Digital Stories for Enhancing Palestinian Refugee School Children’s English Reading Micro - skills: Action Research Study

This action-research-based study aims to investigate the effect of digital stories on students' English micro-skills of reading by designing a series of seven digitized stories based on the seven themes covered in English for Palestine , fourth grade. A digital story is a newly recognized technique in teaching that is believed to improve students’ learning and make it more real and meaningful. It is a technological facility that allows storytellers to accompany their scratch stories with different sorts of multimedia such as video clips, recorded audio, computer generated text and music so that they can be played on learners’ computers and mobiles. The specific objectives of this research are to identify students’ English micro -skills of reading, to illustrate how reading micro-skills-based digital stories can be designed, to illustrate how these stories can be used as a medium to develop English micro-skills of reading and to evaluate the outcome of this technique on these skills. This research study adopted a descriptive analytical approach using a mixed-methods design. The study employed two primary data collection instruments: pre/posttests and reading assessment sessions, and three secondary ones: field notes, comprehension worksheets, and parental reports. The sample consisted of 84 children from UNRWA Biet Lahia Elementary School in North Gaza. The researcher examined the effect of digital stories on students’ English reading micro -skills in the experimental group while maintaining the traditional teaching techniques with the control one. The findings revealed that digital stories can largely enhance students' English micro-skills of English. Additionally, it promotes students' motivation, critical thinking skills, self-confidence and enthusiasm. The researcher recommended further studies in this area with adequate preparation and planning during the whole process of action research.


The Objectives of the Study
To identify the EFL reading micro-skills Palestinian fourth graders are expected to develop. 2. To design reading micro-skills-based digital stories using quality criteria and steps. 3. To use micro-skills-based digital stories as a medium in EFL classrooms to develop children's English micro-skills of reading. 2

4.
To identify the impact of digital stories on the development of Palestinian children's English reading micro-skills.

Research Questions
This action research aims to answer this main question and the more specific questions: 1. To what extent can digital stories develop Palestinian children's reading micro-skills of English? a) What are the English reading micro-skills the Palestinian fourth grade English textbook intends to develop? b) How can digital stories be designed using quality criteria and steps? c) How can digital stories be used to develop Palestinian fourth graders' reading micro-skills of English? d) What is the impact of using digital stories on the development of Palestinian children's English reading micro-skills?

Literature Review
This action-research-based study aims to investigate the effect of digital stories on Palestinian fourth graders' English micro-skills of reading by designing a series of seven digitized stories based on seven themes covered in English for Palestine. This part briefly reviews the literature on reading micro-skills, summarizes the educational value of stories in EFL classes and tackles digital stories as a tool for teaching language in general and reading comprehension in particular.

Micro-skills of Reading
As a skill, reading has been viewed differently by researchers and experts: reading is a unified skill that cannot be split into minor sub-skills , reading consists of many sub-skills (Stephenson & Harold, 2009) and reading comprehension is a collection of several micro-skills combined together (Zarei & Pedram, 2018). This last view considers students' level of comprehension an indicator of their capability of the micro-skills of reading they acquired.
Along a similar line, Hughes (1989) highlighted the difference between micro-skills and macro-skills of reading comprehension. As the name suggests, macro refers to understanding general ideas in the text, like information, proof, and basis. On the contrary, micro implies analyzing and interpreting the linguistic features of the text, e.g. word meanings and discourse indicators.
Hughes embraces the belief that micro-skills must be taught as means to reach and fulfill macro-skills. Hamilton and Weiss (2005) and Pederson (1992) consider storytelling as the original form of education. Everyone has a story to tell, as we are instinctively born with the ability to tell stories. Since stories can touch students' hearts before their minds, they are recognized as deeply appealing and motivating. Wells (1986) suggested that the process of building stories in the mind is a meaning-making process. Consequently, children can more easily link their pieces of knowledge together when they come in a story form.

Stories in EFL Classes
Using stories in EFL classes is a privileged practice that can create motivating and productive learning environments (Harrasi, 2012;Ebrahiminejad et al., 2014& Hamilton & Weiss, 2005. These findings are consistent with Elley (1991), who argued that providing students with interesting contexts for learning would reinforce subconscious and positive learning. Similarly, Ghasemi & Hajizadeh (2011) confirmed the tight relationship between literature and entertaining reading. They clarified that reading with literary input like stories, students have to read between the lines, which can facilitate the readers' top-down process.
Despite the reliable educational value of stories that have been widely proved by scholars (Zaytoun, 1988 An additional advantage of stories is stated by Bence (2017), who pointed out that the use of stories can make the learning process more authentic. Gregori-Signes (2014) equally believed that digital st/ory allows students to perceive and assess their world authentically. Similar advantages are mentioned by Glassner (2004) and Mello (2000), who argued that stories help learners appreciate their own culture as well as other cultures and thus better recognize the world around them. Bence (2017) added that stories could provide an excellent context for practicing all four learning skills with young learners (reading, speaking, listening and writing). Yet, the objective of the EFL lesson directs which language skill to focus on more.
The findings of Marsh (1986) also revealed that the art of storytelling can drag the listeners' attention into new areas, which leads to reforming their knowledge and insights. He correspondingly presented the relation between storytelling and developing imaginative skills, as this art can stimulate students' imagination and encourage them to leap to higher cognitive levels.

Digital story and language skills
A digital story is a beneficial teaching tool that facilitates language learning and develops language skills. Similarly, Christiansen & Koelzer (2016) found that digital stories can enhance students' literacy and language skills. These findings had previously been declared by Clarke

Research Design
This research study adopted a descriptive analytical approach using a mixed-methods design. The researcher adopted this design in order to meet the nature of the research, which aimed at finding the effects of using digital stories on improving Palestinian children's English reading micro-skills. To achieve this aim, two groups were selected, an experimental one and a control one. The experimental group was taught reading through the use of digital storytelling (with treatment), and the control group was taught reading through the traditional method (without treatment), as demonstrated in Figure (3.1).  To this end, five data collection instruments were used: pre-/posttests, field notes, parental reports, reading assessment sessions and comprehension worksheets. To answer the question a, a  table of English reading micro-skills a fourth grader needs to develop was produced early in chapter 3, table (3.5). To answer questions b and c, field notes and comprehension worksheets were used. And to answer question d, parental reports, reading assessment sessions and pre-/posttests were administered.

Pre-/Posttests
Before the experiment, pretests were administered to the three groups to choose the study groups building on their exam results. The two groups that showed similar performances were chosen as a control group and an experimental group, whereas the third one was considered as a piloting group. During the experiment, a series of seven tests were carried out after each of the seven educational units to measure and compare students' progress after implementing each digital story.
A pre-/post reading micro-skills test was prepared by the researcher to measure the students' reading skills in both the control and experimental groups. Being used as a pre-test, it aimed at proving that both groups were equal in terms of reading skills. Then being used as a post test, it aimed at identifying any possible difference in the achievement of both groups.
After the first trialing of the digital story on the experimental group, it was noted that students showed high levels of creativity in answering the teacher's questions that demanded higher order thinking skills (HOTs). As a result, the researcher decided to add a question in the coming posttests to examine students' HOTs. The question was meant to measure students' capability of transferring the knowledge they got out of reading in several creative forms, e.g. tables, diagrams, and drawings.

Field Notes
A workshop was held to inform the English team at Beit Lahia School about the purpose of this research as well as the themes they need to observe while attending the digital story lessons. They similarly were familiarized with certain kinds of behaviors to list, e.g. fidgeting, smiling, uttering words, questioning their peers or any possible changes in their facial expressions or body movements. The teacher observation sheets were completed either by the researcher or by her colleagues. While playing the digital story, the teacher took notes of students' reactions, state of mood, questions, and difficulties. She took these notes first on the piloting group so that she could make some modifications before undergoing this with the experimental group. Equipped with these observations every time, the teacher was able to assess the delivery of the digital story and to document students' interaction with the digitized material. Some EFL teachers who shared the digital stories with their students said that: I shared these brilliant stories with my students. Students in the fourth grade were extremely engaged and motivated as this kind of storytelling provides them with an opportunity to explain and illustrate abstract ideas and concepts in a way that makes them more approachable and accessible. The stories offer a vehicle to bring facts to life and to make the abstract concrete. Your efforts were extremely clear, and your aim was successfully achieved.
Another teacher considered herself privileged for having the digital series. She showed enthusiasm about presenting the digital stories to her students, and she explained their reactions as follows: I showed some videos to my students, and they reacted very positively. I feel lucky because I got these valuable videos and stories, and I will definitely show my learners the rest of the videos later. The stories are really attractive and useful. Using stories in teaching a second language is very exciting. It motivates learners and increases their desire to learn. The most beautiful thing is that the stories in these videos are short, and their language is simple, which makes them suitable for fourth grade students.
A third EFL teacher emphasized the importance of digital stories for improving students' language and thinking skills by offering them a relaxed atmosphere of learning.
Analyzing the comments later helped the researcher to know whether she was still on the right track. Corwin and Clemens's (2012) model of analysis was followed during the process of collecting and analyzing the field notes. Other sheets were filled in by some colleagues in the same school, who observed students' reactions while watching the digital story. As this data collection instrument was applied several times by different people ( including the researcher, her colleagues at the same school, and her colleagues and friends at other schools), this can be seen as investigator triangulation, which means using multiple observers to reach the same findings (Mackey & Gass, 2005).

Comprehension Worksheets
After the first implementation of the digital story on the piloting group, the researcher figured out the urgent need to prepare some guiding questions for directing students' comprehension of the story. She found that the children needed the questions to guide their understanding, and she wanted them to assess their comprehension. So, for each digital story, a written worksheet was prepared to be completed by the students while watching the video. The worksheet consisted of two main parts. The first was for checking students' comprehension of the story events, and it included objective questions (e. g., true/ false, choose, and complete) for evaluating students' mastery of reading micro-skills through the story context. The second part was for eliciting students' attitudes or opinions concerning the story.
During the implementation of the experiment, the teacher asked the students to write about their feelings towards the digital stories. As fourth graders and non-native speakers of English, unfortunately, students were not able to express themselves properly in English. Their attempts were a mixture of poor English and Arabic. The teacher found this procedure not rather sufficient for research purposes, yet very valuable for the students. As a result, she demanded the students to keep the diaries for themselves and write them the way they liked.
To replace the students' diaries, the teacher specified the second part of the worksheet for eliciting students' feelings or attitudes concerning the digital story. Inserting one controlled question to elicit students' attitudes was much easier than a prolonged diary. Besides, she planned to request parental help with this concern.

Parental reports
After completing the whole series of digital stories in parallel with the end of the scholastic year, the teacher made some contact with the student's parents and sent them a report form to fill in. At the top of the report appears an introductory sentence where a space was provided for writing the parent's name, followed by a request to complete the report. The report consisted of three questions that sought the parent's observations, attitudes, and comments on their kids' performances after being exposed to the digital stories. The parental reports were sent with the kids of the experimental group to 42 of their parents. Only 40 reports were received and analyzed. These parents were contacted via Facebook to further explain the purpose of the reports, answer any questions concerning digital stories, and discuss suggestions and comments. It is worth mentioning that the teacher had also made a YouTube channel and shared the digital stories with the students' parents so that they could provide adequate feedback.

Reading Assessment Sessions
To make sure that students in the experimental group really had better reading performances, help was requested from colleagues in the school. Two of the researcher's colleagues assessed students' reading performances by taking random students of the same level from both groups. To elaborate, students were classified according to their levels of English language skills in general. Then, a comparison of students' performance was held between two students within the same level from both the experimental and the control groups. One excellent student from the experimental group was picked to be compared with another excellent student from the control group in terms of reading. This procedure was repeated with students from other different levels.

Material
The researcher designed a series of seven digital stories drawing on the themes of the units in the student's book of English for Palestine Grade 4 (Ministry of Education and Higher Education, 2011). These digitized stories were assessed by a panel of expert referees before being used during English classes as a medium to improve students' reading micro-skills. Most of the stories were written by the researcher herself to suit the content of the Palestinian curriculum and the students' linguistic needs and levels, values, and culture. The digitized material came in seven short videos. One story only was picked from YouTube and modified to suit the students' needs. The story name is Spot Bakes a Cake by Eric Hill, and it was modified to suit the theme of making a cake in unit 11 in the student's book. The process of developing the digitized material will be further explained in (3.7) section below.

4 Procedures
This research followed the cycle of action research, as illustrated by Mertler (2009). The process was organized into nine procedures: problem identification, gathering information, reviewing the related literature, developing a research plan, implementing the plan and collecting the data, analyzing the data, developing an action plan, communicating the results, and reflecting on the research process. Although they are clearly arranged, it is not necessary to stick to this cycle in the same order all the time. In other words, one of the most distinguishing features of action research is its flexibility and out of this cycle, an unlimited number of cycles might emerge (McNiff, 2010). To do so, she compared students' marks and performances in reading skills and other language skills and found that most students got the lowest mark for reading skills, as illustrated in Figure (3.2) below. The researcher decided to plan for a change (action) in the process of teaching reading micro-skills. At this early stage, she knew that she was going to make use of technology, yet she did not realize which technological facility to pick for achieving the desired change. Mean marks in the four skills b) Gathering information: As soon as realizing the problem, the researcher started talking to her thesis supervisor and her school colleagues about the problem and the possible solutions. The existence of the problem and the urgent need for a change was confirmed. Data about students were collected by administering a pre-test to determine their levels and to ensure no statistically significant divergence in their performances. Reflecting on her own ideas, the researcher started to organize them more neatly and sufficiently to fulfill the wanted change. After this stage, the researcher was able to express the research problem, context, and some clear headlines on her research plan. c) Reviewing the literature: Since she identified the problem and the method of change, the researcher started doing some research on three main areas, action research, the most recent methods for teaching reading, and the best technologies for education. The supervisor approved the implementation of digital stories as a medium to enhance students' micro-skills of reading. It was found that little research was conducted on digital stories in general and no research in the problem context. Therefore, the researcher submitted her proposal to conduct her study in this area. As a result, the research direction was specified to digital stories as a new technology for developing language skills. At this phase of the study, the researcher decided on the most relevant programs for her action and started learning them. Two programs were chosen for building the digital stories, story board and movie-maker. A set of data collection instruments has been proposed for later use. d) Designing the research plan: First, the research question/questions were decided to draw on how to determine the rest of the methodology (Mertler, 2009). Four main questions were established, as shown in section (3.1) above. Inevitably, two study variables were included in the statement of the research questions, the independent variable, digital story/traditional teaching method and the dependent one, English micro-skills of reading. The data collection instruments and the research ethics were more accurately decided at this point. The researcher made use of several data collection instruments before, during and after the action, as clarified in the data collection instrument and population and sample sections above. Designing the material was particularly done at this time of the research in order to be ready for later use on students. These steps were followed while designing the series of digital stories: 1. For each unit, a list of the reading micro-skills was made to build the story content according to them. This procedure was repeated for all 1 st semester units in the student's book. According to English Language Curriculum for Public Schools grades 1-12 (2015), fourth graders are expected to recognize English scripts and handwriting, answer factual questions about reading materials, read and understand new and familiar material, and recognize pronoun referents. A list of reading micro skills is made and organized in the table (3.5) (Ministry of Education, 2015). +Building on the themes of the units, the scripts of the stories were written. Appropriate simple language was used to match the needs of fourth graders. This issue was further discussed with EFL teachers at Beit Lahia School. Consequently, the scripts of the story were largely simplified with the help of the school teachers. 3. After surfing the web for the best and most feasible video-making programs, the researcher decided to use a story board for drawing the scenes of the story and a moviemaker to add texts, music, and sounds. Storyboard is an attractive platform for developing narratives as it allows the designer to pick his/her characters and make all the possible changes, e.g. skin color, hair color, eye color, clothing and poses, as indicated in Figure (  The link to the full series https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsmDdFTzXSiEJ8hPAL2otew?view_as=subscriber The digital stories were refereed by a panel of judges. f) Implementing the plan and collecting the data: By the beginning of the second semester of the scholastic year 2018-2019, the digital stories were displayed using a lab top and LCD regularly after the completion of each unit. The first trialing was done on the piloting group. This procedure was designed to assess the quality of the study implementation, e.g. the video clarity, voice, speed, number of repetitions needed, or any other editions. Along with each experimentation, a worksheet was distributed to assess students' comprehension and elicit their attitudes toward the digital story. Observation sheets were simultaneously filled in by the researcher and one of her colleagues to evaluate the delivery of the videos and to reflect on students' levels of involvement. After watching the digital story, students of the experimental group were set for a test in that unit. Students in the control group were similarly set for the same test after each unit. Parental reports were also filled in at that segment of the study. Furthermore, the digital stories were uploaded to a YouTube channel to allow learners to watch them several times with their parents. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsmDdFTzXSiEJ8hPAL2otew?view_as=subscriber.
g) Analyzing the data: As action research is a continuous process of assessment by tracking the change/action and regularly checking if it fits the desired improvements (McNiff, 2010), data were always interpreted qualitatively and quantitatively during the process of implementation. The first round of data collection was accomplished early when the researcher compared students' reading skills to other language skills. She built on this stark difference in the means of their marks to show weakness in their reading skills and justify the need for a change in the process of teaching reading. The data elicited from the worksheet was constantly and qualitatively analyzed to evaluate students' comprehension and made the demanded modifications. Regular exams were also graded and analyzed quantitatively to assess students' development and highlight common themes among the experimental group students. The means of these exams were calculated immediately to record any improvements, as clarified in the statistical analysis section (3.7) below. Parental reports were analyzed qualitatively, and some of their recommendations were reconsidered by the researcher, e.g. some parents asked the researcher to enable them to watch the digital stories, which made the researcher publish them on a YouTube channel. h) Developing an action plan: At this point of research, the researcher was able to arrange her plan together in paper form. It is a documentary step where the researcher starts organizing her thesis to enable other researchers to benefit from her research criteria. Here, the researcher provided her model of action research and presented enough details about each step in order to produce a comprehensive representation of her action and encourage future research. She did her plan in light of the literature review and the analyzed data. i) Sharing and communicating the results: Interpreting the data, the researcher was able, to sum up the results of her action research. She hopes to publish a paper in an academic journal and or/ participate in a local or international conference to share and disseminate the results. As the researcher shared her digital stories with colleagues and friends, she received positive and encouraging comments. EFL teachers at UNRWA and governmental schools provided the researcher with valuable feedback, as illustrated below: -It is really great work and had lots of effort from the researcher to appear in this attractive and motivating way for the students. I recommend the researcher share these enjoyable stories with the Palestinian teachers in ELT Palestinian groups on Face Book to be used in teaching after the thesis defense.
-The stories are amazingly fruitful as well as amusing. Revising some core words is very helpful for children to be ready to read more confidently. Also, the pictures are very catching and interesting. Besides, the voice is very clear, and the music is very relaxing and so suitable for the atmosphere of reading.
-No one can deny the impact of digital storytelling in engaging and motivating students. Creating digital stories in the classroom is a powerful instructional technique that has the potential to transform learning for students.
j) Reflecting on the process: Summarizing the results, the researcher was ready to arrange them as conclusions and recommendations as précised in chapter 5. At this level of achievement, the researcher can relate the results to the research context and circumstances. This warranted her opportunity to express the results eloquently in order to match the local needs of the study population. On the other hand, she can make more connections and links to a larger slice of the population by generalizing the results.

Statistical Analysis
The data from the reading test were collected, computed, and analyzed by using Statistical Package for Social Sciences program (SPSS). The significance level used was (0.05). The following statistical techniques were utilized: • Percentages, relative mean ranks, Mann Whitney-test and frequencies were used to determine the level of achievement of the control and the experimental groups.  Effect size level by using Eta square to ensure the effect size of the apparent significant differences between the two groups.

The Reading Tests
The findings of the research were tackled with regard to the research questions. Therefore, the researcher used different statistic formulas such as means of frequencies, percentages and Mann Whitney-test to show the final results of the collected data. Tables were used to present and clarify the data. In addition, effect size through (η2) was used to measure the extent to which the independent variable, the digital story, had an effect on the dependent variable, the experimental group's reading micro-skills.
To answer the main research question, i.e. to what extent can digital stories develop reading micro-skills of English, the researcher sought to answer the following question: Are there statistically significant differences 05 . 0   between the mean scores of the experimental group on the posttest application of the reading skills and that of the control group?
To answer this question, the researcher tested the following null hypothesis: There are no statistically significant differences at

level between the mean scores of the experimental group on the posttest application of the reading skills and that of the control group.
To examine this hypothesis, the mean rank and sum of the ranks of the experimental and the control groups' results were computed. Mann Whitney test was used to measure the significance of differences. Table (4.1) shows the results. This means that there are statistically significant differences at 05 . 0   levels between the experimental group and the control one in relation to the 'total posttest marks' favoring the experimental group. Thus, the null hypothesis was rejected. Moreover, there is a significant difference between the mean ranks of both groups in favor of the experimental group. Whereas the mean rank of the control group is 37.82, the mean of the experimental group is 51.18.
To measure the effect size of the digital story on the experimental group's achievement in micro-skills of reading, the study applies the "effect size" technique as a complement dimension of the statistical significance, depending on the following criterion of Mackey and Gass (2005, p.349). To calculate the size effect, the researcher used "η" and "d" size effects by using the following formula:  After the first trialing of the digital story on the experimental group, it was noted that students showed high levels of creativity in answering the teacher's questions that demanded higher order thinking skills (HOTs). As a result, the researcher decided to add a question in the coming posttests to examine students' HOTs. The question was meant to measure students' capability of transferring the knowledge they got out of reading in several creative forms, e.g. tables, diagrams, and drawings. The question was located at the end of all the posttests coming after this observation.
Analyzing the posttests results, the researcher found that students in the experimental group registered higher mastery in answering these types of questions in all the posttests. As evidence of this, one posttest was analyzed to compare the students' higher order thinking skills in both groups. Students in the experimental group answered the question correctly with a percentage of 66 %, while those in the control group answered it correctly with only 37%. This can be considered an indicator that students who experienced the atmosphere of digital stories can more critically deal with higher order thinking questions.
The results of the questions indicated that there was a significant difference in the scores of the experimental group and the control one in reading skills. The experimental group had more improvement in their scores than the control group. Hence, results showed that digital-story-based technology can positively affect students' reading abilities. This finding goes in consistence with

Comprehension Worksheets
For each digital story, a comprehension written worksheet was prepared to be completed by experimental group students while watching the video. The worksheet consisted of two main parts. The first is for checking students' comprehension of the story events, and the second is for eliciting their attitudes or opinions concerning the story. The students' answers to the worksheet questions revealed that most of them could comprehend the story events. In general, students provided correct answers reflecting their comprehension of the story. As evidence of this, the worksheets of unit 11 were analyzed. It was found that 27 students answered all the questions correctly. The rest of the class, 12 students, committed one mistake in one item of the worksheet.
This positive performance can be linked to what Burmark (2004) stated regarding merging texts with images and its role in increasing students' comprehension. This similarly goes in consistence with Paivio's (1991) dual-coding theory, which divides the human memory into two main systems: visual and verbal. Since images can be received by both systems, inserting images into the digitized reading material would make information last longer and be more easily restored.
About one third of the students needed a third view of the digital story to complete the worksheet correctly. The second part of the worksheet was designed to elicit students' attitudes about the digital story. They were asked to answer questions like, "What was the most thing/ character you like in this story?" They were allowed to provide their answers in Arabic or in any form they liked. They creatively answered this question in simple English, Arabic, or other symbols like smiling faces, hearts, and flowers. Later, the researcher translated their Arabic responses into English. Broadly speaking, all students liked the digital story, and they showed high levels of comprehension.

Samples of students' answers to the second question:
"I liked the story. It's the first time to see something interesting like this." "I liked when the father said thanks to his family because Prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him, demanded us to thank people." "I've learned how to make a cake, and I'd love to try this with my family." "I liked how the whole family cooperated to make the birthday party for their dad." "I liked the photo of The Dome of The Rock. It looks wonderful from inside." "I liked the trip to Palestine, and I'd love to visit my homeland, Palestine, one day." Analyzing students' responses to this question, the researcher found that the digital experience can greatly motivate students and make them more enthusiastic about learning. The context of the story is so context-based, which helps students personalize their learning experience by relating the events of the story to real events and places in their real life. e.g. Palestinian cities and famous places. They were able to make excellent connections with their Islamic culture and beliefs, as illustrated by the second quotation above in which the student justified the girl's behavior with " To make sure that students in the experimental group really showed better reading performances, the researcher requested two of her colleagues to assess students' reading performances by taking random students of the same level from both groups. To do so, she classified students according to their levels of English language skills and asked her colleagues to pick one excellent student from both groups, the control and the experimental, and compare their reading performances. The results of these sessions were arranged as follows: indicator that students' exposure to digital stories can develop their reading skills. More importantly, students of the experimental group showed a higher level of confidence when reading aloud in front of other teachers, which stands in alignment with what Castañeda (2013) acknowledged concerning the non-threatened environment offered by the digital story and its role in making students feel less stressful about their mistakes.

Field Notes
The teacher's field notes were completed either by the researcher herself or by her colleagues. While playing the digital story, the teacher took notes of students' reactions, state of mood, questions, and difficulties. The researcher's observation sheets can stand as her reflections on the whole experiment.
For analyzing field notes, Corwin and Clemens's (2012) model of analysis was adopted with some slight changes or modifications.
a) Recognizing the research questions. Before starting the process of analyzing the field notes, research questions must be stated clearly. In our case, two research questions can be answered by analyzing the field notes. The main research question, i.e. To what extent can digital stories develop reading micro-skills of English? and one of the minor questions, i.e. How can digital stories be used to develop Palestinian fourth graders' reading micro-skills of English? b) Determining the best locations that can be considered as valuable sources of data. Before collecting data, places of data collection must be specified accurately. In this research, data were basically gathered during the experimentation of digital stories after the completion of each unit. Students were the fundamental source of information as they were carefully observed to seek answers to the previously mentioned research questions. c) Taking notes. Once the action is launched, the researcher has to take notes during the process of implementation. A digital story was presented to students every two weeks and after the completion of each unit in their text book. The teacher introduced the purpose of the research briefly to the students as they were asked to get informed consent and later parental reports. Since the researcher is their regular teacher, students were notably comfortable and relaxed during the whole process of implementation. The teacher used to videotape some parts of the lesson or take photos and quick notes during the lesson. d) Organizing and generating data. Data collected during the lesson delivery cannot be used directly because it usually includes codes, abbreviations or uncompleted thoughts (Saldana,2009). So, the teacher's notes were edited, organized, completed and typed for later use. The teacher's colleagues were also requested to provide a final version of their observations. e) Initial data analysis. After being typed, data were coded and tabulated. This stage changed the raw observations into meaningful statements and paved the way for theme identification. f) Themes identification. After coding and tabulating the data, themes were identified in light of the research questions.
The second round of data analysis revealed a number of themes that can be précised as follows: 1. Inserting digital stories into the curriculum is a unique experience that has many positive impacts on students' learning. 2. The experimental group students who lived this experience had much willingness and enthusiasm about learning. They aroused more questions and responded more creatively to the teacher's critical ones. 3. The experimental group students, in the same way, enjoyed a real and very authentic learning environment, the story, which warranted higher levels of involvement and participation. 4. The relaxing atmosphere of the digital story made the general atmosphere of English classes more comfortable and attractive. Students' were subconsciously practicing reading as they were trying to catch the fleeting events of the story and eagerly seeking to bridge the missing links of comprehension. g) Trustworthiness. To verify the results concluded from the field observation, other sheets were filled in by some colleagues in the same school who observed students' reactions while watching the digital story. The teacher's observation sheets that were filled in by the researcher's colleagues correspondingly reached similar conclusions. The most obviously repeated theme was the children's strong desire to learn and their overwhelming motivation during the whole process. Slow learners have overcome their shyness, hesitation, and insecurities as they were unthreatened.
Feedback was also requested from other teachers outside the school. The researcher shared the series of digital stories with those teachers via e-mail and YouTube. After watching the digitized material, the teachers provided adequate feedback and comments on the published material. Some of their comments came at earlier stages of the experiment, so the researcher was able to make use of them. Other teachers implemented the material in their English classes and provided feedback about students' involvement.
They were truly satisfied with the relevance of the digital story to their students' ages, needs and contexts. A third group of those teachers promised to try the digitized material with their students in the coming years as they do not teach fourth grade currently.
As this data collection instrument was applied several times by several teachers, including the researcher, her colleagues at the same school, and her colleagues and friends at other schools, this can be seen as investigator triangulation which means using multiple observers to reach the same findings (Mackey & Gass, 2005).
h) Presenting the findings. The last step of field notes analysis is sharing the results with other teachers, researchers, and other possible audiences during the viva day or any future conferences.
It can be concluded that digital stories can be an effective medium to enhance students' micro skills in English. However, it was also noted that careful planning is a crucial condition of success, especially when dealing with crowded classes and poor resources.

Parental reports
After completing the whole series of digital stories in parallel with the end of the scholastic year, the teacher made some contact with the student's parents and sent them a parental report form to fill in. The parents' comments were generally positive, and they were very pleased as their kids' reading levels were getting better. As activating more senses, digital stories encourage kids to immerse their language skills along with life skills. They also emphasized the role of the digital story in arousing children's motivation. They happily expressed their satisfaction with the digitized product and asked the researcher to transfer her experiment to other colleagues and school subjects. Access to the digital stories was requested by some parents, which made the researcher upload the whole series on a YouTube Channel and share the links with the students' parents.

Parental reports sample
Note: The researcher translated their Arabic comments into English " My daughter's reading became better, and she is now more eager to learn English." " My daughter can articulate English words and letters better than before." " This experience has helped my daughter gain several skills such as analytical skills, imaginative skills, and critical thinking skills." "Learning English through the digital story can activate more senses which makes my daughter more interested in learning and makes the learning process more active."

Summary
This part reported the results obtained by the five data collection instruments: Pre-and posttests, comprehension worksheets, reading assessment sessions, teacher observation sheets, and parental reports. The results of data analysis were presented with reference to the themes of the main research question of the study.
The specific purpose of this research is to enhance Palestinian fourth graders' English micro-skills of reading identified in the English Language Curriculum for Public Schools grades 1-12 (2015, p32) and also defined in English for Palestine Grade 4 (Teacher Book). These skills include recognition of English script or handwriting, answering factual questions about reading material, recognition of pronoun referents and reading and understanding new and familiar material.
The researcher in this section identified students' English micro-skills of reading as listed in table (3.5), illustrated how reading micro-skills-based digital stories can be designed using quality criteria and steps as mentioned in chapter 3, illustrated how digital stories can be used as a medium in Palestinian EFL classrooms to develop children's English micro-skills of reading, and identified the role of the digital story on the development of Palestinian children's English reading micro-skills.

Conclusion
The researcher in this action research utilized digital stories as a medium to develop students' English reading micro-skills and help them achieve higher performances and better learning opportunities. For this purpose, the researcher raised one main question and four minor ones to direct the process of research. The purpose of the first one, for example, was to specify the English reading micro-skills that fourth graders should develop for building on them while designing the digital story (treatment). The second and third questions were addressed in the methodology chapter (chapter 3). The last minor question served to precise the effect of the whole experiment on students' English micro-skills. To conclude, it is safe to say that the process of designing a digital story is a logical, systematic, and scientific one. However, bringing this technology to EFL classes demands careful planning and is never a haphazard procedure.

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The main research question has been tested through the implementation of five data collection instruments. The results gathered by these tools can be concluded as follow:

The Posttests Results
The analysis of tests results has revealed the following conclusions a) Exposure to digital stories can largely enhance English micro-skills of reading since children who watched the digital stories performed better in their reading tests. They were more capable of dealing with unfamiliar reading tests as they were exposed to this while watching the story. They were more fluent in making intelligent guesses about what they read, which helped them answer the questions correctly. This finding goes in consistence with (Christiansen & Koelzer, 2016; Razmia, Pouralib, & Nozad, 2014 & Dong, 2015) b) Children in the experimental group can more creatively deal with higher order thinking questions. This was noted early after the first view of the digital story, and it was tested by allocating one question in each posttest to measure high order thinking skills. Answering these questions, students of the experimental group presented innovative sorts of knowledge transfer, and they provided original forms of what they read. To elaborate, they were asked to summarize the different stages of a trip, so their answers took different forms, e.g., diagrams, drawings, and some symbols to illustrate their impressions about each stage of the trip. Some of their diagrams were circular, horizontal and even in a map cluster form.
Other students made the summary in a table form by putting the character's name at the top of the table and inserting the activities he/she did during the trip; others put a drawing of the activities in the upper row and the character's name in the left column so that they could tick the activity for each character as explained by the reading text. The idea of activating higher order thinking skills through stories was previously discussed by Abdolmanafi-Rokni & Qarajeh (2014).

5.1.2
The Comprehension Worksheets a) Students can more easily read familiar/ unfamiliar words when they come in a story context. As the story triggers students' desire to follow its events and understand its plot, they actually do their best in order to achieve this purpose. Consequently, they focus for a longer time with increasing motivation and enthusiasm. b) The digital input, with its music, texts, and images, can largely enhance students' understanding and make it a fun activity rather than a complicated one. This can be linked to what Burmark (2004) specified regarding merging texts with images and its role in increasing students' comprehension. This similarly goes in consistence with Paivio's (1991) dual-coding theory, which divides the human memory into two main systems: visual and verbal. Since images can be received by both systems, inserting images into the digitized reading material would make information last longer and be more easily restored. c) The use of digital stories demands the teacher to arrange some other facilitating tools such as worksheets, guiding questions, and discussions. Inserting this technology into an English classroom is not a haphazard, spontaneous procedure. Without supporting the digital material with appropriate guidelines, students may get distracted. The worksheet is an excellent solution to the chaotic atmosphere that students may get trapped in when watching the story.

5.1.3
Reading Assessment Session a) Students who were exposed to the digital story enjoyed higher reading competencies than those in the control group.
When asked to read familiar/unfamiliar texts, students of the experimental group provided more accurate and confident performances, as revealed by their marks in chapter four. Moran et al. (2008) and Salkhord et al. (2013) specified that the implementation of digital technologies, e.g. CALL and digital story, would foster students' reading comprehension skills.
Students who lived the experience of digital stories were more confident and less stressful when they were tested by other teachers. They were less hesitant and more courageous to read aloud in front of others. It was observed that students in the control group were more hesitant when teachers asked them to read. The examiners said that students may perform better if they are less anxious or stressed. These observations can be traced back to stand in alignment with what Castañeda (2013) acknowledged concerning the non-threatened environment offered by digital stories and its role in making students feel less stressful about their mistakes.

Teacher's Observation Sheets
a) The digital story provides an authentic context of learning which has a positive impact on students' motivation and interaction. Registering the students' answers to some questions, the researcher was astonished by the number of real connections they made with their society, religious beliefs and even political issues that affect their lives. One example was provided by students when they asked about what prevents Gamela, a girl from the west bank, Palestine, from visiting Gaza, another Palestinian city. Some students referred to the political restrictions imposed on Palestine generally and the siege imposed on Gaza particularly. Others justified that by saying, " She's a girl, and she cannot travel alone".
Their explanations are built on their conservational backgrounds. Some Gazan families would prevent girls from traveling alone, although it is still the same country and it is just an hour's trip by car! These kinds of discussions cannot ever be generated if the learning context is not a story. (Gregori-Signes , 2014), Rance-Roney (2008) and Smeda et al. (2014) discussed the relationship between digital stories and authentic and cultural learning. b) More students can get involved in the learning process when it comes in a digital form. Slow learners' tendencies and willingness to participate in the reading process became higher. As all students were busy tracking the events of the story, shy and reluctant students could seize the chance and take the initiative to read without being judged or criticized. c) While watching and reading digital stories, students look less affected by external distractions as they are utterly engaged in what they are doing. They were completely concerned with tracking the story events and watching the images. Other distractions were marginalized or ignored automatically! d) Being short and simple, digital stories suit the limited attention span of children. Thus, children in the experimental group were rarely seen fidgeting, unlike those in the control group. e) Students in the experimental group were also privileged with the hidden curriculum of values injected into the digital story. They showed impressive behaviors and were less likely to make trouble during the class due to their immersion in the story events.

5.1.5
Parental reports a) Teaching young learners can best achieve its desired outcomes when constant connections with parents are kept. At this young age, teachers may fail to get adequate feedback from the participants because they cannot express themselves well and do not recognize the meaning of what they are doing. Their progress may just be unseen to them, yet noticeable to their parents. This assumption leads the researcher to keep regular contact with participants' parents to get feedback and make steady improvements in procedures. Parental reports were true and constructive, as they wanted the best for their kids. They directed some of the research procedures, such as the YouTube channel. They asked for access to the digital stories to familiarize themselves with the idea. Similarly, they requested the researcher to share her ideas with other teachers inside the school for the best of their kids. As a result, the digital series was shared with all the school teachers in a formal workshop. b) The enactment of digital educational tools like digital stories can be upgraded by being continuous and transferable outside the school. This procedure was done at an early stage when the first versions of the digital stories were refereed by some experts in the fields of education and technology. This did actually improve the digital product both technically and academically. c) The positive psychological impact of constant relationships with students' parents (on all three parties, the students, the parents, and the teacher) is so vital that it can intensely motive an academic impact. d) The feedback gathered via parental reports is very genuine. Parents undoubtedly wanted the best for their kids, so they were honest when providing their comments and suggestions.

Recommendations and Pedagogical Implications
In this section, the researcher provides teachers and action researchers with valuable pieces of advice with reference to the long journey of this action research: a) Conducting action research demands a prolonged journey of preparation and searching. Action researchers are advised to state their problems carefully, study their contexts penetratingly, review their fields, recognize their possibilities and infeasibilities, and back up their A plan with several B plans before starting the process of action research. b) In the digital world, supporting learning with technology has become an inevitable educational approach. Teachers nowadays are obligated to bring the carnival of technology to their classes if they want to be taken seriously by a digital generation of students. c) A digital story is highly recommended for EFL classes as it proved its reliability in upgrading students' levels. Despite this fact, it is significant to say that without careful planning and systematic proceeding, the whole process may go in vain. In other words, teachers are recommended to conduct sufficient research in their area of interest so that they can reward their students with the most relevant digital product. Likewise, teachers are demanded to prepare a toolbox of facilities and attachments to guarantee the effectiveness of their digital stories, e.g. Worksheets, B plans, action plans, daily records, and reflective journals. d) The process of designing a digital story is a multidisciplinary one. The action researchers who would like to make use of this technology have to take into consideration so many things while preparing their digital versions. To elaborate, considering the students' age, needs, and context are important factors that should affect the type of product. The local environment is equally crucial as it does influence the teachers' choices, alternatives, plans, tools and overall assessment procedures. For instance, a teacher cannot depend on individual assessment procedures if he/she teaches in a crowded