Investigating the Influence of Home Literacy Practices in a Multilingual Environment on Grade One Students' Early Reading Acquisition in Arabic

Abstract

The purpose of the current study was to investigate the influence of home literacy practices in middle SES households in North Lebanon governorate on grade one students’ early reading acquisition in Arabic in different language contexts. Three different language contexts were identified where either Arabic, English or French was the dominant language used by parents to communicate with their children. The study also aimed to examine if home literacy practices and early Arabic reading proficiency differ across contexts with different language use profiles. Data was collected from three private schools that have the same tuition fees and same curriculum, but where a different language of instruction is adopted. The data collection tools were a questionnaire about language use and home literacy practices administered to parents and early Arabic reading assessments for grade one students. The results reveal that students from an Arabic dominant environment scored higher than their colleagues on all the early Arabic reading assessments.The results also revealed that parents, in the three different language use environments, were engaged with their children in the same kind of literacy activities but there were differences in how commonly these practices were engaged in by parents in the different language-oriented communities. The results also showed that there was a strong correlation between the direct teaching of letters and early Arabic reading skills in the Arabic and French dominant environments, but the correlation was stronger in the Arabic context. However, there was no significant correlation between literacy practices and early Arabic reading assessment in the English dominant environment. The results of the current study can encourage the teachers of the Arabic language to design workshops for parents about the importance of being involved in home literacy practices with their children and how it can enhance their children’s early Arabic reading skills. Moreover, curriculum specialists can design reading activities that align with the literacy practices the students are engaged in with their parents at home which can create a strong connection between home and school. These can also open the door for more research about the correlation between home literacy practices and Arabic early literacy skills in different Lebanese contexts as wells as different multilingual Arab countries, especially given that there is very research that is addressing this topic.