Uncovering the Myths of Shared Reading English Picture Books for Chinese Families: A Narrative Inquiry
Abstract
This doctoral research explored the experiences of Chinese parents in parent-child shared reading on English picture books (EPBs). It was unique in its approach, taking the perspective and standpoint of the parents as the research stance, and was one of the few studies in the existing literature to do so. The Narrative Inquiry proposed by Polkinghorne (1995) was adopted to explore Chinese parents' voices, especially the unspoken ones. The study aimed to learn from Chinese parents' experiences, provided valuable insights into their reflections and expectations of their family literacy activities, and contributed to the limited research on English family literacy in the Chinese context.
The findings of this study suggest that, in the current Chinese context, parent-child shared reading practices on EPBs were influenced by their beliefs about literacy, which were highly shaped by their own literacy experiences, as well as the socio-cultural environment, SES, and educational level in which they were situated. The results contributed to a better understanding of how Chinese parents explore their literacy beliefs to reflect their experience of the parent-child shared EPBs reading by making these activities unique, relevant, and meaningful. In addition, the study revealed that these parents showed open-mindedness and inclusiveness towards topics, such as language skills and pedagogical framework, related to shared reading and had a solid learning awareness and motivation to implement family literacy practices. However, the study also highlighted the deficiencies in their socialized family literacy support system. And the impact of the unregulated commercialized environment of education on their implementation of English family literacy activities.
The study provided more background literature for future research on English family literacy in China and further insight into future exploration of parent-child shared reading on EPBs and English family literacy in the Chinese context.