STORYTELLING SUPPORTED BY TECHNOLOGY: AN ALTERNATIVE FOR EFL CHILDREN WITH LEARNING DIFFICULTIES

This action research aims to investigate how technology improves the conditions of storytelling to help enhance the learning attitude and motivation of EFL children with learning difficulty using power point designs and an online recording system—VoiceThread (http://voicethread.com/). The use of power point designs is to assure children of clear illustrations and print during storytelling. VoiceThread is used to present the story with audio and visual aids to help children review keywords and read aloud simple summarizing sentences. By online practicing, children were more involved in the storytelling and language acquisition process, chances rarely available in the regular class. Twenty Taiwanese EFL children determined learning-at-risk took part in this one-year project; survey questionnaires, storytellers’ ethnographic notes, and teacher interviews were collected to examine the progress in terms of their changes in attitude, motivation, and responsiveness to storytelling and English learning. Results showed that the improvement in the task of reading aloud was of small magnitude; their attitude and motivation, however, did improve noticeably in their more active responses to the stories presented using technology and more cooperative behavior in related activities.