Copyright © 2017, the Authors. Published by Atlantis Press.This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).

Optimizing Storytelling through Dual Coding Theory

Dian Kusumawati, Yeni Rachmawati

Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia, Bandung, Indonesia

Corresponding e-mail: dianku@student.upi.edu

Abstract

This paper explores about how a storytelling, which has been convinced by many, as a practical learning approach todevelop early childhood literacy ability, however together with the decreasing of storytelling culture in the society, it hasnow been lesser in use let alone to be considered as an effective learning method to practice in the kindergaren educationupbringing. Nevertheless, storytelling is undoubtedly believed to improve children’s literacy skills as it gives more rooms toidentify new vocabulary, building imagination and exercising creative thinking. Simultaneously with research developmenton early childhood, there are some interesting results showing how significantly Dual Coding Theory has improved theability on children reading comprehension. Dual Coding Theory is one of the cognitive theory developed by Allan Paivio,Professor of Psychology at the University of Western Ontario. This theory states that human being processes and storesinformation in two different subsystems, namely verbal and non-verbal (visual) which are correlated and work together. Byexposing the entire sensory at early age, it will build an important foundation for a better understanding on the vocabularyand story ideas. It is with hope that through this article, the valuing of storytelling method by way of Dual Coding Theorycan be elaborated and to position the importance of Dual Coding Theory in the development of children’s literacy. It is alsoexpected to have vivid implication on the improvement of teacher’s motivation to reinforce the storytelling method in thekindergarten education as effort to set up a good literacy foundation.

Keywords: storytelling, early childhood, literacy, dual coding theory

1 INTRODUCTION

Reading opens the door to unlimited knowledge.Literacy opens the doors to knowledge and places.Therefore, reading skill is crucial and a must tomaster by everyone. Storytelling is essential tohuman life, as it is through storytelling that we getinformation, build awareness and understanding aswell as getting knowledge. To children at earlystage, storytelling is a bridge to get information, tolearn about vocabulary and learn to understand ideasin a story before they have the ability to read andwrite

Unfortunately in these one or two decades inIndonesia, despite the understanding that early stagechildren in the kindergarten should not yet toformally teach how to read, nonetheless, many hasbegan long before they entered next formal schoolslevel as demands from primary school forcing themto start learning to read earlier.

This has intensified by the assumptions in thesociety that children at kindergarten who will enterprimary school level should already be able to readeven though the government has issued guidelinesthat no reading to give to children enteringElementary School level and that there are noreading lesson to conduct in kindergarten educationstage (Surat Edaran Direktorat Jenderal ManajemenPendidikan Dasar Dan Menengah Nomor1839/C.C2/TU/2009). However, it still holds a longdebate between kindergarten and first grade teacheras to when the task of teaching reading starts.

This condition has led into a less favourablelearning climate where learning in the kindergartenis supposed to be fun and by means of playing tobecome semi-formal and rigid. Creative learningmethod has become lesser implemented due to thedemand for teacher to teach reading, this includesthe use of story-telling which considered as aneffective learning method has become rarelyimplemented in the kindergarten educationalupbringing.

131

3rd International Conference on Early Childhood Education (ICECE-16)Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research (ASSEHR), volume 58

In contrast with the early stage readingimplementation, fact finds that children's readingability in Indonesia is positioned at the bottom rankbased on test results done by the Organization forEconomic Cooperation and Development (OECD)(Faizah , et al , 2015) .

Reading skills is obtained not only through theability to compose letters and pronounce them but itrequires the ability to understand ideas. This abilityto understand is the very first thing that needed to betaught to children before they learn how to readletters as letters for them are abstract and difficult tounderstand.

When students entered formal education level(elementary school), they will deal a lot with longtextbook readings, which is so much different fromthe previous books learned in the kindergarten wherebooks are in the form of story books with moreimages and short texts narration. (Sentari, 2002).

This condition will require a specific learningmethod to enable students acquiring comprehensivereading skills, and storytelling is consideredeffective in helping students to understand ideas in astory.

Many researches and studies have conducted tofind effective teaching models and methods to readfor children (Sukartiningsih, 2005), but not manyresearches has specifically analyzed on howinformation is processed and stored by the brain asbasic element for human being to build knowledge .

This article is a literature studies aims to mapout some researches done on storytelling and therole of Dual Coding Theory in improving thechildren’s literacy skills as a mean or bridge toprepare the early childhood learning reading processwhich will become the foundation to a better readingability in the future. In addition to that, this article isalso expected to be of useful to teachers ofkindergartens and any succeeding researchers.

2 REVIEW OF THE RELATEDLITERATURE

2.1 Storytelling

For chidren at early childhood, storytelling is abridge to get information, to learn about vocabulary,and learn to understand ideas in a story before theyhave the ability to read and write. Some studiessuggested that in order to enrich language skills ofearly childhood, a meaningful experience is a tool toprovide opportunities to improve and sustain theirlanguage growth. (Isbell, Sobol, Lindauer, &Lowrance, 2004).

Storytelling is different from reading a story(storyreading), storytelling is telling a story withoutthe help of books, pictures or other props that couldbreak the magnetic flux between the listener and thestoryteller. Story-telling encourages wordrecognition in reading readiness, increasingvocabulary, develop imagination, help children learnto express himself verbally, develop children'sability to listen attentively, increasing attention spanand concentration as well as creativity. (Chesin,2009)

Therefore, in order to get a story delivered withall the advantages and benefits mentioned earlier,teachers need to understand the theoretical basis ofCognitive to help deliver the story-telling in a morevaluable way to assist children in learning to read(reading readiness) and the one theory that couldoptimize the benefits of storytelling is the DualCoding Theory. (Fredericks, 1997).

2.2 Dual Coding Theory (DCT)

How mind works when it putting words togetherwhile reading has become an interesting subject tostudy for a long time. The language and the role ofmental imagery has also long been a source offascination in scientific research on cognitive. Thereare several formulas that describe how informationis stored and organized in our brain. One theory thatstates that information is received by the brain andprocessed as a mental representation divided intotwo subsystems is Dual Coding Theory. What willbe presented in this paper is only a part of theapplication of the cognitive theory by Dual CodingTheory.

The Dual Coding Theory in an abstractlycognition way defines two different kinds of mentalcodes, one is a verbal code to process and digestlanguage in all forms of sensory and the other is anonverbal codes to represent and processinformation related to objects and events. Nonverbalcode is also referred to as imagery system that servesto generate, analyze and synthesize the mentalimages from objects and events, whether visually,auditorily, or other modalities.(Paivio, 2006)

DCT has never taken something abstract intorationale; all mental representation in the DCT areassociated with sensory modality (eg, such asauditory, visual, affective, etc.). Nonverbal aspectsof cognition such as mental imagery is a typicalaspect of the DCT in modern cognitive theoryespecially in the theory of literacy. (Sadoski &Paivio, 2013).

According to Sadoski & Paivio (2013), thebasic foundations of Dual Coding Theory oncognition are associated with reading and literacy.The whole mental representations received from

132

Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research (ASSEHR), volume 58

sensory experience that we encountered is encodedin the system of representation that is concrete asverbal and nonverbal units, and is classified into twoseparate coding systems with differentcharacteristics and hierarchy qualitatively, but stillbe able to operate independently, in parallel orinterconnectedly. Mental encoding is doneconcretatively, even abstract information such assymbols language or schematic diagrams are alsoencoded as in the following example: visualmodalities is encoding verbally and non-verbally. Averbal encoding is mentally represent the letter C inthe word cup, while nonverbal visual encoding canbe represented in the form of a cup of coffee set onthe table complete with its saucer.

In the auditory modality, encoding an oralhearing captured from the phoneme /k/ orpronunciation of words like /kʌp/, and the verbalencoding of nonverbal can be done in the form of acup clattering on its saucer, or the sound of coffeepouring into the cup. Encoding oral haptic can befrom the fingertips sensation when touching theBraille raised dots pattern or handwriting motoricactivity; writing it, saying it and writing the word ofcup in a perfect way. Encoding haptic in the form ofmeasuring the cup’s weight, flexibility, and thewarmth of a cup of hot coffee.

This DCT encoding and mental mode ismodular. It means that they form a separatesubsystem which units are structurally different butfunctioning independently. For example, we canrecall a visual image of a cup of coffee without thepresence of the aroma of coffee, its taste, the warmthof the cup, the spelling of the c-u-p word, thepronunciations of /kʌp/, or motoric activity used towrite the word cup, even though all of these thingsare interrelated and can easily influence each otherin our memory, neurologically these two sub-systems of the Dual Coding Theory is indeed havinga different place in the brain. (Sadoski & Paivio,2013).

Here's a table showing orthogonal relationshipbetween mental coding and sensori-motor modalitiesin the Dual Coding Theory. The examples in thebelow diagram are all representation types of varioussensory modalities in both subsystems. Adaptedfrom Table 1, Paivio (1972).

Table 1. Orthogonal relationship between mental codingand sensory modalities in the Dual Coding Theory

Mental Codes

ModalitySense

Verbal Nonverbal

VisualVisual language(writing)

Visual objects

AuditorAuditory language(speech)

Environtmentalsounds

HapticBraille,handwriting

“Feel” of objects

Gustatory - Taste memoriesOlfaktory - Smell memoriesEmotion - Feel emotions

According to Sadoski (2013), there are variousspecific evidences of modalities in the system ofrepresentation, which can be seen in thephenomenon of specific-modality interference. Atthe time we tried to do two different tasks in onemodality, it caused disturbance in completing onetask or it even interfered the completion of bothtasks. For example it is difficult for us to listen totwo conversations at once, both involved the samemodality which is auditory. However, to do twotasks using separate modality will be easier, forexample, exercising (motoric modality) whilelistening to music (auditory modality) withoutinfluencing each other.

In constructing a system of cognition, thecognitive theories is usually formulated byspecifying the basic units or "building blocks". Inthe Dual Coding Theory, these units form isconcrete. The term used to distinguish the tworepresentations of the underlying neurologicalrepresentations of two subsystems are logogen andimagen. Logogen is for verbal representation,encoding of verbal, mental language and innerspeech; whilst imagen is for nonverbalrepresentation, coding nonverbal, mental images orimagery.

The organizing and interconnecting in thesystem of verbal and imagery described as follows:

133

Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research (ASSEHR), volume 58

Figure 1. The organizing and interconnecting in thesystem of verbal and imagery

General model of DCT showing the verbal and nonverbalsystems including representational units and theirreferential and associative interconnections, as well asconnections to sensory input and response output systems.From Mental Representations: A Dual Coding Approachby Allan Paivio (1986), Figure 4.1 (p.67).

Largely speaking, the fundamental of thecognitive theory of Dual Coding Theory andorganizational of structures has described. Howinformation is processed by the Dual Coding Theoryis by activating two basic units and the relationshipsbetween them. Dual Coding Theory generally refersto the skills of reading and literacy, by looking athow information taken from sensory experience ismentally represented and encoded into two separatecoding systems through different hierarchicalcharacteristics qualitatively and can be operatedindependently, in parallel, or throughinterconnection.

Key points to this theory are the three ways ofprocessing information in the opinion of Paivio:1.Representational level where verbal and nonverbalare directly effected. 2. Referential level, and 3.Associative Level. (Sadoski, 2013).

In the Dual Coding Theory, all cognitions,including perception, memory, meaning, and

knowledge must be executed by representationoperation within and between the two codes. Thiskind of infomation can get into a much deeperoutlines for various activities related to literacy.

3 METHOD

This paper is using a literature study method, whichexamines and analyzes textbooks and journals aboutstorytelling, Dual Coding Theory and mentalimagery and as a preliminary study for furtherresearch.

4 DISCUSSION

Storytelling through Dual CodingTheory

In storytelling through Dual Coding Theory, themental imagery becomes an important componentcatalyzing the storytelling to the best advantageousand assists in developing literacy skills, especially inthe reading comprehension. Significant areas todevelop through storytelling with Dual CodingTheory (Roney, 1989, Fredericks, 1997) are: 1.Tostrengthen the nerves (neural pathways), 2. Helpingchildren to maintain their focus, 3. To help buildingliteracy skills and improve the skills of reading,writing and speaking, 4. To develop imaginationthrough mental imagery, 5. To help childrenmanaging emotions and motivation, 6. Enhancecreativity, 7. Strengthening high-level of thinkingskills (higher order thinking), 8. To develop skills insolving problem.

5 CONCLUSIONS

Storytelling is important in helping the developmentof children. Researchers who study brain andbehavioral development identified that imaginationis not only the core of creativity, but also animportant substance to a higher order thinking.

Combining storytelling with mental imagerystrategy in the Dual Coding Theory, will helpopening up the capacity of imagination in a moreprofound way, not only for the sake of academicinterest, but also for the behavior development aschildren with diverse experiences and rich onimagination are having more ability to be morecreative, to speak better, able to manage emotionsand have stronger motivation so they are able to lookat the problem more clearly and solve problemsbetter.

134

Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research (ASSEHR), volume 58

6 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Mr.Bachruddin Mustafa, M.A., Ph.D., my mursyid andadvisor Dr. Zamzam Ahmad Jamaluddin T, M.Si.,Miss. Sentari Tanuwijaya, Bubun Lysandri andMoch. Sya’ban Suwargana for the full support.Thank you for the patience, motivation, whichwithout they precious support it would not bepossible to conduct and finish this paper.

7 REFERENCES

Chesin, G. A. (2009). Storytelling and storyreading,(February 2015), 37–41.http://doi.org/10.1080/01619566609537343

Faizah, et.all. (1995). Panduan Umum Literasi untukMengembangkan Potensi Anak Seutuhnya,http://www.ayomembacaindonesia.org/?page_id=2

Fredericks, B. L. (1997). Developing Literacy SkillsThrough Storytelling.

Isbell, R., Sobol, J., Lindauer, L., & Lowrance, A.(2004). The Effects of Storytelling and StoryReading on the Oral Language Complexity andStory Comprehension of Young Children,32(3).

Paivio, A. (2006). Dual Coding Theory andEducation, 1–20, University of WesternOntario.

Roney, R. C. (1989). Back to the basics withstorytelling, 42(7), 520–523.

Sadoski, Mark, Paivio, A. (2013), Imagery and Text: a dual coding theory of reding and writing,Second edition, UK:Routledge.

Sentari, (2002). Pengaruh Strategi Belajar MentalImagery Terhadap Penguasaan Bacaan, Skripsi,Fakultas Psikologi, Universitas Indonesia,Depok.

Sukartiningsih, W. (2005). Peningkatan kemampuanmembaca dan menulis permulaan melaluipembelajaran konstruktivisme. JurnalPendidikan Dasar, Vol.6 No.2, 61–118.

Surat Edaran Direktorat Jenderal ManajemenPendidikan Dasar Dan Menengah Nomor1839/C.C2/TU/2009

135

Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research (ASSEHR), volume 58