The present study explored the efficacy of a parent implemented emergent literacy intervention to promote reading readiness and to improve parent-child relationships among preschoolers and their caregivers. Subjects were 24 parents and their preschool children ranging in age from three to five years who attend preschool at the Mailman-Segal Institute (MSI) for Early Childhood Studies. An assessment of the students' pre -literacy skills was conducted and teacher and parent rating scales that measured social- emotional and behavioral functioning were collected. Parents were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. Parents assigned to the experimental group learned to implement activities from the Parents Activate Literacy Skills (PALS) curriculum in their daily routine to promote pre-literacy skills. Parents assigned to the control group learned to implement parenting techniques to promote improved parent-child interactions in an adapted version of Russell Barkley's Parent Training Program. Adherence to interventions was monitored by parents' self-report, and fidelity of implementation was assessed throughout the research by trained observers. The proposed study seeks to understand better the skills required for early literacy acquisition among preschoolers. The children were assessed pre and post-intervention using selected subtests of the Woodcock-Johnson III Achievement Battery and the Woodcock-Johnson III Tests of Cognitive Abilities. Parents were asked to complete behavior rating scales and a measure of parenting stress, while teachers were asked to complete behavior rating scales prior to and post-intervention. One-way (treatment versus control) analyses of covariance were used to test for differences between groups. Results from the analyses revealed that children in the Literacy Intervention group performed significantly better than children in the Behavior Management group on Oral Comprehension, Sound Blending, and Phonemic Awareness subtests of the Woodcock-Johnson. Additionally, parents in the emergent literacy intervention showed a significant decrease on the parent-child dysfunctional interaction scale of the Parenting Stress Index (PSI)-Short Form.

Syftet med denna studie var att undersöka den fysiska miljöns betydelse för barnens intresse gällandeläsning i förskolan. Studien har pedagogers inställning till läsning och läsmiljö som fokus.Undersökningen utfördes med förskollärare från fem olika förskolor inom samma kommun.Metoderna som användes var kvalitativa intervjuer och observationer. Resultatet visar att det mestcentrala i studien var att alla informanter var eniga om att det är grundläggande för en givandeläsmiljö att miljön är planerad, organiserad och att miljön ständigt ska vara föränderlig. Ett begreppsom återkommer upprepade gånger i studien är att materialet i läsmiljön ska vara lättillgängligt.Informanterna menar att det inte räcker med en bra läsmiljö, utan det behövs kunskap och intressehos pedagogerna till att kunna bearbeta materialet i miljön. Slutligen anser dem att det ärpedagogernas ansvar att skapa en givande läsmiljö som inspirerar hos barnen på förskolan till att läsadå detta är något som inte finns naturligt. / <p>Godkännande datum: 2019-06-07</p>

Individual differences in early literacy skills can be attributed to children’s previous history of emergent literacy experiences during their preschool years. The purpose of this qualitative study was to learn about the emergent literacy experiences of one Libyan American preschooler and one Syrian American preschooler and how their families support these experiences in their bilingual homes. Through the lens of social theory of learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991; Wenger, 1998) and sociocultural theory (Rogoff, 1990; Vygotsky, 1978), this multi-case study was designed to explore family literacy practices with a preschooler in a naturalistic setting. The questions guiding this study were: (1) How did the texts, tools, and technologies available in two bilingual home settings impact the emergent literacy practices of a Libyan American child and a Syrian American child? (2) What support did family members provide for these two children as they developed emergent literacy practices in their bilingual home settings? Data sources included a demographic questionnaire, digital-recordings of family literacy practices with a preschooler, audio-recorded in-depth interviews with the parents, home visits, the preschoolers’ writing samples, and photographs of literacy activities, materials, and the home environment. The recorded family literacy practices and interviews were transcribed and analyzed to identify emerging themes. Both within-case analysis and cross-case analysis were conducted. Findings revealed that the preschoolers in both families use a multimodal process such as talking, drawing, singing, chanting, recitation, technologies, and sociodramatic play in their daily literacy experiences. The parents are not concerned with teaching their children specific literacy skills; but they naturally use techniques for keeping them on task and questioning skills to enhance oral language and comprehension development. These families’ home literacy practices are Americanized by living in the mainstream social group, and English is frequently used among the family members. However, their bilingualism and religious literacy practices enrich and vary their children’s emergent literacy experiences and their family literacy practices. The significance of this study resides in the importance of getting to know individual families’ backgrounds to better understand and respect the cultural practices of family literacy.

Recent and ongoing research has demonstrated the alarming likelihood of children from low-income homes and from ethnic minorities to read at much lower reading levels than their peers. Additionally, reading ability is related to the earliest of emergent literacy skills, which can be measured in young children before they enter formal schooling. The home environment, including the available resources, support for literacy and school, and the parent-child relationship, plays an important role in promoting the development of emergent literacy skills. More research is needed, however, to inform programs and researchers about the specific relationship between the home environment and emergent literacy development. The current study was conducted using a sample of 122 preschool children enrolled in ERF enriched preschool classrooms in one school located in a Southwestern state. The study investigated the power of three variables of the home literacy environment (HLE) (i.e., Family Reading and Writing, External Resources, and Daily Activities) to predict three emergent literacy outcomes (i.e., receptive oral language, alphabet knowledge, and name writing) using canonical correlation analysis (CCA). The study also used commonality regression analysis to examine the shared and unique variance in these emergent literacy outcomes accounted for by the variables of the HLE and the parent-child relationship. The results of the CCA did not find the variables of the HLE to have a statistically significant relationship with the emergent literacy outcomes. Missing data techniques were used to account for incomplete data, and he results were closer to obtaining statistical significance when the more advanced method of multiple imputation was used to account for missing data, with the p-value decreasing from .751 with listwise deletion to between .094 and .504 with multiple imputation. The second analysis of the study, the commonality regression analysis, did find home variables to account for unique and shared variance in the emergent literacy outcomes, particularly in preschool name writing. Specifically, the External Resources scale of the Familia Inventory (Taylor, 2000) uniquely accounted for the smallest amount of variance (i.e., .1 percent) in name writing, while the scores of the PCRI uniquely accounted for the largest amount of variance (i.e., 3.4 percent). When combined together, however, the predictor variables accounted for larger amounts of variance in name writing ability. The Familia Inventory scale of External Resources accounted for the smallest amount of variance when combined with the other predictor variables (i.e., 21.5 percent) while the scores on the PCRI accounted for the largest combined amount of variance, accounting for 31.4 percent of the variance in name writing ability. These results complement and extend on existing research. The findings, limitations, and implications of the results of this study are discussed.

In the field of deaf education, a long-standing and still unanswered question is why are the reading levels and academic achievement levels of deaf and hard of hearing children inferior to their hearing peers. Teachers and parents continue to look for reasons to explain the gap and strategies they can use to narrow this gap between the reading achievement of children who are deaf and children who hear. For all children, literacy learning begins at birth. During the early years, children listen to and learn from the language their parents speak to them. The children are affected by the family interactions and experiences of daily life both inside and outside the family. Examination of literacy interactions of deaf children and their parents may provide answers to help us understand the literacy achievement gap deaf children experience. For this research dissertation, my focus was on: (a) How does the communication method of the deaf child affect language learning?; (b) How can the parent-child literacy interactions of deaf children be described?, and (c) How can preschool-age deaf children’s emergent literacy behaviors be described? This naturalistic study looked at the early literacy interactions of preschool deaf children of hearing parents. From an initial group of ten families, three families from an early intervention program were selected. The researcher identified the literacy histories of the deaf children, described the parent-child literacy interactions, and explored emergent literacy behaviors occurring in the home. Data sources included parent questionnaires, parent interviews, literacy logs, and observations of parent-child literacy interactions, including storybook reading. Findings reveal that overall family support, the definitive personality of the parents, and the early diagnosis and amplification of the deaf child defined the difference between the deaf child that excelled as an emergent reader and those who did not. Family support assisted in making each child a successful emergent reader. Parents who made an early decision and commitment to a communication mode, whether manual or oral, allowed their child to progress in areas beyond simple vocabulary. Lastly, the early diagnosis of deafness and early amplification aided the deaf child in emergent literacy achievements.

Individual differences in early literacy skills can be attributed to children’s previous history of emergent literacy experiences during their preschool years. The purpose of this qualitative study was to learn about the emergent literacy experiences of one Libyan American preschooler and one Syrian American preschooler and how their families support these experiences in their bilingual homes. Through the lens of social theory of learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991; Wenger, 1998) and sociocultural theory (Rogoff, 1990; Vygotsky, 1978), this multi-case study was designed to explore family literacy practices with a preschooler in a naturalistic setting. The questions guiding this study were: (1) How did the texts, tools, and technologies available in two bilingual home settings impact the emergent literacy practices of a Libyan American child and a Syrian American child? (2) What support did family members provide for these two children as they developed emergent literacy practices in their bilingual home settings? Data sources included a demographic questionnaire, digital-recordings of family literacy practices with a preschooler, audio-recorded in-depth interviews with the parents, home visits, the preschoolers’ writing samples, and photographs of literacy activities, materials, and the home environment. The recorded family literacy practices and interviews were transcribed and analyzed to identify emerging themes. Both within-case analysis and cross-case analysis were conducted. Findings revealed that the preschoolers in both families use a multimodal process such as talking, drawing, singing, chanting, recitation, technologies, and sociodramatic play in their daily literacy experiences. The parents are not concerned with teaching their children specific literacy skills; but they naturally use techniques for keeping them on task and questioning skills to enhance oral language and comprehension development. These families’ home literacy practices are Americanized by living in the mainstream social group, and English is frequently used among the family members. However, their bilingualism and religious literacy practices enrich and vary their children’s emergent literacy experiences and their family literacy practices. The significance of this study resides in the importance of getting to know individual families’ backgrounds to better understand and respect the cultural practices of family literacy.

A six week parent-child shared reading intervention targeting children's emergent literacy and emotion knowledge was implemented for 33 Head Start home-based families. This pilot study tested the hypothesis that the nominal addition of social emotional components to an evidenced-based shared reading intervention (dialogic reading) would result in additive effects in regards to parent and child outcomes. The study utilized a pre-post test design involving random assignment of families to one of two treatment groups. Both groups received the standard dialogic reading intervention, while parents in the DR ES (dialogic reading plus emotion skills) received an additional nominal dose of training in how to be nurturing towards their child during reading and how to use the story as a catalyst to talking about emotions. Differential effects between the two interventions were not found. Specifically, no clinically significant group effects were found for children's print concepts knowledge and emotion knowledge (emotion labeling and perspective taking) at post-test. Similarly, no effects emerged for parents' reading related behaviors, namely, application of verbal prompts, and displayed warmth. Effect sizes, as measured by eta squared, were also consistently low for all dependent measures, ranging from .00 for children's perspective taking and parents' displayed warmth to .03 for parent verbal prompts. Significant time effects emerged for all outcome variables with the exception of parent warmth, with effect sizes ranging from d = 0.31 (parent warmth) to d = 1.31 (parents' dialogic reading prompts), with an average effect size of d = 0.61. This study is the first to explore the potential impact of combining emotional content into the dialogic reading intervention. It refocuses attention on the contexts that promote children's school readiness skills. Results suggest that the potential benefits of dialogic reading extend beyond parent and children reading related skills, and may include children's emotional development. Findings warrant further investigation of interventions that support parents in maximizing the benefits of shared reading.

Syftet med det här examensarbetet är att ur ett förskollärarperspektiv undersöka vad högläsningen har för betydelse för barns utveckling av literacy. De teoretiska utgångspunkterna hämtas från forskningsfältet literacy som handlar om att kunna läsa och skriva samt förståelsen av symboler, språkliga verktyg och hur man kan använda dem i samspel med andra. I den här undersökningen har fem förskollärare medverkat i semistrukturerade intervjuer. Resultaten visar på utifrån förskollärarnas utsagor att de använder sig av högläsning i undervisningssyfte för att främja barns språkutveckling. Resultaten visar även på flera faktorer som är betydelsefulla för barns utveckling av literacy ur förskollärarnas perspektiv. En faktor är att barn ska få ett berikat ordförråd under högläsningen. Ytterligare en faktor är vikten av att barn får möjlighet att vara delaktiga i högläsningen och att förskollärare är lyhörda och tar del av de frågor som barnen väljer att lyfta fram. Delad högläsning bidrar till att barn utvecklar sitt verbala språk, utvecklar fantasin, det gynnar samspelet mellan barn/barn och vuxna/barn, förbereder barn att bli läsare och bidrar till innehåll i barns lek. Dessa faktorer är viktiga kunskaper för att barn ska kunna utveckla sin literacy.

Early childhood teachers attend in-service trainings to continue their education after entering the workforce. The effectiveness of in-service training is being studied by many researchers. Some researchers postulate that adding modeling of the behavior and follow-up feedback to in-service trainings increases the ability of early childhood teachers to implement newly learned behaviors. The study investigated the effects of an instructional package (explicit teaching, modeling, and feedback) on early childhood students' implementation of vocabulary behaviors during shared storybook reading. The three vocabulary behaviors studied were selecting and stressing words, explaining and relating words, and repetition. Two case studies were completed with early childhood students, using a single-subject multiple-probe design across behaviors. Participants were baselined across all three behaviors. The behaviors were taught individually using explicit teaching and modeling. When criterion was reached, a new behavior was trained and modeled. Participants were given feedback on their performance, as well. Results showed the participants were able to implement selecting and stressing words and repetition during shared storybook reading after explicit training and modeling. The implementation of explaining and relating behaviors required additional feedback and reteaching for the participants to reach criterion. The study supports the research indicating that modeling and feedback improve early childhood students' abilities to implement newly learned skills.

Syftet med denna forskningsstudie var att undersöka hur högläsning används enligt lärare i lågstadiet samt vilka uppfattningar de har om dess nytta och effektiva sätt att arbeta med den. Metoden som användes var semistrukturerade intervjuer med åtta lärare i år 1–3. Vårt resultat visar att lärare i stor omfattning använder högläsning i undervisningen. Även om lärarna inte hade god kunskap om effektiva modeller för högläsning använde de sådana omedvetet, då spår av dessa kan synas i deras arbetssätt. Det har också visat sig att lärare hade kunskap om flera fördelar som högläsningen bidrog med, dock var det många aspekter som inte nämndes. Lärarnas huvudsyfte med högläsningen var att skapa en mysig stund för eleverna vilket de menade skulle resultera i att det ökade elevers läslust och deras ordförråd. Då deras arbetssätt gav resultat gällande detta samt att de använde högläsning som en metod i den övriga undervisningen, kan det ge skäl för att göra högläsningen till en mysig stund. Att lärarna inte arbetade med högläsningen kan också bero på att, högläsning inte nämns i läroplanen. Detta verkar då ha resulterat i att lärare använder högläsningen skiljt från ämnesundervisningen, som en ”vid sidan av-praktik”. Dock är denna studies slutsats att lärare skulle kunna utnyttja högläsningen ännu mer i undervisningen för att mer effektivt stimulera elevers läsutveckling.