Technology and Bilingual Education: Helping Yolŋu Students Crack the Alphabetic Code Gemma Alejandra Morales https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1123-0330 Ph.D. Arts Candidate October, 2018 School of Languages and Linguistics This thesis is being submitted in total fulfilment of the degree. ABSTRACT Phonological awareness and letter knowledge have a significant and causal relationship with early reading for readers of alphabetic languages. While the existing research regarding the emergent reading skills of mainstream Western populations is vast, little is known about the development of literacy skills among children coming from cultures transmitted primarily through oral tradition. This study examined the emergent literacy skills of students attending a remote bilingual Indigenous school in the Northern Territory, Australia. The study included all Transition (kindergarten) to Grade 4 students enrolled at the participating school. This thesis proposes that phonological awareness, letter knowledge, and early word reading are closely related for children learning to read in Dhuwaya and that phonological awareness training can facilitate the acquisition of early reading ability in Dhuwaya. A Dhuwaya language game-like iPad application software was used as a phonological awareness intervention tool. This Intervention App was specifically designed and created for this thesis project. The Intervention App includes 24 levels that progressively increase in difficulty. Each level consists of a sound segmentation activity, a letter knowledge activity, and a sound blending activity. Letter knowledge, phonological awareness (at both the syllable and phoneme level), and word recognition skills were measured at three separate testing times: immediately before the start of the intervention, immediately after the intervention ended, and six months after the intervention ended. This study investigated the different patterns and relationships found amongst the participants’ performance across the various measures assessed. This study also examined the relationship between student age and assessment performance. i The study also investigated the intervention effects, if any, on phonological awareness, letter knowledge, and early word reading. The results indicate that phonological awareness, particularly at the phoneme level, is significantly related to early word recognition in Dhuwaya. Results also suggest that letter knowledge mastery is crucial to early word recognition in Dhuwaya. However, the participants’ letter knowledge, phonemic awareness, and word recognition skills were delayed when compared to the benchmarks proposed in existing research. Phonemic awareness and word recognition scores were particularly low across all three testing times. Post-intervention scores suggest that the Intervention App did not have a significant impact on syllable awareness and letter knowledge skills. However, post-intervention scores suggest that the Intervention App was moderately successful in increasing phonemic awareness skills and that increased phonemic awareness skills may have led to increased word recognition skills. The theoretical and practical implications of the results are discussed in this thesis, as well as suggestions for creating more effective Dhuwaya language emergent literacy IT resources. ii DECLARATIONS I, Gemma Alejandra Morales, the degree candidate, hereby declare that this thesis is entirely comprised of my original work towards the Doctor of Philosophy (Arts) degree except where indicated in the preface. All sources of information referred to in this work are acknowledged with reference to the respective authors. This thesis contains fewer than the maximum word limit of 100,000 words exclusive of tables, figures, bibliographies, and appendices. iii PREFACE This thesis includes a few excerpts from a published book chapter authored by myself, Gemma Alejandra Morales. Research conducted for this Ph.D. thesis was used to author the book chapter. I am the first author of the book chapter. Jill Vaughan and Merrkiyawuy Ganambarr-Stubbs are the second and third author, respectively. The citation for the book chapter in question is: Morales, G., Vaughan, J., & Ganambarr-Stubbs, M. (2018). From home to school in multilingual Arnhem Land: The development of Yirrkala school’s bilingual curriculum. In G. Wigglesworth, J. Simpson, & J. Vaughan (Eds.), Language practices of Indigenous children and youth: The transition from home to school (pp.69-98). London, UK: Palgrave Macmillan. FUNDING This thesis was supported by the Australian Research Council Discovery Project DP0877762 ‘A longitudinal study of the interaction of home and school language in three Aboriginal communities’ awarded to Professors Gillian Wigglesworth and Jane Simpson, and by the ARC funded Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language (CE140100041). iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS On the completion of this thesis, I would like to acknowledge the support and contribution of my supervisor Dr. Gillian Wigglesworth. She has provided me with indispensable feedback and guidance throughout my candidature. I would also like to thank her for believing in my project vision. I would not have been able to gather the resources needed to carry out this project without her help. I would also like to thank my committee members, Dr. Rachel Nordlinger and Dr. Barbara Kelly, whose advice helped shape this thesis and whose guidance helped me generate a project idea when I felt lost. I would also like to thank my dear friend Vanessa Navarro Maza who helped me improve my writing through her meticulous proofreading even though she has a busy life of her own. I would like to thank the Yirrkala Community School principals for allowing me to work at their school. I would also like to acknowledge the Yirrkala staff members for being exceptionally welcoming and inclusive. I thank the children who participated in the study and their parents for allowing me to conduct my research. I am forever grateful to Tania, April, and Emma, the teachers of the classrooms with whom I worked. These three teachers generously allowed me to spend countless hours in their classrooms. I feel blessed to have had the pleasure of working with such accommodating teachers who made sure I had time to work with their students on a daily basis. I acknowledge my Yolŋu research assistants and the Yolŋu senior teachers at the school for their input, expertise, and knowledge of the Yolŋu language. These women were integral to the completion of this project as they helped me create all the necessary project materials. My research assistants were also invaluable as they helped me communicate and work v with the children in the classroom. I would also like to thank the LPC members for making me feel at home and for clearing out “my desk” every time I was in the field. I acknowledge the Yirrkala community at large for welcoming me into their community and for teaching me invaluable lessons about their culture. This project would not have been possible without the willingness and helpfulness of Yirrkala community and school. I extend my deep gratitude to my family and friends whose constant support, encouragement, and belief in me and my ability to succeed kept me motivated throughout the process. I am eternally grateful to my parents who have provided me with countless opportunities which have allowed me to explore my passions and further my education. I would also like to thank my brother Choompy who is my best friend and my greatest confidant. I thank my extended family for being loving and the Lendorians for being amazing friends. I thank my labmates Dani and Josh for helping me maintain my sanity throughout this process. They understood life’s challenges as a PhD researcher and made me feel that I was not alone. Finally, I would like to thank Adam for helping me day-to- day so that I could get my work done and for pushing me even when I was tired. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ...........................................................................................................................i DECLARATIONS .................................................................................................................iii PREFACE ..............................................................................................................................iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...................................................................................................v TABLE OF CONTENTS .......................................................................................................vii LIST OF TABLES .................................................................................................................xiii LIST OF FIGURES ...............................................................................................................xvii GLOSSARY ..........................................................................................................................xviii 1.0 INTRODUCTION ...........................................................................................................1 1.1 Emergent Literacy ............................................................................................................2 1.2 Literacy in Remote Indigenous Australia ........................................................................6 1.3 Current Study ...................................................................................................................9 1.4 Thesis Overview ..............................................................................................................11