A study of the effects Multimedia Books have on developing reading skills among Portuguese young learners of English as a Foreign Language

摘要

The growing importance of technology in today's society makes it important for educators to integrate the tools it provides into all areas of education because the new and emerging technologies are challenging the traditional process of teaching and learning. My research adopted a case study approach, which provided rich descriptions, in particular of: Will multimedia technology prove to be more efficient or at least as efficient as traditional methods when developing extensive reading? Will multimedia CD-ROMs improve reading? Will multimedia CD-ROMs motivate children to read? The answer to these questions was also object of my research. There a few examples outside Portugal about the motivating power of multimedia books among students. Will this be the case in Portugal? The main purpose of the study was to determine whether Multimedia Books fostered pupils to read and whether there were any gains in the reading performance and language accuracy when pupils worked with a computer-based storybook vs. those who worked with a normal paper book.