In this article, we analyze the use of the book trailer as a tool to stimulate reading in children with learning difficulties, starting initially from its characterization, uses, and cognitive processes it stimulates in students who present this condition.
This resource, although originating from the advertising field, has been gradually incorporated into classrooms, both ordinary and special. It has all the characteristics of a short film and is used as such, but its publication is done on social networks, which achieve a higher level of penetration, and in the case of students, they are usually familiar with its use, especially because they use them as a recreational medium.
In addition to its use in advertising, it has potential as a tool to stimulate reading in children because it captures their attention, allows interaction with other media, and the use of technology; diversifying the stimuli students receive from the teacher, which adds dynamism and creativity to the classroom routine, generating a substantial improvement in the student’s contact with reading material.
What is a Book Trailer?
Even though it can be conceived as an advertising tool that allows the positioning of books or texts of any genre and aimed at any type of audience in the market, its essential objective is to attract potential readers to works that pique their interest. There are numerous experiences of its application for improving reading and especially for developing reading habits in primary and secondary school students, and even in their teachers.
Among these applications at the research level are the studies carried out by Tabernero (2016) who, in an investigation on virtual epitexts in the dissemination of children’s books: towards a poetics of the booktrailer, made a selection of 80 texts online, concluding that this resource for the virtual dissemination and positioning of texts is truly an epitext with the category of an incorporated paratext, as well as constituting a multimodal literacy tool.
For his part, Rovira (2017) worked with the booktrailer and booktuber as LIJ2.0 tools to develop reading habits. They conducted a documentary-type investigation in which they managed to establish the usefulness of these two tools to promote reading habits in educational institutions, considering the booktrailer as audiovisual advertising books and highlighting that digital devices have facilitated the recording, editing, and publication of videos, thus turning them into tools that facilitate and stimulate reading, particularly emphasizing their use to stimulate reading comprehension.
Likewise, Romero, Heredia, and Sampériz (2019) conducted research using the booktrailer as a digital tool for the reading training of future teachers. For this, they analyzed four (04) short films with second-year students using Nvivo software for data processing, noting in their conclusions that this type of audiovisual resource serves to promote reading and acquire literary competence in the selected sample.
In this same line of research, Martínez and Rodríguez (2020) worked with the booktrailer as a didactic strategy for the development of communicative, narrative, and digital competencies, in which they worked with a sample of primary school students, finding that only three of the 74 students included in the study had difficulty with communicative competence. In this sense, they concluded that this didactic tool generates a high level of acceptability if used in both the literature and technology and computer science areas.
Book Trailer as a Reading Stimulation Tool
It fundamentally consists of a short video of 1 to 3 minutes, aimed at capturing the attention of the viewer and stimulating them towards reading the text it is based on. They function as a small preview of the content of the selected book, providing brief information about the plot, setting, and characters. Similar techniques to those of short films are used for their development, but they differ from them in that they are disseminated online.
The design and production of book trailers in classrooms for children with learning difficulties make it easier to capture their attention, involve them in a novel project that breaks the routine of classroom work, awaken their curiosity and interest in reading, in addition to developing skills such as public speaking, because they can be the protagonists of the book trailer, as well as the analysis of the content of a text to reflect it in the video to be made. This requires them to use basic thought processes such as attention, concentration, perception, and memory. In addition to this, they learn to analyze and synthesize content from readings that capture their interest.
On the other hand, they can learn to use the technological tools available to them, such as Android devices, tablets, and computers, to upload their production to various internet platforms where book trailers can be incorporated, including: Vimeo, YouTube, Daily Motion, and even Instagram.
Students get involved in the design, production, and editing of the video, and can even narrate their experience with reading the text in the classroom, and that opinion can be reflected in various book trailers that they can then upload to social networks and share with their classmates and with students from other educational institutions who, like them, need to use innovative ways to motivate them towards learning to read and developing reading habits.
Additionally, it constitutes an educational inclusion tool because it makes it possible to cater to the diversity of students, even those with learning difficulties, which allows for the evaluation of their achievements through an innovative activity, highlighting the achievement of their goals and their spontaneous participation in the activity, generating a mutual benefit for all students with learning difficulties.
To learn more about book trailers and their use in the educational environment, you can consult the following bibliographical references:
- Heredia, H. (2020) Non-fiction books and the booktrailer: a didactic proposal for sixth grade of primary school, Cádiz: University of Cádiz.
- Martínez, L and Rodríguez, A. (2020) The Booktrailer as a strategy for the development of communicative, narrative, and digital competencies, Revista Boletín Redipe 9 (6) 168-182 June.
- Romero, M., Heredia, H. and Sampériz, M. (2019) The booktrailer as a digital tool in the reading training of future teachers. A case study, Dialnet, Unirioja.es
- Rovira, J. (2017) Booktrailer and Booktuber as LIJ2.0 tools for the development of reading habits, Investigaciones sobre lectura, 7, 55-72.
- Tabernero, R. (2016) Virtual epitexts in the dissemination of children’s books: Towards a poetics of the booktrailer: an analysis model. Ocnos Revista de estudios sobre lectura 15 (2) 21-36.