Sibling readers’ joint reading practices and multimodal responses to picturebook reading events in home settings.
This research explores a gap in family reading practices using a multiliteracies perspective. The predominant focus within family reading practices is how parents help their children to read with noticeable benefits such as language development, social bonding and literacy skills. Less attention has been given to siblings engaging with texts independently of parental guidance. This empirical study investigated how siblings aged three to eight from seven families responded to high-quality picturebooks during home-based reading events. Siblings were offered a range of print and digital picturebooks to read. Although parents filmed the reading events (in adherence to Covid-19 safety guidelines) the reading was led by siblings themselves with minimal adult intervention. Adopting a collective case study methodology, data was collected between 2021 and 2022 through purposive and convenience sampling. Sixteen children participated in dyad or triad groups. There was equal gender representation. Multimodal and reflexive thematic data analysis was employed to examine the siblings’ participation, social, literary and embodied multimodal responses. Parent diary logs provided additional insight, confirming that their children benefitted from the autonomy of reading together. Findings revealed a preference for the adoption of traditional role models during print reading events, with older siblings often acting in loco parentis. During digital picturebook reading events, gestures were significant in enabling siblings to exert control at times. It became clear that some parts of reading events could be categorised as ‘engaged’. Engaged reading events featured familiar easy-to-read stories; clearly defined roles (reader, listener or book handler), and flexible role distribution, whereas tensions arose when the lexical difficulty of the text was too challenging, or when no role was afforded to the younger sibling. The sibling reading events also fostered social bonding and relational reading moments, a feature captured by the idea of a ‘sibling reading club’. Multimodal responses highlighted the idea of reading as a socio-material practice with everyday objects being reclaimed to match different reading needs. Deep sofas, cosy bunk beds, duvets and toys were the mediators for these reading experiences. This research contributes new knowledge about sibling-led reading and its potential to support reading for pleasure in home settings. One implication is that increasing siblings’ joint, yet independent, reading time can alleviate pressure on busy families while simultaneously offering tangible benefits to both younger and older siblings.
sibling readers, family reading practices, picturebook, multiliteracies, socio-material reading practices, multimodal, reflexive thematic data analysis
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