The fun of using Puppet Pal with primary school-aged language learners

The context for teaching and learning is an urban Primary School in Christchurch, New Zealand. Many more English Language Learners (ELLs) than before are enrolling at the present time and now represent one fifth of the school roll.  The Primary School caters for Year 0-6 children and takes children from both in zone and out of zone.  Many of the ELLs enrolled at the current time are from out of zone.  One of the reasons given by out of zone parents for enrolling in this school is the robust ESOL programme offered in conjunction with the strong emphasis on technology enhanced language learning (TELL).

There has been a dramatic increase in the number of ELLs in the Junior School in the past two years. Many of these ELLs have had only minimal pre-school education and there is a noticeable decrease in early literacy skills among the newly enrolled five year olds.  Therefore, it is vital that the school harnesses the best tools in language learning. The school relies on recent research to demonstrate to its community that TELL improves English Language Learning. The study presented by Alhinty (2014) suggesting that the use of the iPad enhanced intrinsic motivation to learn the target language is one such example.

There is a sole teacher running the ESOL programme working four days per week. Due to the large increase in the number of ELLs at the school the teacher by necessity had to categorize the children into three groups by need.  The children with minimal English have ESOL withdrawal lessons twice per week.  The second tier have lessons twice per term and the third tier are monitored by a running record and analysis of writing taken by the ESOL teacher at three monthly intervals.

The ethnic breakdown of children by age group is shown in Table 1.

Table 1

The figures from Table 1 highlight that the majority of ELLs are of Asian descent with Chinese being the predominant ethnicity of L2 learners in this educational setting.

This school is well advanced in its implementation of technology-enhanced language learning (TELL).  The Principal is passionate about using technology to enhance learning generally and very supportive of TELL.  The school continues to purchase devices such as iPads, Chrome books, and lap-tops to ensure a technologically rich environment exists.  In addition to this there is also a BYOD policy in place.  Several ELLs from the seniors have taken advantage of this and have their own device so they always have access to technology to enhance learning in the target language. iPads are used to assist improvement in literacy learning across the school.  All children are taught to write collaboratively and share their work on Google docs.  There is a large group of children (including ELLs) who belong to the Code club run by the Principal before school twice a week.

A high number of teaching staff possess considerable expertise in weaving technology into learning. Several staff use specific skills in implementing TELL.  At least four staff members have studied language acquisition at a post-graduate level at Canterbury University in the last few years.  There are opportunities to share knowledge about TELL at staff meetings and this collaborative learning is encouraged by the school leadership team.

The justification of so much effort and enthusiasm toward technology-enhanced language learning continues to be addressed within the school community.  The Staff are encouraged to read widely and keep up-to-date with the latest research on how language is acquired and also the benefits of using technology to assist in this endeavour.  As part of the school’s policy on informing the school community regarding learning, relevant research is presented and discussed at Parent Talk Times.  A recent example of this was the examination of Falloon’s (2013) findings on selecting appropriate iPad apps.

Puppet Pal

Perceived ease of use

The app is very easy to access as an online software programme.  The touch screen technology is simple. Five to six year-old learners of English as an additional language enjoy using this tool.

Perceived usefulness

The value that Hartson (2003) places on “cognitive affordance, physical affordance, sensory affordance and functional affordance” p. (323) are all present in the Puppet Pal app. Young L2 learners go through a process that embraces rich language skills throughout.  Firstly, the learners choose the puppets, and create dialogue and interactions based on prior learning.  The L2 learners take turns to record their puppet show.  A listening activity follows as the learners replay the video and can self-assess its qualities and flaws.  This induces a high level of oral discussion and engagement in the target language.  The learners can decide to make several more recordings of the same activity with the intention of improving their target language each time.  The entire process helps the learners create and built greater knowledge and skills pertaining to the target language.  Learning takes place both visually and through audio. In addition to this, much critical thinking is developed through allowing the learners to take more ownership of their own language learning.  Captured video is evidence of learning.  Oral competencies in the target language can be monitored, but moreover a process of self-reflection and self-regulation of their own language development can be undertaken by the learners themselves.

Appropriateness for this context

The tactile interface of the touch screen appeals to young learners and allows them to be independent of the teacher throughout the process of creating a video recording of their own puppet show.  This affordance promotes active engagement in learning.  Learners are very interactive and meaningful language learning occurs. The multimodal nature of the tool allows learner choice and can cater well to individual learning styles and varying levels of English proficiency.

Video presentation

This video presentation aims to clearly demonstration the functions and usefulness of the digital tool Puppet Pal.

By Kathryn O’Regan