Does learning to write allographs on a touchscreen tablet stimulate the development of the abstract identity of letters in 5-year-old pre-readers ?
Résumé
The aim is to study the effect of a visual-motor exploration of allographs on a touch tablet to develop the abstract identity of letters in 5-year-old pre-readers. The scores in visual allograph recognition are compared between a pre- and post-test according to the exploration of the allographs on the tablet (visuomotor: writing with a stylus; and visual: seeing the writing of a trace). In this task, we manipulated allographic variability (low -e.g. c-, high -e.g. b-) and calligraphy (uppercase script, lowercase script, lowercase cursive). While writing letters on the tablet, static and dynamic parameters are recorded (e.g. total time). Repeated measures ANOVA shows superior progression with visual exploration, particularly for allographs with high variability. These results are discussed in light of environment-subject interactions. No correlation is shown between the gain in visual recognition of allographs and the three motor components identified by principal component analysis, which suggests that motor processes do not contribute to visual processes when the shapes of letters are learned on a tablet.