Reading affects everything we do in life. Sometimes it is difficult to determine how many people have a reading disability, and what tools can be used to overcome it. The main aim of this thesis is to gain insight into how and if audio recordings (audiobooks, talking books or mobile apps for reading) are used in elementary schools by teachers as a tool for pupils with reading disabilities. A quantitative approach was adopted for data collection in the form of a self-administered online survey created by using Sunet Survey software. The survey, with 15 questions in Croatian, was sent to 63 elementary schools in Primorje and Gorski Kotar County in Croatia. The sampling frame consisted of 541 elementary school teachers teaching first through fourth grades. 98 responded to the survey. To support the results, 2 theories were used. The cognitive authority theory to support the notion that teachers play a large role in pupils' relationship with reading, and the cognitive load theory to support the notion that assistive technology can help pupils with reading disabilities. The results elucidate that our sample consists of 96.6% female respondents who are between 45 and 54 years old, have 10 to 20 years of professional experience, and mainly teach first grade. 75% of the respondents currently have and 89.8% used to have pupils with reading disabilities in their class. Although audiobooks are not the most popular tool in Croatia, 63.6% of respondents recognize them as a tool they use. The results also show that schools and school libraries are not sufficiently equipped with tools to help pupils with reading disabilities. Most involvement depends on the individual will of teachers.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:hb-28653 |
| Date | January 2022 |
| Creators | Tolic, Kristina |
| Publisher | Högskolan i Borås, Akademin för bibliotek, information, pedagogik och IT |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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