ENHANCING EARLY LITERACY SKILLS THROUGH PLUGGED GCOMPRIS-BASED DIGITAL LEARNING

Abstract

Early literacy is a foundational predictor of later reading development, yet many kindergarten children still experience difficulty recognizing letters, connecting letters with sounds, matching letters with meaningful images, and discriminating visually similar letter forms. This study examined the effect of Plugged GCompris-based digital learning on the early literacy skills of children aged 5–6 years. A quantitative quasi-experimental pretest–posttest control-group design was used with 20 children, comprising 10 children in an experimental group and 10 in a control group. Data were collected through observation and early-literacy tasks and analyzed using descriptive statistics, normalized gain (N-Gain), and the Mann–Whitney test. The experimental group obtained a mean N-Gain of 0.77 (SD = 0.20), whereas the control group obtained 0.14 (SD = 0.20). The experimental group also had a substantially higher Mann–Whitney mean rank (15.20) than the control group (5.80), and the original analysis reported a statistically significant between-group difference. Improvement was evident across alphabet recognition, letter–sound association, picture–letter matching, and visual discrimination. The findings indicate that well-aligned interactive digital activities can strengthen constrained early-literacy skills when used as a complement to teacher-guided instruction. The study is limited by its small, single-site sample and absence of delayed retention measurement, warranting larger and longer-term investigations.