THE HOME ENVIRONMENT IS CRUCIAL TO A CHILD’S LITERACY DEVELOPMENT: PARENTS PLAY A KEY ROLE IN PROMOTING LITERACY ORIENTATION IN INFANTS AND TODDLERS AND THIS HELPS THE CHILD IN LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT AND LEARNING

Researchers have repeatedly found that the home literacy environments of toddlers and preschoolers have measurable effects on later language acquisition and literacy skills.

Families are essential to emergent literacy development. Reading and writing are usually first introduced to children in the home.

A meta-analysis review on intervention studies that tested whether parent-child reading activities would enhance children's reading acquisition was carried out by researchers. The combined results for the 16 intervention studies, representing 1,340 families clearly showed that parent involvement has a positive effect on children's reading acquisition.

According to experiments conducted in the Early Childhood project in Baltimore, USA, for the National Reading Research Centre, children are likely to become intrinsically motivated to read when their home literacy experiences promote the view that reading is a source of entertainment. Some key factors in home environments that impact literacy development include literacy resources, opportunities to learn, socio-economic status, parents’ educational level, and parental expectations. Among the key factors in home environments, the role of the parents is the most important factor for their child’s literacy development because they are the teachers, guides, and models whom children first meet.

Creating a literacy orientation (i.e. having interest in books, reading and writing) has to begin with exposing a child to literacy routines in the home environment from a young age. Such routines include exposing the child to books, talking about words and books, reading to the child, and allowing the child to be exposed to writing and handling writing implements.

Adults reading to infants and toddlers has been linked to future language development and early reading ensures that reading habits continue into later years.

In one study of 2,581 mothers from low-income homes in the Early Head Start Programme in the USA, frequency of early maternal reading predicted maternal reading at later ages, and child language at age 14 months predicted maternal reading at 24 months. The authors concluded that early maternal reading and children’s language result had a “snowball effect” for continuation of an established pattern of book reading at subsequent ages.

Language skills in infancy have received particular attention as they influence overall development, and in particular reading achievement. Building a child’s vocabulary from infancy was shown in a longitudinal study of British infants to be a predictor of language and literacy outcomes at school age.

Carrying out activities which build children’s vocabulary when they are in infancy has been shown to develop the language and literacy abilities when they are older.

Another study of 1,063 children in UK showed that total vocabulary size at age 2 can significantly predict subsequent language and literacy achievement up to fifth grade. Reading, talking, and singing to babies helps with vocabulary building, which in turn boosts literacy skills and affects their literacy functioning levels when they are older.

How a reading adult carries out conversations during the reading process can have an impact on a children’s later language skills, especially when reading to children who were at risk of language deprivation. Reading practices that promote language development and engagement observed in this at-risk sample have implications for reading intervention efforts with young children.

In a study of 87 primary caregivers and their 24-month-old children enrolled in an early intervention programme, it was found that caregivers’ use of labelling, expansions, and questions was related to 24-month-old children’s attention during reading. Although children’s language skills at 24 months were associated with the reported frequency of caregiver reading in the home, caregivers’ use of questions was related to frequency of reading.

Other studies also found that while reading to children, specific parent behaviours, such as asking open-ended questions, adding information, focusing on print concepts, and eliciting abstract language, are related to children's later language skills.

A systematic review of 21 studies on shared reading covering 1275 children from 12 to 42 months of age was carried out for the Centre for Early Literacy Learning (US Department of Education). It showed that early expressive language development was facilitated by joint reading strategies that engaged, supported, and promoted children’s active participation in the book reading opportunities. Relating the story to children’s own experiences, providing positive feedback to children during book reading, expanding on their comments, asking them open-ended questions, and following their interests while interacting with books all encouraged children’s participation in the shared reading activities.

The longer a child stayed engaged in the book reading episode, and the more an adult encouraged the child’s active participation by expanding on what a child says or by asking open-ended questions, the greater the effect the reading experience. When using shared book reading strategies with young children, the effects are enhanced when the episodes last more than five minutes and more than a few books are read. However, it is important to remember that when a child’s interest in the book starts to fade, it is best to try another book or terminate the episode.

One of the most powerful pieces of shared reading is what happens in the pauses between pages and after the book is closed. Some ways parents can engage their children while reading include:

(i) Talking to children about what they see in the books and linking it to their real life experiences (eg. “you like ice cream” when looking at a picture of ice cream) (ii) Offering explanations about what is seen in the book (eg. "he cried because he was sad") (iii) Including explanations of word meanings (eg. "a puppy is a baby dog")

Research has shown that talking to children while looking at books was related to children’s later performance on measures of vocabulary, story comprehension, definitions, and emergent literacy.