Augmented Reality for Supporting Adult-child Shared Reading

Abstract Augmented reality (AR) stories offer a new opportunity for parents and teachers at libraries and schools to explore electronic stories. Embedded with multimedia design, AR allows diverse paths of exploration in the story contexts for shared story-reading experiences among parents and children. In this study, parents in the reading community (a library and a school) were provided with AR guided support and a skill-building activity. Observations and in-depth interviews were conducted to collect qualitative data. Inductive analysis was used to summarize the findings. Results of the study were summarized in the following themes: Prior adult-child reading experiences; Novelty with AR reading; Parents’ scaffolding for using AR; Interactive reflective thinking from AR reading; Positive responses from learning of shared reading; and Parents’ suggestions and concerns. It was observed that the AR reflective reading approach encouraged parents to play an active role in guided reading. Children and parents were positive about their active participation in the AR-mediated exploratory reading context. With the AR guided support and skill-building activity, parents applied the scaffolded-reading skills in the AR reading intervention. The AR-mediated reading approach is promising and open to more dynamic design of interactive features.