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Parents and Preschool Children Interacting with Storybooks: Children’s Early Literacy Achievement
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Lynch, Jacqueline Anderson, Jim Anderson, Ann M. Shapiro, Jon |
| Copyright Year | 2008 |
| Abstract | This research reports on one area of a larger study in Western Canada examining the literacy activities of families from culturally diverse backgrounds. The research focused on parents’ interactions with preschool children in storybook sharing and children’s emergent reading development as measured by the Test of Early Reading Ability-2 (TERA-2). The sample consisted of 35 parents and children. Parents’ and children’s interactions in storybook sharing were videotaped and coded using a modified scale by Shapiro, Anderson, and Anderson (1997). Relationships were found between parents’ and children’s interactions in storybook reading and children’s early literacy achievement. Parents and Preschool Children • 227 Parents and Preschool Children Interacting with Storybooks: Children’s Early Literacy Achievement Jacqueline Lynch, Assistant Professor York University Jim Anderson, Professor Ann Anderson, Professor Jon Shapiro, Professor University of British Columbia Abstract This research reports on one area of a larger study in Western Canada examining the literacy activities of families from culturally diverse backgrounds. The research focused on parents’ interactions with preschool children in storybook sharing and children’s emergent reading development as measured by the Test of Early Reading Ability-2 (TERA-2). The sample consisted of 35 parents and children. Parents’ and children’s interactions in storybook sharing were videotaped and coded using a modified scale by Shapiro, Anderson, and Anderson (1997). Relationships were found between parents’ and children’s interactions in storybook reading and children’s early literacy achievement.This research reports on one area of a larger study in Western Canada examining the literacy activities of families from culturally diverse backgrounds. The research focused on parents’ interactions with preschool children in storybook sharing and children’s emergent reading development as measured by the Test of Early Reading Ability-2 (TERA-2). The sample consisted of 35 parents and children. Parents’ and children’s interactions in storybook sharing were videotaped and coded using a modified scale by Shapiro, Anderson, and Anderson (1997). Relationships were found between parents’ and children’s interactions in storybook reading and children’s early literacy achievement. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between parents’ and children’s interactions in storybook reading and children’s literacy achievement. Storybook reading has been viewed as an important means for supporting young children’s literacy development. Of all the experiences said to contribute to early literacy, shared book reading is often considered to be the most important literacy experience between caregivers and children (Neuman, 1999). To develop accurate models of the home literacy environment, it is necessary to examine how parents 228 • Reading Horizons • V48.4 • 2008 interact with their children when encouraged by educators to read to them (Senechal, LeFevre, Thomas, & Daley, 1998). Overall, storybook exposure in the early years of formal schooling has been shown to contribute to children’s language skills and has also been shown to relate to reading comprehension in the later primary grades (Senechal et al., 1998; Whitehurst, Zevenbergen, Crone, Schultz, Velting, & Fischel, 1999). Other models of literacy acquisition can be developed when findings of research with diverse cultural groups are incorporated into theories and models of early reading development (Hammer & Miccio, 2004). Moreover, insight into both parents’ and children’s interaction with text can challenge or refine theories about the importance of various types of interactions in storybook reading. Theoretical Frame and Background This research was based on a Vygotskian or social constructivist perspective that maintains that learning occurs in the context of shared meaningful activities, of which storybook reading is an example. According to Vygotsky (1978), adults deliberately structure shared activities within a child’s zone of proximal development so children can demonstrate more complex behaviors than they might on their own. One way children learn about literacy is by interacting with significant others in their lives. Specifically, in storybook reading, adults may phrase questions and statements in relation to children’s literacy knowledge. Parents can adjust the types of interactions with children to the child’s literacy knowledge, while also supporting a higher-level of learning. One method of examining parent-child interactions in storybook reading is to examine the levels of cognitive demand associated with each interaction. Sigel (1970, 1993) referred to distancing as behavior or events that involve cognitive separation from the immediate environment. Cognitive distancing is evident in parent-child book sharing when parents ask certain types of questions and make statements that place more cognitive demands on children. Low-level distancing utterances include repeating text or labeling what is seen in the pictures. High-level distancing utterances involve more cognitive distance, such as explaining or extending the text (Leseman & de Jong, 1998). According to Bus and van IJzendoorn (1995), parents who engage children in higher level thinking skills are thought to benefit children’s literacy learning by promoting literacy understandings in terms of developing the skills of hypothesizing, predicting, and understanding the relativity of one’s own perspective to others. Parents and Preschool Children • 229 Sonnenschein and Munsterman (2002) and Phillips and McNaughton (1990), found that while parents and older siblings focus on various types of interactions in storybook reading with preschoolers, there was little focus or talk about print. Evans and Saint-Aubin (2005) researched children’s focus on print in storybook sharing by videotaping children’s eye movements when they were being read to by a parent or a preschool teacher. They found that based on the children’s eye fixations on the print, when read a storybook by a teacher or parent, the children pay little attention to print. In relation to children’s achievement, in a study of Turkish, Surinamese, and Dutch families living in the Netherlands, Leseman and de Jong (1998) found that there were differences in children’s receptive knowledge of Dutch words after parents engaged in storybook sharing with their children. Interactions during book reading revealed differences among each cultural group. According to the researchers, the Turkish group, relative to both of the other groups, pointed far less to the pictures in the book and also uttered fewer picture labels and descriptions. It seemed that Turkish mothers made less use of pictures in the storybook to support their young children’s understanding of the story. Furthermore, the Dutch group engaged in fewer utterances requiring literal repeating and completing of read sentences than the Surinamese and the Turkish group. Higher level utterances (i.e., explaining, evaluating, and extending utterances) were more predominant among the Dutch group than in the other groups, which seemed to relate to children’s vocabulary knowledge. Similarly, DeTemple (2001) found that engaging in non-immediate talk or higher-level utterances, such as drawing inferences and making predictions, while storybook sharing, was positively associated with children’s later literacy skills, including their emergent literacy knowledge and comprehension skills. In one of the few studies to compare questions with comments, Kertoy (1994) examined the types of interactions between White, middle-class parents and children ages three to six years old. She found that questioning by the adult contributed to a greater percentage of the children’s utterances related to story structure and print than did commenting or general story reading by the adult. However, commenting by the adult contributed to a greater percentage of utterances by the child related to story meaning than did questioning or general story reading by the adult. Kertoy (1994) recommended that parents and teachers combine questioning and commenting during storybook reading to maximize opportunities for lengthier comments by children. Senechal, Thomas, and Monker (1995) found that fouryear-olds who were asked what/where questions or who pointed to illustrations depicting the target word acquired significantly more words than peers who only 230 • Reading Horizons • V48.4 • 2008 heard the text read verbatim. Vocabulary knowledge has also been shown to be a strong predictor of reading comprehension and academic achievement (Pressley, 2006). These studies signify the importance of having children actively involved in the shared-reading experience. To gain a better understanding of the quality of interactions in storybook sharing, this study addressed the need to focus on areas of interactions in storybook reading that may relate to children’s literacy achievement. Because most research on storybook reading has involved White, middle-class families, this study also extends our understanding by providing an exploratory account of the way in which families from diverse backgrounds interact in storybook reading. In particular, the research questions addressed in this study were: Do parents’ and children’s interactions in storybook reading relate to young children’s literacy achievement as measured by the TERA-2? If so, what types of interactions relate to children’s literacy achievement? |
| Starting Page | 227 |
| Ending Page | 242 |
| Page Count | 16 |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| Volume Number | 48 |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1091&context=reading_horizons&httpsredir=1&referer= |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
