Alphabet training of primary school students is an essential, but challenging activity. Alphabet knowledge is an important fundamental literacy skill which has been found to directly impact the future academic success of students. Game-based learning and the use of multimodal engagement activities have been found to be effective intervention strategies in successful alphabet training programmes. In this study, a Kinect-based digital Catcher Game was developed for English alphabet training of primary school students. For a duration of 4 weeks, a control group (CG) consisting of 41 Class-III students received traditional classroom training for 60 minutes each day. During the same period, an intervention group (IG) consisting of 45 Class-III students was trained for 30 minutes in the traditional class and using a Catcher Game session for another 30 minutes. The alphabet knowledge performances of the two groups were compared before and after the game-based training intervention. During the pre-test, no statistically significant differences were observed in the alphabet knowledge performance of the CG and IG. In the post-intervention evaluation, the IG students were found to perform significantly better in the test than the CG. During their post-intervention feedback, most of the IG students and teachers talked favorably about the use of Catcher Game intervention and attributed the significant improvement in IG performance to this intervention. Post-intervention, the teachers also reported a significant improvement in the motivation and engagement among the IG students during regular classroom sessions.

The Catcher Game was further transformed to experiment with a multisensory training approach involving the use of visual picture mnemonics using the first letter of the object spelling as well as the use of the sound of the letter name. This new version of the Catcher Game was named Catcher Game II were examined the impact of a kinesthetic digital game-based learning intervention on the improvement of alphabet knowledge and classroom engagement of primary school students.  111 primary school students were randomly assigned to one of the two treatment groups and received English alphabet training at the primary school for 6 weeks. In the control group (CG), the students received English alphabet training using the traditional teaching methods for 60 minutes daily. In the intervention group (IG), the students were daily trained using the traditional method as well as a kinesthetic digital game for 30 minutes each. The student alphabet knowledge performances were measured using - (1) letter name accuracy in isolation, (2) letter name fluency in isolation, (3) letter name accuracy in word context, and (4) paired associate learning. The extent of student engagement was also recorded and compared. Within-group comparisons were made for the pre-test and post-test data. Also, between-group comparisons were made between the CG and IG. It was found that the students from both groups achieved improvements in their performances as well as session engagement from the pre-test stage to the post-test stage. However, the IG students demonstrated a statistically significant higher mean score gain and session engagement than the CG students.