Abstract
The study investigated how parental belief and family socio economic status (SES) were related to the home literacy environment and to early literacy-related skills in a foreign language (English). Eighty-six Chinese children in kindergarten (Mage = 5 years 5 months, 44 girls) were assessed on English phonological awareness, English receptive vocabulary, English expressive vocabulary, Chinese receptive vocabulary, and nonverbal intelligence. Parents completed a questionnaire about family demographics, home literacy environment, and parental belief on the importance of early English literacy skills. Principal component analysis revealed three dimensions of home literacy environment: Formal Literacy Activity, Informal Language Exposure, and Passive Literacy Exposure. Results showed that parental belief and family SES were important predictors of home literacy environment, which further explained 44% of the variance in early English language and literacy skills. Parental belief indirectly predicted children’s English receptive vocabulary and expressive vocabulary through Informal Language Exposure, and phonological awareness through Formal Literacy Activity. The results underpinned the importance of parents’ involvement at home and the potential feasibility of interventions on parental beliefs in helping children develop early language and literacy skills in English as a foreign language.
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Notes
Kindergartens in China are either public or private, last for three years, and serve children from three to six years old. Children who complete Chinese kindergarten can enter primary school directly or parents can choose to attend one additional year of kindergarten. Neither preschool or kindergarten are compulsory in China. Compulsory education begins with primary school, which lasts for six years, ending in middle school, which typically spans three years.
We did not include the variable “paternal education” in the analysis because it is generally correlated with maternal education and maternal education level is a better predictor of Asian children’s early English learning outcomes, compared to paternal education (see Zhang et al., 2021, for a meta-analysis).
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Funding was provide by Humanities and Social Science Fund of Ministry of Education of China [Grant No. 20YJC740102].
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Lai, J., Ji, X.R., Joshi, R.M. et al. Investigating Parental Beliefs and Home Literacy Environment on Chinese Kindergarteners’ English Literacy and Language Skills. Early Childhood Educ J 52, 113–126 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10643-022-01413-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10643-022-01413-3