Elsevier

Early Childhood Research Quarterly

Volume 35, 2nd Quarter 2016, Pages 95-110
Early Childhood Research Quarterly

Associations between child home language, gender, bilingualism and school readiness: A population-based study

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2015.11.003Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Different language groups show distinct patterns of school readiness.

  • Punjabi-speaking children show a ‘social and emotional balance profile’.

  • Cantonese- and Mandarin-speaking children show an ‘academic and independent profile’.

  • Bilingualism is associated with positive social, emotional, and cognitive development.

  • Data on cultural diversity in school readiness inform culturally responsive teaching.

Abstract

This paper examines school readiness profiles of kindergarten children for the largest language groups in British Columbia, Canada. School readiness data were drawn from a population-level database that contains teacher ratings of children's school readiness, obtained via the Early Development Instrument (EDI; Janus & Offord, 2007). School readiness profiles (N = 95,537) were compared according to children's home language background (English, Cantonese, Mandarin, Punjabi, and Tagalog) serving as a proxy for cultural/ethno-cultural background, and gender (49% female). Furthermore, children speaking Cantonese, Mandarin, Punjabi, or Tagalog as their home language were divided into monolingual and bilingual groups according to their English proficiency, using administrative records of children’s home language and English Language Learner (ELL) status. Analyses were conducted via multilevel modeling, controlling for the nested structure of the data (children within classrooms) and for children's families’ socioeconomic status (i.e., income). The most prominent findings were that bilingual children were rated higher than the overall average on virtually every aspect of school readiness. Cantonese and Mandarin speaking children were rated most highly on pre-academic skills, and Punjabi-speaking children on emotional and social competencies and behaviors. English Language Learners in all language groups were rated as being more shy and reluctant to display socially scripted behaviors than non-English Language Learners.

Introduction

Children's early language skills in the language of school instruction have received an increasing amount of attention as English Language Learners (ELL) from immigrant families form a growing part of North American classrooms (Capps et al., 2005; Hernandez, Takanishi, & Marotz, 2009; Ramlo, 2009; Statistics Canada, 2011b; Winsler, Burchinal et al., 2014). Questions of critical importance for educators center around the influences these diverse social and cultural factors exert on children’s developmental readiness for school (Crosnoe, 2007; Gandara, Rumberger, Maxwell-Jolly, & Callahan, 2003; Graue, 1993; Sue & Okazaki, 1990; Vygotsky, 1980) and on how schools and teachers understand culturally diverse children's early development (Carlton and Winsler, 1999, Kannen, 2008). Research in education acknowledges that it is vital for teachers and schools to develop an understanding of (i) how ethno-cultural, socioeconomic factors, and gender relate to children's development and competencies, (ii) how social and cultural factors are related to parental expectations about school readiness, and (iii) how social and cultural factors affect teachers’ and schools’ expectations, assumptions, decisions, and practices with respect to school readiness (Carlton and Winsler, 1999, Graue, 1993, Rimm-Kaufman and Pianta, 2000, Zigler and Styfco, 2004). This study primarily focuses on the first question, specifically, on the joint associations between children’s school readiness profiles as rated by their kindergarten teachers, and their language background (as a proxy for ethno-cultural background), bilingualism (classified according to children's home language and English Learner Status), socio-economic status (estimated via block-level median family income), and gender.

Social and cultural context shape both teachers’ and parents’ expectations about children’s development and school readiness, varying significantly according to ethno-cultural background (e.g., East Asian, South Asian, or Filipino family background in Western Canada) and socio-economic factors (Beiser, Hou, Hyman, & Tousignant, 2002; Graue, 1993). In turn, children’s transition to school is related to the social and cultural expectations of their parents and teachers. When parents’ and teachers’ expectations correspond with, or are complementary to each other, rather than conflicting, children are more likely to be successful in school (Alexander, Entwisle, Blyth, & McAdoo, 1988; Entwisle, Alexander, & Olson, 2007). Teachers and parents, however, often emphasize different aspects of school readiness competencies, with parents focusing on pre-academic skills, and teachers emphasizing motivation, attitude, discipline, and social and emotional skills (Lewit and Baker, 1995, Meisels, 1998). Whether or not a child speaks both her or his own heritage home language and the language of instruction can be a key component in school readiness. Children who enter school without a functional understanding of the language of instruction can be at a significant disadvantage (Duncan, Ludwig, & Magnuson, 2007; Duncan and Magnuson, 2005, Duncan and Magnuson, 2012; Han, 2012). In contrast, bilingual children begin school with a number of cognitive advantages that lead to early school success (Akhtar, Menjivar, Hoicka, & Sabbagh, 2012; Barac & Bialystok, 2012; Bialystok, 2001; Cummins & Mulcahy, 1978; Hammer et al., 2014; Kapa & Colombo, 2013) and socio-emotional skills that facilitate further acquisition of the language of instruction (Kim, Curby & Winsler, 2014; Winsler, Kim, & Richard, 2014). Finally, school readiness expectations are also influenced by gender role expectations with gender differences in children’s school readiness and educational attainment found repeatedly (Buchmann, DiPrete, & McDaniel, 2008; Winsler et al., 2014).

Section snippets

Approaches to school readiness

School readiness has been a highly contested construct in education over the past decades (Pianta, Cox, & Snow, 2007; Shepard, 1997). Perhaps the earliest and most pervasive approach has been a maturational view, which purports that the unfolding of biological development is the primary determinant of a child’s readiness, with the consequence that chronological age and/or pre-kindergarten screening has become the most widely used criteria for kindergarten entry (Meisels, 1998, Snow, 2006).

Bilingualism and ethno-cultural background

The retention of one’s heritage home language can reflect a desire to maintain a strong cultural identity for families of bilingual children (Creese and Blackledge, 2010, Golash-Boza, 2005, Nelson, 2003) as well as immersion in a vibrant ethnic-cultural community (Portes & Schauffler, 1994). Bilingual children—that is, children with fluency in a heritage language as well as proficiency in the language of instruction—are typically academically successful, and both cultural background and

Research questions and hypotheses

Our study design employed an ecological framework (Bronfenbrenner & Morris, 2006). In view of the social and cultural diversity of Canadian society and the potential opportunities and challenges this may entail for school systems, we were interested in examining associations between bilingualism and language background and children’s school readiness. In addition, in line with Bronfenbrenner’s adage to examine interaction terms in regard to child, context, and process characteristics, as well

Sample

The study sample was drawn from a multi-wave population-level database which contains teacher ratings of children’s developmental outcomes on the Early Development Instrument (Janus & Offord, 2007) assessed in the middle of their kindergarten year. In British Columbia, kindergarten is offered through the public school system, and children can enter kindergarten in September of the year they become five years old. Whereas school attendance is mandatory starting in grade 1 (age 6), kindergarten

Results

The statistical analyses are presented first, as the standardized hierarchical regression coefficients for the full model, and the corresponding statistical significance levels for the covariate (income), the group predictor variables (language background, gender, and bilingualism), and the corresponding interaction terms, as well as the R2 for each of the 16 EDI subdomain analyses. The results are then examined in the order of the hypotheses. We begin with the EDI patterns for bilingualism,

Discussion

We discuss our study findings in the order of the research questions. First, we discuss results pertaining to bilingualism, then to children’s language backgrounds, and then to interaction effects between bilingualism, language background, and/or gender.

Conclusions

This study focused on the three largest language and immigrant groups (Chinese, Punjabi, and Filipino or Tagalog) in British Columbia, Canada. Given that the EDI is used at national levels in Canada and in Australia, we hope that our study design can be replicated in other jurisdictions to examine in what ways different cultural patterns play out in other contexts, for the same as well as for other ethno-cultural groups. In fact—in line with Bronfenbrenner's adage that, in human development,

Acknowledgements

We would like to acknowledge the leadership and vision of the late Dr. Clyde Hertzman, who untimely passed away in February of 2013. This study and our research on children’s development and wellbeing are a continuation of his research legacy and the founding of the Human Early Learning Partnership at the University of British Columbia. This study has been funded by a grant from the Canadian Institutes for Health Research (CIHR). The first author has also received funding from the Lawson

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