Emergent Biliteracy in Young Mexican Immigrant Children

Abstract

This article explores the relationship between emergent biliteracy and growing up in a biliterate environment. The study focuses on two questions: (1) What knowledge of biliteracy do young bilingual preschool children develop in the early years? (2) How do context and specific language environments influence the development of biliteracy in young Mexican Spanish‐English bilingual children? The authors report data from a multiple‐method research project with 12 4‐ and 5‐year‐old Mexican immigrant children living in the U.S. Southwest. Results indicated that the children were developing knowledge and metalinguistic awareness about print in both their languages; the families demonstrated a wide variety of communicative practices and ways in which they used written materials in the two languages; and intergenerational learning occurred in both directions among family members. The authors propose a model of emergent biliteracy that integrates the different cultural contexts that foster or hinder biliteracy development in the young bilingual child. The research contributes to the development of an ecological model of emergent biliteracy that recognizes the dynamic and complex interactions among home, school, and neighborhood contexts. This model serves as a heuristic device that allows researchers and teachers to consider how different linguistic and cultural spaces affect children's biliteracy development in the environments where they are growing up bilingual. [Note: Iliana Reyes discusses the research presented in this article in a podcast presented by the “Voice of Literacy”: http://www.voiceofliteracy.org/posts/29769.] تستكشف هذه المقالة العلاقة بين ظهور ازدواج معرفة القراءة والكتابة والنشأة في بيئة مزدوجة معرفة القراءة والكتابة. وتركز الدراسة على سؤالين: (1) ما الفهم الذي يطوره الأطفال في الروضة ذوي ازدواج اللغة عن معرفة ازدواج القراءة والكتابة في السنوات المبكرة؟ (2) وكيف يؤثر السياق وبيئات اللغة المعينة في تنمية ازدواج معرفة القراءة والكتابة في أطفال مكسيكيين يتكلمون اللغتين الإسبانية والإنكليزية؟ إذ يذكر المؤلفون معطيات من مشروع بحث متعدد الطرق يشمل فيه اثنا عشر طفلاً مكسيكياً تتراوح أعمارهم بين أربع وخمس سنوات وهم مهاجرون يسكنون في جنوب غرب الولايات المتحدة. أشارت النتائج إلى أن الأطفال كانوا يطورون معرفة ووعياً ما فوق اللغة بصدد الخطوط في لغتيهم وعرض الأهالي التنوع الواسع في الممارسات التواصلية والطرق التي استخدموا فيها مواد مكتوبة في اللغتين وقد تم التعلم عبر الأجيال في الاتجاهين بين أفراد الأهالي. إذ يقدم المؤلفون نموذجاً لبزوغ ازدواج معرفة القراءة والكتابة يتكامل السياقات الثقافية المختلفة التي تشجع تنمية ازدواج معرفة القراءة والكتابة أو تعوقها عند طفل مزدوج اللغة. ويساهم البحث في تطوير نموذج بيئي لبزوغ ازدواج معرفة القراءة والكتابة الذي يعترف التفاعلات الديناميكية والمعقدة بين السياقات في البيت والمدرسة والحي. ويخدم هذا النموذج أداة لتشجيع استكشاف الحلول تدعو الباحثين والمدرسين لتأمل كيف تؤثر الأماكن الثقافية واللغوية المختلفة تنمية ازدواج معرفة القراءة والكتابة عند الأطفال في البيئات التي ينشؤون فيها مزدوجي اللغة. [Podcast: http://www.voiceofliteracy.org/posts/29769.] 本文探索在双语文化环境中双语读写能力的萌发与成长之间...

Supporting Inferential Thinking in Preschoolers: Effects of Discussion on Children’s Story Comprehension

“…Among the limited intervention research on storybook reading with ELs, findings have shown contributions of the frequency of home reading (Collins, 2010) and the utility of reading in the L1 or L2 to L2 vocabulary learning (Roberts, 2008). Descriptive studies have shown that storybook reading is common, that storybook reading takes place in primary and second languages (Reyes & Azuara, 2008), and that discussion aids comprehension (Iddings, Risko, & Rampulla, 2009). Less is known about the amounts of talk and interaction that are optimal for learning (Hammett, van Kleeck, & Huberty, 2003), how the demand of talk (Danis et al, 2000) affects comprehension, and how child and family variables interact in monolinguals or ELs.…”

Signgeist: promoting bilingualism through the linguistic landscape of school signage

“…This environmental print can facilitate early writing and reading by providing early success and exemplars for copying (Reyes & Azuara, 2008). Recognising this, teachers seek out or create signs that provide language input for their students.…”

“…biliteracy), Reyes and Azuara (2008) examine the relationship between this emerging biliteracy and one's environment, as bilingual children negotiate two languages in the different contexts of home, school and neighbourhood. In some cases, children see signage in their home language in their neighbourhood, but not at school (Moore, 2010), but where the bilingualism is a goal of the classroom, teachers purposefully provide environmental print in both languages (Brown, 2012).…”

“…Teachers create signs that add to the language input they provide through instruction (Brown, 2012;Morgan, 2004) and administrators place signs as part of their marketing to the general public (Eaton, 2005). Sign-making practices provide environmental print seen by students (Giles & Tunks, 2010;Prior, 2009;Reyes & Azuara, 2008). While bilingual signs would serve the purpose of promoting bilingualism, a nexus analysis of sign making in this programme sheds light on practices that compartmentalise sign making according to the responsibilities of the sign maker and impede the reach of the Bilingual Program.…”

Biliteracy Among Children and Youths

“…In this section, I review studies that take a sociocultural approach in describing how families and communities affect biliteracy by emphasizing different aspects or factors that impact the process. Although the studies vary in terms of methodology, many of them involve single case studies with natural observations and descriptions of an individual child's biliteracy development (e.g., Bauer & Mkhize, 2012;Buckwalter & Lo, 2002) or observations of a smaller set of children who were part of a larger research project (Drury, 2004;Gregory et al, 2004;I. Reyes & Azuara, 2008;Yaden & Tsai, 2012).…”