Exploring the Relationship Between Kindergarteners’ Buddy Reading and Individual Comprehension of Interactive App Books

Interactive app books are increasingly part of young children’s literacy ecosystem. However, most previous studies examined buddy reading with traditional print books or CD-ROM books. Little is known about whether and how buddy reading with app books might be related to subsequent individual reading. To address this, informed by multimodal literacy and sociocultural theories, we investigated how 53 kindergarteners’ (ages 5–6 years) buddy reading behaviors were related to their subsequent individual reading behaviors and comprehension outcomes while reading app books. Multivariate mixed response analysis yielded these findings: (1) buddy reading monitoring behaviors (asked questions, drew attention to book content, debated, or negotiated) were associated with higher inference/critical thinking and vocabulary meaning generation scores; (2) buddies who read in triads had lower individual-prompted retelling scores than buddies who read in dyads. The findings highlight the importance of promoting monitoring during buddy reading and paying attention to group size.

How App Books’ Affordances Are Related to Young Children’s Reading Behaviors and Outcomes

Given the increasing use of app books with young children, research is needed to inform their selection and design. Although broad guidelines exist, more fine-grained guidance is needed. To address this need, we explored the relations among app books’ digital affordances, readers’ behaviors with these affordances during both buddy and individual reading sessions, and their individual outcomes. Fifty-three kindergarteners (ages 5.05–6.46 years; M = 5.60, SD = 0.42) read 12 app books twice each across 24 buddy reading sessions and four app books once each across four individual reading sessions, and their comprehension was assessed after each individual reading session. Multivariate, mixed response analysis found that (a) when a greater number of minimum hotspots were available per page, retelling was better; and (b) availability of word hotspots was linked to better critical thinking/inference outcomes. Implications include choosing app books with affordances that this study showed support particular reading outcomes, in alignment with instructional goals.

Translingual Practice, Strategic Participation, and Meaning-Making

This case study examines one third-grade teacher’s strategic participation in translingual practice and the ways that this participation shaped emerging bilingual students’ meaningful engagements with texts. Using a transliteracies perspective, we describe instances of emergence and resonance as students and their teacher leveraged resources coded in English, Arabic, and Spanish to co-construct meaning. Analysis of small-group guided reading, buddy reading, and an interactive read-aloud detail how the teacher used entextualizing, envoicing, and recontextualizing strategies to support students’ participation. Analysis of postinstruction interviews describes how resources, expertise, and emotion resonated within each literacy event and across time for this teacher. We conclude with recommendations for including translingual pedagogies in similar classroom contexts, arguing for the importance of recognizing and developing teachers’ translingual competence, as well as their emerging multilingualism.