The Relationship between Senior High School Chinese-language Teachers’ Digital Narrative Literacy and Digital Narrative Writing Teaching Practices in Jinzhou City: The Role of Writing Teaching Self-efficacy and Teacher Agency

Abstract

Digital narrative writing instruction is important for cultivating students’ digital expression and media narrative competence. It responds to the literacy requirement of “expression and communication” and holds practical significance for Chinese-language teaching in county-level senior high schools. However, its implementation in Jinzhou City, China, remains limited. Instruction is still dominated by pen-and-paper training, and students’ digital expression remains superficial. Digital narrative is often reduced to “illustrated composition”, making it difficult to reach the core of narrative structure and media expression. Accordingly, this study focused on Chinese-language teachers in Jinzhou City. It used purposive sampling and an online questionnaire to examine the relationship between digital narrative literacy and teaching practices. It also tested the mediating role of writing teaching self-efficacy and the moderating role of teacher agency. A sample was collected from 12 senior high schools between July and September 2026, yielding 386 valid questionnaires (82.1% response rate). Results show that digital narrative literacy has a significant positive relationship with teaching practices, self-efficacy plays a mediating role, and teacher agency positively moderates both direct and mediating effects. Improving teaching thus depends on cultivating digital narrative literacy, with teacher agency as the condition and self-efficacy as the pathway.