Enhancing Struggling Readers' Word Decoding: Assessing the Impact of Digital Text Features

Abstract

Given the increasing frequency of students engaging with digital texts in educational settings, it is critical to examine the affordances of digital text features (DTFs) which provide support in the reading process (Clinton-Lisell, 2023; Colwell et al., 2022; Tortorelli & Strong, 2025). These interactive features can be skillfully used to support struggling readers, who are reading below grade level, to overcome decoding challenges. This qualitative, case study is in response to the Ontario Human Rights Commission’s Right to Read Report (OHRC, 2022) which advocates for K–8 students to have a better sense of foundational literacy skills. The study was grounded in Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development (1978) and Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory (1986). The thesis study explored how struggling readers in Grades 4–7 utilized DTFs to decode words, with the support of their literacy tutors. Student participants (n=15), along with their tutors (n=14), were selected from a community-based tutoring clinic in October 2025. The student-tutor matches practiced using DTFs with the support of the researcher, who served as a coach and mentor. Knowledge of DTFs and strategies were based on the exploratory pilot study conducted in Winter 2025, which yielded effective ways to use the features to support decoding. Several points of data were collected throughout the seven-week intervention, to gain insights from both the student and tutor participants. All data were thematically analyzed by manually hand coding and then using data analysis software. Findings illustrated various ways in which DTFs can be leveraged to support the decoding process, and the connections to dimensions of a four-prong reading engagement model (Lee et al., 2021). As student participants were behaviourally, cognitively, affectively, and socially engaged with DTFs, they made positive strides towards strengthening their decoding skills. This study provides instructional implications for how DTFs can support students in educational settings.