其他摘要 | Reading acquisition is a developmental continuum, that is, children have already developed various skills that serve as key foundations for reading learning in the early years of life. Family is the most important environment for young children, and numerous studies have indicated the home literacy environment is closely related to children's emergent literacy skills. However, few studies have been conducted to deeply explore the characteristics of the home literacy environment and factors that may influence it. Furthermore, the investigation of the home literacy environment in previous studies was mostly based on a narrow framework, with taken less account of parents' reading behaviours and children's literacy interests. It is not clear how the different aspects of the home literacy environment relate to each other and how they may affect children's reading development. Thus, the current study would focus on the characteristics of the home literacy environment and its impact on emergent literacy skills based on a broad framework of the home literacy environment.
Study 1 mainly aimed to examine the characteristics of the early home literacy environment and its effect on Chinese word reading using a cross一sectional design. Two hundred twenty-four children aged three to six years old were randomly recruited from Beijing and Shanghai and were asked to complete a Chinese character recognition task. Meanwhile, their parents were required to report on children's home literacy environment. The results showed that children from Beijing and Shanghai had rich home literacy environments and the home literacy environment changed significantly with children's age, suggesting that the home literacy environment may change over time. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that, in the whole sample, the home literacy environment could significantly predict children's Chinese word reading. Importantly, the effects of the home literacy environment on Chinese word reading showed different patterns in different age groups. Specifically, reading interest played unique roles in the Chinese word reading of 4-year-old children. Moreover, home reading resources independently contributed to 6一year-olds' word reading skills. While for 3 and 5 year olds, no significant effects of the home literacy environment were found.
On the basis of Study 1,Study 2 adopted a follow-up design to further examine the characteristics of early home literacy environment and its effect on emergent literacy development. Furthermore, study 2 also aimed to explore the role of children's emergent literacy skills in the construction of the home literacy environment. Sixty-seven Mandarin-speaking children were followed from the second year of kindergarten (T1) to the third year (T2). Nonverbal intelligence, Chinese word reading skills, print awareness and vocabulary knowledge were measured, and parents were required to report their children's home literacy environments. The results indicated that some aspects of the home literacy environment were stable, while the other aspects changed with children's development. Furthermore, parent reading instruction and shared reading independently contributed to children's emergent literacy skills. But for vocabulary knowledge, no significant effect of the home literacy environment was found. Notably, we found that Chinese word reading skills at T1 significantly predicted parent reading instruction at T2. Overall, study 2 further confirms that the characteristics of the home literacy environment may change with the development of children and uncovers the important role of the home literacy environment in emergent literacy skills, which extends the findings of study 1. Meanwhile, study 2 also reveals the influence of children's Chinese word reading skills in the construction of the early home literacy environment.
Study 3 mainly aimed to comprehensively examine the effects of the home literacy environment on different emergent literacy skills. One hundred and seventy-four children aged four to six years old were randomly recruited from Beijing. All children were required to complete a series of tasks on nonverbal intelligence, Chinese word reading, morphological awareness, vocabulary knowledge and narrative skills. Meanwhile, parents were asked to report the characteristics of children's home literacy environment (including traditional home literacy resources and activities, shared reading quality and digital home literacy resources and activities, parents' reading behaviors and children's literacy interests), their expectations and beliefs on early literacy development. The results showed that parents' reading behaviors significantly predicted the traditional home literacy resources and activities (including parent teaching and shared reading), shared reading quality (meaning-directed behaviors), and the digital home literacy resources and activities (including number of e-books and digital home literacy activities). The results also indicated that children's literacy interests significantly predicted the traditional home literacy resources and activities (parent teaching), shared reading quality (code-directed behaviors), and the digital home literacy activities. In addition, parents' beliefs (reading belief) had significant effects on the traditional home literacy activities (parent teaching), shared reading quality (code-directed reading behaviors), and the digital home literacy activities. Parents' beliefs (positive affect) also significantly influenced the traditional home literacy activities (shared reading), shared reading quality (meaning-directed behaviors), and the digital home literacy activities (children's informal digital literacy activities). As for the effects of the home literacy environment, results showed that the home literacy environment could significantly predict children's Chinese word reading, morphological awareness, vocabulary knowledge and narrative skills. Mediation analyses showed that both parents' reading behaviors and children's literacy interests indirectly influenced different emergent literacy skills through the home literacy activities. Moreover, parents' beliefs indirectly influenced children's emergent literacy skills through the home literacy environments.
Overall, the present study provides important evidence on that early home literacy environments change with children's development. Parents' beliefs and children's emergent literacy skills are important factors influencing the construction of early home literacy environments. Furthermore, the home literacy environment is essential to the development of early literacy skills, metalingustic awareness and oral language skills. The present study provides an important empirical basis for revealing the dynamic change of the home literacy environment during the process of children's reading development and the role of parents and children in the construction of the early home literacy environment, and also has important practical implications for the scientific home reading education. |
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