An Assessment of Home and Classroom Literacy Environments and the Emergent Literacy Development of Kindergarten Students in Two Southwestern Michigan School Districts
type: CreativeWork
description: Problem. In some school districts, low literacy proficiency is a problem of tremendous proportion. Assessing whether a solid foundation is being laid is more important than focusing our efforts at remediation in the later years. This study aimed at investigating the illiteracy problem at the "root" level. The purpose of the study was to determine the characteristics of the home and classroom literacy environments and the development of print, writing, and story concepts of kindergartners in two selected school districts. It also explored whether there was a difference in the performance of students from morning, afternoon, alternate whole-day, and whole-day kindergarten programs. It also examined the relationships among several home environmental variables. It was envisioned that this study could reveal where children were at in their literacy development and provide teachers and parents with the opportunity to reflect on and improve their practice. Method. One hundred and fourteen kindergartners participated in the study. The Preliteracy Inventory was used to collect data on the kindergartners' print, story, and writing concepts. The data were analyzed using a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and a one-way analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) to compare the performance of children in the four different types of kindergarten programs. Through a parent survey, data were collected on the home literacy environment. The seven teachers of the kindergartners were interviewed to collect data on the classroom literacy environment. The Chi-square test of independence was performed to test six hypotheses in order to determine whether a significant relationship existed among the selected variables. Results. With regard to the three emergent literacy concepts measured, performance ratings indicated that, for each concept measured, the majority of students were in the process of developing the required skills. However, students were identified who fell below developmentally appro…
abstract: Problem. In some school districts, low literacy proficiency is a problem of tremendous proportion. Assessing whether a solid foundation is being laid is more important than focusing our efforts at remediation in the later years. This study aimed at investigating the illiteracy problem at the "root" level. The purpose of the study was to determine the characteristics of the home and classroom literacy environments and the development of print, writing, and story concepts of kindergartners in two selected school districts. It also explored whether there was a difference in the performance of students from morning, afternoon, alternate whole-day, and whole-day kindergarten programs. It also examined the relationships among several home environmental variables. It was envisioned that this study could reveal where children were at in their literacy development and provide teachers and parents with the opportunity to reflect on and improve their practice. Method. One hundred and fourteen kindergartners participated in the study. The Preliteracy Inventory was used to collect data on the kindergartners' print, story, and writing concepts. The data were analyzed using a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and a one-way analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) to compare the performance of children in the four different types of kindergarten programs. Through a parent survey, data were collected on the home literacy environment. The seven teachers of the kindergartners were interviewed to collect data on the classroom literacy environment. The Chi-square test of independence was performed to test six hypotheses in order to determine whether a significant relationship existed among the selected variables. Results. With regard to the three emergent literacy concepts measured, performance ratings indicated that, for each concept measured, the majority of students were in the process of developing the required skills. However, students were identified who fell below developmentally appro…
author: Tobias, Magdalene
keywords: Education, Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research
date published: 2000-01-01T08:00:00Z
date modified: 2026-07-24T00:53:34Z
provider: Andrews University
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: Andrews University