The Relationship of Home Environment and Kindergarten Readiness.

<p>The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between home environment and school readiness of children entering kindergarten in a rural East Tennessee county. Family and home environment variables included family income, family structure, parents' education, participation in literacy activities, availability of home learning tools, and amount of children's television viewing. A self-reported parent survey was used to gather information about the family environment; the <em>Brigance K Screen</em> was used to determine entering kindergartner's readiness for school. Three hundred and thirty eight children and parents participated.</p><p>An initial analysis of data incorporated simple descriptive statistics in the form of frequency tables. To examine the relationships between the dependent variable (<em>Brigance</em> scores) and independent variables (family characteristics/environment), Kendall's tau-b and Cramer's V were used. Independent sample t-tests and analyses of variance (ANOVAs) analyzed differences in <em>Brigance</em> scores between groups. Finally, a hierarchical multiple regression analysis determined if kindergarten readiness could be predicted by specific variables: socioeconomic status, literary resources, and literacy activities.</p><p>The analysis of relationships in this study indicated that family income was more closely related to success on the <em>Brigance K Screen</em> than any other variable; next in importance were the levels of fathers' education and mothers' education. Significant positive correlations also indicated the value of parents reading to their children, educational outings, availability of educational tools--specifically, a home computer, family structure, mealtime conversation, and the number of children's books in the home. A significant negative correlation was found between the duration of television viewing and <em>Brigance</em> scores; increased television viewing time was significantly related to lower test scores. ANOVAs and t-tests indicated significant differences in total <em>Brigance</em> scores of prekindergarten students from different socioeconomic status groups based on family structure, family income, and parents' education levels. Children from two-parent homes scored significantly higher than those from other family situations as did children from higher income homes. In addition, parents' education level was reflected in the <em>Brigance</em> scores; more educated parents had children who scored higher than children with less educated parents. The multiple regression analysis reinforced the statistical significance and magnitude of the relationship between socioeconomic factors and school readiness, but literacy resources and literacy activities also accounted for variance in the scores.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

EdD (Doctor of Education)

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation - unrestricted

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Educational Leadership

Year dc:date.issued

2002

Author dc:creator

• Williams, Nancye C.

• Literacy
• Brigance Screen
• Television
• Education Level
• Kindergarten
• School Readiness
• Environment
• Income
• Education
• Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright by the authors.

Repository record dc:identifier

https://dc.etsu.edu/etd/705

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dc.etsu.edu:etd-1862