A Study of Parental Engagement with Home Literacy Practices and School Supports in an Area of Disadvantage

Abstract

This thesis aimed to explore the home literacy environments (HLE) of children from Junior and Senior Infant classes in a Delivering Equality of Opportunity in School (DEIS) band 1 urban school serving an area of social and economic disadvantage. This thesis sought to delve into the learning environments of these children in the emergent stage of language and literacy development and to explore briefly the way in which literacy practices in the home align with school practice. Parents completed a questionnaire based on their own personal reading habits, those of their children, their home literacy environments and the literacy based activities they partake in with their children. Following the questionnaire, four parents were interviewed from the chosen classes as well as an infant teacher and the Home School Community Liaison. The data gathered for this study was compared to that of previous researchers and the questions motivating the study were discussed. The results found that contrary to much of the previous research in this area, these parents of low socioeconomic status report that they are immersing their children in environments where rich learning experiences occur and advantageous and appropriate learning activities are promoted. The parents interviewed described meaningful and varied literacy and language practices and appeared to value literacy and language development. Overall, strong relationships exist between these children’s microsystems, and both the parents and the teachers reported good communication between school and home. However, the results are impacted by the small sample size of the study which limits the potential to generalise these findings. The preliminary findings of this study were presented by the researcher at the Trinity College School of Education Postgraduate Research Conference in May 2018.