. Stokken, W.M.Rogne, I.J. Erdal. (2020).     Digital samhandling. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget.

Rogne, W.M, Gamlem, S.M., & Ottesen, R.L. (2021). Lese- og skriveferdigheter ved oppstart i 1.klasse med vekt på bokstavkunnskap. Acta Didactica Norden.

Spilling, E.F., Rønneberg, V., Rogne, W.M., Roeser, J., & Torrance, M. (2021). Handwriting versus keyboarding: does writing modality affect quality of narratives written by beginning writers? Reading and Writing.