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The Sooner, the Better: Early Reading to Children

The Sooner, the Better: Early Reading to Children As reading to children plays an important role in language development, primary caregivers are often encouraged to read to their children from a very young age. However, little is known about the age at which such reading should start. The linguistic skills of 104 children were assessed shortly before school entry. Their parents were asked how old their children were when they first read to them and how often they had read to their children. Almost half of the study children were read to before they were 6 months old. The age at which children were first read to was closely associated with family characteristics such as socioeconomic status, the frequency with which children were read to as preschoolers, and with children’s linguistic and cognitive competencies. The findings imply that reading books to very young children indeed contributes meaningfully to a favorable home literacy environment and supports children’s language development. Keywords storybook reading, onset of reading to a child, home literacy environment (HLE), parent–child interactions, linguistic competencies parent–child interactions (Farrant & Zubrick, 2012; Niklas, Introduction 2015; Niklas, Möllers, & Schneider, 2013). Children’s language and literacy competence does not begin Other theoretical frameworks relevant to a discussion of when children enter school—Children’s literacy learning the influence of the HLE include Vygotsky’s (1978) social starts well before formal schooling, and studies have shown constructivist theory and Bourdieu’s (1986) social theory. that children are sensitive to speech even prenatally (e.g., According to Vygotsky, children learn through observation Moon, Lagercrantz, & Kuhl, 2013; Partanen et al., 2013). and interaction with knowledgeable others in social contexts. Parents and primary caregivers (subsequently referred to as In the context of language and literacy learning, the impor- parents) are highly influential in a child’s early learning as tance of parents modeling literacy activities and supporting parent–child interactions are frequent and ongoing. Indeed, their children’s emerging literacy skills is clear. Bourdieu research shows that the home literacy environment (HLE) is theorized that the cultural capital to which an individual or a the context in which children first acquire the language and family has access is a key component of the HLE. This cul- literacy skills that equip them to make sense of, describe, and tural capital includes cultural objects and resources such as participate in the world (e.g., Liebeskind, Piotrowski, books and works of art, as well as the ability to utilize and Lapierre, & Linebarger, 2014; Niklas & Schneider, 2013; learn from such objects and resources. Consequently, a fam- Raikes et al., 2006). ily’s cultural practices such as reading and writing are closely Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) ecological theory offers a theo- associated with the family’s cultural capital. retical framework for the influence of the HLE on child The multifaceted HLE incorporates various literacy- development. According to Bronfenbrenner, children belong related activities such as parental reading behavior, library to a complex and evolving social and cultural ecology. His visits, teaching of letters and sounds, and owning books at theory posits that distal elements of a child’s ecological sys- home (Niklas, 2015). However, reading to children is a core tem such as extended family, community, and society have some impact on children, but proximal factors such as a child’s immediate family have the most influence on a child’s University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia development. Similarly, distal family characteristics such as Corresponding Author: family socioeconomic status (SES) based on income, occu- Frank Niklas, Melbourne Graduate School of Education, University of pation, or education and family migration background are far Melbourne, 4/100 Leicester Street, Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia. less influential than proximal family characteristics such as Email: frank.niklas@unimelb.edu.au Creative Commons CC-BY: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage). 2 SAGE Open element of the HLE (Bus, van IJzendoorn, & Pellegrini, their children’s language and later emergent literacy learning 1995; Niklas, Nguyen, Cloney, Tayler, & Adams, 2016). intensively by providing a high-quality HLE facilitate chil- Many studies have focused on the impact that reading to dren’s vocabulary acquisition (Mol, Bus, de Jong, & Smeets, children has on children’s linguistic competencies (e.g., 2008; Niklas & Schneider, 2015). Consequently, the HLE Edwards, 2014; Raikes et al., 2006), but little is known about appears to play an important role in children’s early linguis- the age at which parents should start reading to their chil- tic development. dren, whether the age of first reading predicts the frequency with which a child is read to later on, or whether the age of HLE and Reading to Children first reading predicts children’s competencies as preschool- ers (e.g., DeBaryshe, 1993). Research demonstrates that home learning environments are In this study, parents were asked how old their child was associated with children’s numeracy abilities (e.g., Kleemans, when first read to. This first-reading age was then tested to Peeters, Segers, & Verhoeven, 2012; Niklas & Schneider, explore its relationship with various child outcomes shortly 2014) and behavioral outcomes (e.g., Schmiedeler, Niklas, & prior to school entry. Schneider, 2014), and predict children’s literacy competen- cies (e.g., Niklas & Schneider, 2013; Sénéchal & LeFevre, 2002). For instance, Niklas and Schneider (2013) demon- Early Linguistic Development strated that aspects of the HLE such as parental reading, The ability to read and write letters, with comprehension, is reading to the child, and the number of books in a household the basis for success in formal education. Adults who show predicted preschoolers’ vocabulary and phonological aware- greater literacy competencies often earn higher incomes, ness as well as the further development of literacy competen- have better job prospects, lower risk of mental illness, and cies even when controlling for a range of child and family enjoy better health (Fawcett, 2003; Lyon, 2002). However, background variables. no clear-cut borders exist between the precursors of reading Sénéchal and LeFevre (2002, 2014) showed specific asso- and spelling, such as children’s vocabulary and phonological ciations of different aspects of the HLE with children’s lin- awareness, and children’s later reading and spelling skills guistic and literacy competencies. The informal literacy (Bowman, Donovan, & Burns, 2003; Schatschneider, environment consisted of variables measuring the shared Fletcher, Francis, Carlson, & Foorman, 2004; Torgesen, reading behavior in the family, whereas the formal literacy 2002; Torppa et al., 2007). Oral language skills such as environment took parents’ literacy teaching into account. vocabulary and code-related skills such as phonological Parents’ literacy teaching predicted letter knowledge and awareness are interrelated domains of emergent literacy. phonological awareness, whereas the informal literacy envi- Consequently, the early ability to understand language and to ronment was associated with vocabulary growth. use or manipulate language expressively is very important Despite the fact that the HLE is a multifaceted construct, (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998). Understanding the initial reading to children is still a fundamental element of this con- stages of linguistic development and identifying aspects of struct. Exposure to books supports vocabulary acquisition early literacy experiences that support children’s later read- (Bus et al., 1995; Farrant & Zubrick, 2012; Prevoo et al., ing proficiency present opportunities to have a positive 2014) as books typically contain more complex vocabulary impact on early linguistic skills of very young children. than common usage vocabulary (Sénéchal, LeFevre, Hudson, As language and literacy experiences in the first three & Lawseon, 1996). Early meta-analyses conducted by years of life set the scene for children’s later literacy compe- Scarborough and Dobrich (1994) and Bus and colleagues tencies, these experiences are critical. Passive listening and (1995) revealed that reading to children explained about 8% nonverbal communication are a child’s first step toward of the variance in children’s linguistic competencies. This becoming an active talker, and differences in children’s abil- finding is important as reading to children can be more easily ity to segment conversational speech signals are predictors manipulated than, for instance, family SES. In addition, one of later language development (Newman, Ratner, Jusczyk, can assume that early effects of a positive learning environ- Jusczyk, & Dow, 2006). As children develop, language com- ment are cumulative over time (Sénéchal & LeFevre, 2001; prehension becomes increasingly important. For instance, in cf. Stanovich, 1986). a study conducted by Flax, Realpe-Bonilla, Roesler, In addition to the frequency of reading and quality of read- Choudhury, and Benasich (2009), children’s language com- ing (Lever & Sénéchal, 2011; L. M. Phillips, Norris, & prehension at three years of age predicted various language Anderson, 2008; Sim & Berthelsen, 2014), the onset of read- and reading measures at seven years of age. Furthermore, ing seems to play an important role (DeBaryshe, 1993; Niklas, children with stronger early linguistic skills tend to outper- Cohrssen, Tayler, & Schneider, 2016; see also B. M. Phillips form children with weak early linguistic skills on assess- & Lonigan, 2009). In their study, B. M. Phillips and Lonigan ments of literacy abilities in school, and this gap appears to (2009) analyzed the relationship of different measures of the widen over time (Bast & Reitsma, 1998; Torppa, Poikkeus, HLE—among these the onset of reading to children—with Laakso, Eklund, & Lyytinen, 2006). Parents who support various background characteristics of the family. Here, higher Niklas et al. 3 quality HLE was associated with greater family income, better were read to in the year before school as well as to children’s caregiver education, and lower educator stress level. However, linguistic abilities, and would predict these even when con- no child outcome measures were included in the analyses, and trolling for child and family characteristics. As shared reading the focus was not on the onset of reading to children. seems to be a fairly specific predictor for children’s linguistic In her study, DeBaryshe (1993) found that the age at competencies, we expected weaker associations with other which 41 two-year-old children were first read to was a bet- cognitive child abilities such as concentration, numeracy ter predictor of oral language skills than the frequency with competencies, and intelligence. We also anticipated that the which children were read to or visited the library. It should onset of shared reading would not predict these abilities sig- be noted that correlational data only were used and no con- nificantly when controlling for child and family characteris- trol variables for family or child characteristics were included tics. In an additional exploratory approach, we tested whether in this analysis. Given the small sample size, the young sam- and how the associations between the onset of shared reading ple, and the fact that important family characteristics such as and the outcome variables changed for different subgroups of family language or migration background were not taken children by incrementally excluding children whose parents into account, the findings of DeBaryshe need to be regarded started reading to their children comparatively late. as preliminary—important as they are. In a German study (Niklas, Cohrssen, Tayler, & Schneider, Method 2016), the age children were first read to was a significant predictor of reading frequency in kindergarten, children’s Participants rhyming abilities, vocabulary, and, to a lesser extent, other All 104 preschoolers attended one of four child care centers cognitive abilities such as numeracy skills and intelligence located across one local government area in Melbourne. as well. However, the onset of shared reading was assessed After obtaining approval from local government, formal con- according to categories only and about 75% of the sample sent to conduct the study was obtained from the center coor- fell into the earliest category (shared reading started before dinators, directors, and teachers. Each family registered as the child age of two years). In addition, although research using the various early childhood settings was invited to par- indicates that the association of the HLE with children’s lin- ticipate in the study. Members of the research team were on guistic and cognitive outcomes seems to be comparable hand to obtain consent from parents and caregivers and to across countries, there is also evidence that the HLE might answer questions at morning drop-off and afternoon pickup be more closely associated with children’s vocabulary in times. German-speaking contexts than in English-speaking con- Children were assessed toward the end of their final term texts (Niklas, Tayler, & Schneider, 2015). in kindergarten. In the sample, boys (55.8%) outnumber girls Although these studies indicate that starting shared read- (44.2%), with a mean age of approximately 5 years 2 months ing early seems to be beneficial for children’s linguistic (SD = 4.0 months) at the time of assessment. About 6% of the development, little is known about whether the age at which sample spoke a language other than English as the main lan- parents first read to children is a specific predictor of English- guage at home. In 37% of the sample, at least one of the speaking preschoolers’ linguistic competencies, even when parents, or the child, was born outside Australia. However, controlling for child and family characteristics. In addition, when participants born in a country in which English is an we do not know whether children start to benefit from par- official language were excluded from the migrant group, the ents reading to them from a particular age. overall percentage of children with a migration background decreased to 20.6%. The Current Study The assessment of children took place in the kindergarten rooms during November and December 2014, and thus about Research has shown that literacy-based parent–child interac- two months before the children entered school as the school tions in general, and reading to children in particular, support year in Australia starts at the end of January. Multiple assess- the development of children’s linguistic competencies (Bus ment tasks were used and those relevant to the analyses are et al., 1995; Liebeskind et al., 2014; Sénéchal, Pagan, Lever, briefly described below. In addition, parents were asked to & Ouellette, 2008). However, despite a few studies analyz- complete surveys on family background characteristics and ing the onset of reading (e.g., DeBaryshe, 1993; Niklas, their reading behavior at three points during 2014. Cohrssen, Tayler, & Schneider, 2016), there are still ques- tions to answer. This study uses data from an Australian study to analyze the association of the onset of parent–child Measures—Assessment of Children’s Linguistic reading with (a) the frequency with which children were read and Other Cognitive Competencies to in the year prior to commencing formal school education, and (b) various child outcomes. Several subtests were drawn from the Woodcock–Johnson We expected the age at which children were first read to III Tests of Cognition and Achievement (WJ III; Mather & would be closely related to the frequency with which children Woodcock 2001a, 2001b; McGrew, Woodcock, & Mather, 4 SAGE Open 2001). The WJ III is a standardized, normed measure fre- presented with a subitizing task. Dotted cards were revealed quently used to assess children’s achievement (e.g., Chien for 3 s and the children were first required to state how many et al., 2010; Duncan et al., 2007). dots had been seen and then to compare the number of dots presented. The sum scores of each of the four subtests were Verbal Comprehension. This test has four subtests: Picture combined in a total sum score that measured children’s early Vocabulary, Synonyms, Antonyms, and Verbal Analogies. numeracy ability (Cronbach’s α = .70). Each subtest starts with a sample item to demonstrate how to approach the question and for the researcher to provide feed- Measures—Parent Survey back to the child. Thereafter, no feedback is provided. Together, these subtests measure different aspects of children’s Parents were requested to complete surveys about child and acquired vocabulary skills. For four- to six-year-old children, family characteristics and the HLE, and 98 surveys were estimated reliabilities on Verbal Comprehension range from returned. In addition to providing information on migration .89 to .90. background and main language spoken at home (see sample description), respondents were asked about their occupation Sound Awareness, subtest: Rhyming. Here, children had to pro- and their partner’s occupation to assign prestige values to vide a word that rhymed with a given word or sentence. This these occupations (cf. Wegener, 1988). Here, values from 20 subtest becomes increasingly complex the further one (an unskilled laborer) to 186.8 (a physician) are assigned. advances through it. The median reliability for WJ III Sound The household occupation awarded the highest prestige was Awareness is .81. used as an indicator of family SES (M = 99.7, SD = 33.5). Parents were asked whether they read to their child, inde- Concept Formation. This task requires rule application and pendent of the language used, and how old the child was when frequent switching from one rule to another. It is a broad first read to (parents were required to enter years and months measure of the ability to reason, form concepts, and solve in the space provided). Only one family reported not having problems, using unfamiliar information or novel procedures. read to their child. More than one third of the sample (37.5%) For each presented item, the child tries to figure out the rule indicated that they started reading to their child within the first that divides a set of symbols into two groups. Other than in three months after the child’s birth and four families reported similar assessment tools, during the assessment of concept that they read to their child from birth. This early start was formation, the child receives feedback on the performance, sometimes attributed to the participating child having older and in case of wrong answers the correct one is pointed out siblings whom they joined for reading sessions. Another third and explained (median test reliability = .94). of the families started reading to their child when they were In addition to the WJ III subtest, two other assessments four to six months old. Six months was the mode (24%) and were used to measure children’s short-term concentration 6.34 months the mean (SD = 5.90) for this sample. These find- and their numeracy abilities. ings align very well with the reported average onset of reading in a study by B. M. Phillips and Lonigan (2009). Almost all Concentration. The Frankfurt Tests for Five-Year-Olds–Con- families had started reading to their children by the time the centration (FTF-K; cf. Esser, 2002) measures children’s abil- children were 15 months old (93.8%). Two parents reported ity to work quickly, to remain goal-oriented, and to starting to read to their children when they were 18 months concentrate. In this timed, paper-and-pencil worksheet test, old, three parents first read to their children when they were children are required to draw a line through as many pears as two years old, and one family started reading to their child possible in 90 seconds while disregarding the apples. Pears when he was three years old (see Figure 1). and apples are black line drawings presented in rows and fill- Finally, on three occasions during 2014, parents were ing one side of an A4 page (retest reliability for up to 3 asked to report the number of days during the preceding weeks: r = .79-.85). week on which the study child had been read to. The average tt of these three values (Cronbach’s α = .89; r = .65-.80) was tt Numeracy abilities. Four subtests were used to assess children’s used to indicate the average number of days a child was read numeracy abilities: Counting, Identifying Number Symbols, to in a typical week during the year prior to commencing Stating Number Values, and Estimating Amounts. In the school. Almost half of the families reported having read to Counting subtest, children were asked to count forward and their child every day (49%). Another 25% of the respondents backward and to name numbers that immediately precede or read to their children on five or six days per week, and 11.2% follow a spoken number word. They were also shown number read to their child on three days or fewer. symbols from 1 to 21 in a nonnumerical sequence and asked to name the number. The number values task required children to Analytic Approach match cards depicting different numbers of stick-figure draw- ings of children with a spoken quantity or with an indicated First, correlations and descriptive statistics for all study vari- numeral on a number line from 1 to 10. Finally, children were ables are reported. Pearson’s r was used as correlation Niklas et al. 5 cognitive abilities were highly correlated. Current shared reading frequency showed similar associations with the study variables as onset of shared reading with the exception that the frequency children were read to was significantly associated with children’s numeracy abilities. In a next step, correlations were again calculated, this 15 time for subsamples excluding families who started reading to their children late. As can be seen in Table 2, excluding families from the analysis who started reading to their chil- dren after their child’s first birthday, or after the child was 9 months old, did not change the picture much although first 0 reading was no longer significantly associated with family 0123456789 12 14 15 18 24 36 background variables. However, including only those fami- Child age in months when the child was first read to lies who started reading to their children when the child was 6 months old or younger led to small, nonsignificant correla- Figure 1. Distribution of child age in months when the child was tions of first reading with the frequency with which the child first read to. was read to in the final year of preschool and with children’s verbal comprehension. Rhyming and concept formation coefficient for all correlations except for the correlations of were still significantly associated with the onset of reading in onset age of shared reading with the other variables as this that children who were read to earlier within this subsample variable was slightly positively skewed (skewness = 2.3). still showed greater performance on these assessment tasks. Here, Spearman’s rho was used instead. Thereafter, correla- Finally, when we included only those families who started tions (Spearman’s ρ) of first reading to a child with the other reading to their child when the child was three months old or variables are reported for reduced samples, excluding fami- younger, no significant correlations were found at all. In lies that report late onset of first parent–child reading. Here, addition, most correlations were close to 0. we started with the full sample of children with available In a last step, regression analyses were used to predict data (child age when the child was first read to ≤36 months) reading frequency in the final preschool year, and children’s and reduced the sample to children aged 12, 9, 6, or 3 months linguistic and cognitive abilities by first reading, when con- and less when read to for the first time. This exploratory trolling for child and family characteristics (see Table 3). approach tested whether the associations of the study vari- Even after controlling for various child and family character- ables change for these subsamples. Finally, regression analy- istics, the age at which a child was first read to was a very ses were conducted to predict both current reading frequency strong predictor of parent–child reading frequency in the and children’s linguistic, and other cognitive competencies year prior to school (large effect size) and a significant pre- by the age the child was first read to, while controlling for dictor of children’s rhyming abilities and verbal comprehen- child age, sex, and main language as well as family SES and sion (small to medium effect size). In comparison, first migration background. Here, in a first model, the control reading was not a significant predictor of children’s concen- variables are used as predictors, and in a second model, first tration and numerical abilities (p > .60) and only a margin- parent–child reading is introduced into the model as addi- ally significant predictor of children’s concept formation (p tional predictor. < .10; 3% of additional explained variance by age the child was first read to; small effect). In addition, older children showed greater competencies Results but were not read to more frequently, and there was a ten- Table 1 presents the correlations and descriptive statistics for dency that children who spoke English as their main lan- all study variables. The later that parents started reading to guage and came from higher SES families performed better their child, the less frequently they read to their child in the in the linguistic tasks. Finally, boys were read to more fre- year prior to school. No significant associations of first read- quently in our sample, and girls performed better on the ing with child sex, age, and main language and with concen- rhyming task and slightly better on concept formation and tration and numeracy abilities were found. However, children concentration. who were read to earlier showed greater rhyming ability, ver- bal comprehension, and concept formation. In addition, first Discussion reading was significantly associated with family background variables. Here, families with a migration background or Early support of children’s linguistic competencies is essen- with a lower SES began reading to their children later. tial as linguistic and literacy skills play a major role in every- Children in these families also showed significantly lower day life and are important for later academic achievement verbal comprehension. As expected, all linguistic and and life success in general (Fawcett, 2003; Lyon, 2002). 6 SAGE Open Table 1. Correlational Analyses and Descriptive Statistics (Means and Standard Deviations) for all Study Variables. 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 M SD First read to (child age in months) −.41** .10 .06 .25* −.16 −.29** −.36** −.33** −.38** −.15 −.13 6.34 5.90 Reading frequency (2) .12 .00 −.05 .21* .28** .26* .35** .21* .12 .23* 5.74 1.59 Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) (3) .26** .14 −.14 −.12 −.23* −.13 −.20* −.16 −.07 0.56 0.50 Age in months (4) −.01 .08 −.22* .12 .16 .14 .18 .28** 52.74 3.96 Migration background (5) −.25* −.06 −.15 −.24* −.23* −.13 −.09 0.37 0.49 Main language (6) .06 .18 .33** .12 .11 .11 0.94 0.24 SES (7) .29** .26* .19 .03 .11 99.71 33.53 Rhyming (8) .63** .34** .36** .39** 6.55 4.17 Verbal comprehension (9) .51** .40** .49** 22.09 5.64 Concept formation (10) .31** .43** 9.93 6.36 Concentration (11) .43** 28.41 5.87 Numeracy abilities (12) 21.45 5.97 Note. SES = socioeconomic status. 0 = no migration background; 1 = one or both parents and/or child born abroad. 0 = another language than English is child’s main language; 1 = English is main language. *p < .05. **p < .01. Table 2. Correlational Analyses (Spearman’s ρ) for Age, the Child Was First Read to in Months, With the Study Variables for Different Subgroups of Children. First reading (child age in Reading Age in Migration Main Verbal Concept Numeracy a b c months) n frequency Sex months background language SES Rhyming comprehension formation Concentration abilities Age ≤36 96 −.41** .10 .06 .25* −.16 −.29** −.36** −.33** −.38** −.15 −.13 ≤12 88 −.30** −.03 .01 .25* −.04 −.14 −.29** −.25* −.35** −.07 −.08 ≤9 81 −.22* .00 −.09 .17 −.07 −.03 −.31** −.25* −.39** −.11 −.18 ≤6 68 −.04 .06 −.02 .12 −.04 −.04 −.32** −.17 −.31* −.13 −.14 ≤3 36 −.06 .14 .19 .07 −.02 .28 −.07 .05 −.24 .08 .24 Note. SES = socioeconomic status. 0 = female; 1 = male. 0 = no migration background; 1 = one or both parents and/or child born abroad. 0 = another language than English is child’s main language; 1 = English is main language. *p < .05. **p < .01. Results in this study demonstrate that early onset of parent– In a set of additional regression analyses, we included the child reading is favorable for children’s linguistic competen- current frequency with which the child was read to as an addi- cies (cf. DeBaryshe, 1993; Niklas, Cohrssen, Tayler, & tional predictor of child outcomes. This led to the onset of Schneider, 2016). Whereas onset of shared reading explained shared reading becoming a nonsignificant predictor of chil- a similar amount of variance in both, children’s rhyming dren’s linguistic competencies. Whereas children’s vocabu- abilities and verbal comprehension, research indicates that lary was predicted by current frequency of shared reading, no the onset of shared reading should be a better predictor of significant amount of variance of rhyming was explained any children’s linguistic abilities such as vocabulary, as opposed longer by these two variables. These findings may be partly to literacy competencies such as sound awareness (Niklas, due to multicollinearity for which we found evidence. Cohrssen, Tayler, & Schneider, 2016; Sénéchal & LeFevre, However, they also indicate that current reading behavior 2002, 2014). seems to be a better predictor of child outcomes than the onset Furthermore, the age at which children were first read to of shared reading, while the onset of shared reading may be was highly correlated with the frequency with which they more of an indicator of the later HLE. Small sample size may were read to in the year before school. This finding indicates partly explain the reduced and nonsignificant amount of that the early parent–child reading onset may be regarded as explained variance in child linguistic competencies by onset a marker for general literacy habits in a family. Clearly, the of shared reading, given that in a larger German study, onset age at which children were first read to represents an impor- of shared reading remained a significant predictor of child tant aspect of the HLE (cf. Niklas, Cohrssen, Tayler, & vocabulary and rhyming abilities when current frequency of Schneider, 2016; B. M. Phillips & Lonigan, 2009). shared reading was controlled (cf. Niklas, Cohrssen, Tayler, Niklas et al. 7 Table 3. Regression Analyses to Predict Frequency, Children Were Read to in the Last Year Before Formal Schooling, Children’s Rhyming Abilities, Verbal Comprehension, Concept Formation, Concentration, and Numeracy Abilities. Unstandardized regression Explained Gain ΔR by 2 a Variable coefficient B SE t value variance R first reading Reading frequency Model 2 .32** .17** Age −0.00 0.04 −0.03 Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) 0.72 0.30 2.39* Migration background 0.18 0.30 0.59 Main language 0.66 0.63 1.05 SES 0.01 0.01 1.21 First reading −0.13 0.03 −4.62** Rhyming Model 2 .24** .04* Age 0.24 0.11 2.31* Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) −1.71 0.83 −2.05* Migration background −0.42 0.84 −0.50 Main language 0.71 1.76 0.40 SES 0.03 0.01 2.10* First reading −0.17 0.08 −2.15* Verbal comprehension Model 2 .28** .04* Age 0.32 0.14 2.33* Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) −0.93 1.10 −0.85 Migration background −1.47 1.11 −0.13 c † Main language 4.57 2.31 1.97 SES 0.03 0.02 1.92 First reading −0.21 0.10 −2.04* Concept formation Model 2 .18* .03 Age 0.37 0.17 2.21* Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) −2.36 1.32 −1.79 Migration background −2.12 1.33 −1.59 Main language −0.75 2.78 −0.27 SES 0.03 0.02 1.23 a † First reading −0.21 0.12 −1.70 Concentration Model 2 .09 .00 Age 0.35 0.16 2.15* Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) −2.25 1.28 −1.76 Migration background −1.00 1.29 −0.77 Main language 0.71 2.69 0.26 SES 0.00 0.02 0.21 First reading −0.06 0.12 −0.49 Numeracy abilities Model 2 .13* .00 Age 0.51 0.16 3.20* Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) −1.46 1.27 −1.14 Migration background −0.49 1.29 −0.38 Main language 0.85 2.68 0.32 SES 0.03 0.02 1.29 First reading −0.05 0.12 −0.40 Note. SES = socioeconomic status. First reading to child (child age in months). 0 = no migration background; 1 = one or both parents and/or child born abroad. 0 = another language than English is child’s main language; 1 = English is main language. p < .10. *p < .05. **p < .01. 8 SAGE Open & Schneider, 2016). Finally, current reading frequency also Also aligning with results from earlier research, both the significantly predicted children’s numeracy abilities. This onset of parent–child reading and reading frequency were finding may be due to shared reading being associated with closely associated with background variables such as family numeracy-related activities in the home which were not con- SES and migration background (Aikens & Barbarin, 2008; trolled (Niklas, 2015) or to the numeracy abilities assessed Edwards, 2014; Niklas et al., 2013; Prevoo et al., 2014). depending to some extent on children’s verbal skills. However, the association of the age at which children were In exploratory analyses, the onset of shared reading first read to with children’s linguistic outcomes remained proved to be closely associated with later reading frequency significant when “late onset reading” children were excluded and with children’s linguistic competencies, even when from the sample, whereas the association with family back- excluding those families from the sample who started read- ground variables diminished. In addition, first reading ing to their children comparatively late. Consequently, the remained a significant predictor of children’s linguistic out- significant associations were not due to child and family comes when controlling for SES, migration background, and characteristics in the few cases in which the child was first child’s main language. The onset of shared reading is thus an read to very late. The associations changed meaningfully important predictor of both later shared reading frequency only when all children were removed from the sample who and child linguistic competencies, independent of the family were first read to at 6 months of age or later. This may be due background. in part to the somewhat diminished variance in onset of read- Some further interesting results were observed. As ing in the remaining subsamples. However, the variance in expected in samples of children as young as these, child age all other study variables remained stable for all analyzed sub- was a significant predictor of all child outcomes. In addition, samples, suggesting that the findings are not the result of boys were read to more frequently, whereas girls showed lack of variance only. Consequently, parents should be somewhat greater cognitive abilities. We can only speculate encouraged to start reading to their young children early. on these findings. Given the small sample size, these results Although it is unlikely to make much difference whether may be random. Alternatively, the parents of boys in our parents start reading to children at the age of two or four sample may have thought that their children would need months, our findings indicate that reading aloud to a child greater support and thus read to them more frequently. before the child reaches the age of six months appears to be advantageous to the child’s linguistic development. Research Limitations shows that children are sensitive to language even prenatally (Moon et al., 2013; Partanen et al., 2013), yet in the first few The onset and frequency of parent–child reading were self- months after a child is born, general language experiences reported in parent surveys and such survey responses are sus- are more likely to make a difference than reading aloud. ceptible to perceived social desirability. Prospective However, as no negative effects of a very early start of read- longitudinal studies would be needed for more accuracy as ing to a child are to be expected, the sooner the better appears parents might also not remember correctly the age of their to be best. child when they first started reading to him or her. However, Whereas some studies found comprehensive measures of previous home learning environment studies have shown that the HLE to be a predictor of children’s numeracy abilities as surveys provide reliable data and lead to findings that are well (Anders et al., 2012), the onset of reading to a child closely related to those obtained with other measures (cf. proved to be a specific predictor of children’s linguistic com- Burgess, 2002). Consequently, although our approach cer- petencies, but not of numeracy competencies or of concen- tainly has to be regarded as exploratory and preliminary, and tration. Obviously, shared book reading events present rich the findings interpreted with caution, our correlational analy- opportunities for children to acquire new vocabulary, to ses with subsamples may help to better understand the associa- rehearse new words in extended conversations, to play with tion of onset of shared reading and various outcome variables, language, and to experience the purpose of print media. All and may provide a first hint at the child age at which shared of these experiences support children’s linguistic develop- reading supports children’s linguistic development. ment (Bus et al., 1995; Mol et al., 2008; Schatschneider Beyond the limitation of self-reported, retrospective esti- et al., 2004; Torgesen, 2002; Torppa et al., 2007). mations of the onset of shared reading by parents, other limi- The age at which children were first read to was also tations mark this study. The sample size was small and related with children’s concept formation in correlational characterized by, on average, middle to high SES families. analysis. Furthermore, first reading was a marginally signifi- One may expect to find later onsets of reading and less fre- cant predictor of concept formation, after controlling for quent reading to children in samples with a low to middle child and family characteristics (p < .10, small effect size). family SES (Niklas, Cohrssen, Tayler, & Schneider, 2016). This aligns with recent studies that reported small to medium Further research needs to test whether the associations found effect size associations of the home learning environment in this study would change with a wider range of family SES. with intelligence (Frumkin, 2013; Kleemans et al., 2012; Nonetheless, the onset of reading and the frequency with Niklas, Cohrssen, & Tayler, 2016). which children were read to align very well with figures Niklas et al. 9 reported in other international studies (Duursma, 2014; B. Funding M. Phillips & Lonigan, 2009). The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support In addition, it is not possible to interpret our results caus- for the research and/or authorship of this article: This work was ally due to the high likelihood of gene–environment interac- supported by a fellowship within the Postdoctoral Programme of tions, that is, inherent parent and child characteristics the German Academic Exchange Services (DAAD). influencing both, the HLE and child outcomes. Future research should test whether onset age of shared reading var- References ies between families with or without a genetic risk for dys- Aikens, N. L., & Barbarin, O. (2008). Socioeconomic differences in lexia and analyze possible interactions. reading trajectories: The contribution of family, neighborhood, We also did not assess whether children in families with a and school contexts. Journal of Educational Psychology, 100, background of migration were read to in English or in an 235-251. Anders, Y., Rossbach, H. G., Weinert, S., Ebert, S., Kuger, S., language other than English. As the child outcomes were all Lehrl, S., & von Maurice, J. (2012). Home and preschool assessed in English, this might have played a role. However, learning environments and their relations to the development in families with a migration background, children not only of early numeracy skills. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, had more limited vocabularies, but onset of parent–child 27, 231-244. reading also occurred later, independent of the language Bast, J., & Reitsma, P. (1998). Analyzing the development of used. individual differences in terms of Matthew effects in read- In our study, we focused only on the age at which children ing: Results from a Dutch longitudinal study. Developmental were first read to and the frequency with which they were Psychology, 34, 1373-1399. read to in the final preschool year. Consequently, we do not Bourdieu, P. (1986). The forms of capital. In J. Richardson (Ed.), consider other aspects of shared book reading that play a Handbook of theory and research for the sociology of educa- major role in children’s linguistic development such as the tion (pp. 241-258). New York, NY: Greenwood Press. Bowman, B. T., Donovan, M. S., & Burns, M. S. (Eds.). (2003). quality of the reading (e.g., Mol et al., 2008; L. M. Phillips Eager to learn: Educating our preschoolers. Washington, DC: et al., 2008) or the appropriateness of the book (Kucirkova, National Academies Press. Messer, & Whitelock, 2012). Future studies need to explore Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979). The ecology of human development. the relationship between onset of shared book reading and Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. the quality of the book reading. Burgess, S. R. (2002). The influence of speech perception, oral Unfortunately, we were not able to include children’s language ability, the home literacy environment, and pre-read- actual reading or spelling abilities in school or literacy com- ing knowledge on the growth of phonological sensitivity: A petencies in kindergarten as outcome measures to test one-year longitudinal investigation. Reading and Writing: An whether the age children were first read to also predicts these Interdisciplinary Journal, 15, 709-737. outcomes. However, children’s rhyming abilities and vocab- Bus, A. G., van IJzendoorn, M. H., & Pellegrini, A. D. (1995). Joint ulary are important predictors of later reading and spelling book reading makes for success in learning to read: A meta- analysis on inter-generational transmission of literacy. Review abilities (e.g., Bowman et al., 2003; Schatschneider et al., of Educational Research, 65, 1-21. 2004). Consequently, the onset of shared reading should also Chien, N. C., Howes, C., Pianta, R., Burchinal, M., Ritchie, S., be associated with later academic achievement in school. Bryant, D., . . . Barbarin, O. (2010). Children’s classroom engagement and school readiness gains in prekindergarten. Conclusion Child Development, 81, 1534-1549. DeBaryshe, B. D. (1993). Joint picture-book reading correlates Despite these limitations, this is one of the first studies to of early oral language skill. Journal of Child Language, 20, focus first on the influence of the age at which children were 455-461. first read to on the development of children’s linguistic Duncan, G. J., Claessens, A., Huston, A., Pagani, L., Engel, skills, and second on how this first reading is associated M., Sexton, H., . . . Duckworth, K. (2007). School readi- with later literacy experiences in the home. The findings ness and later achievement. Developmental Psychology, 43, 1428-1446. indicate that starting early can support the development of Duursma, E. (2014). Parental bookreading practices among fami- children’s language abilities and that the onset of shared lies in the Netherlands. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, reading seems to be a good and specific indicator of the 14, 435-458. overall HLE. Consequently, parents should be encouraged Edwards, C. M. (2014). Maternal literacy practices and toddler’s to start reading to their children when they are very young— emergent literacy skills. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, the sooner, the better. 14, 53-79. Esser, G. (2002). BUEVA – Basisdiagnostik für umschriebene Declaration of Conflicting Interests Entwicklungsstörungen im Vorschulalter [BUEVA—Basic The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect diagnostics for developmental disorders at preschool age]. to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. Göttingen, Germany: Beltz. 10 SAGE Open Farrant, B. M., & Zubrick, S. R. (2012). 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Using early standardized language mea- Herkunftsmerkmalen und der basalen Lesefähigkeit am Ende sures to predict later language and early reading outcomes der ersten Klasse [The early learning environment provided by in children at high risk for language-learning impairments. the family as a mediator between structural family background Journal of Learning Disabilities, 42, 61-75. and basic reading abilities at the end of Grade 1]. Psychologie Frumkin, L. A. (2013). Young children’s cognitive achievement: in Erziehung und Unterricht, 60, 94-111. Home learning environment, language and ethnic background. Niklas, F., Nguyen, C., Cloney, D., Tayler, C., & Adams, R. Journal of Early Childhood Research, 11, 222-235. (2016). Self-report measures of the home learning environ- Kleemans, T., Peeters, M., Segers, E., & Verhoeven, L. (2012). ment in large scale research: Measurement properties and Child and home predictors of early numeracy skills in kinder- associations with key developmental outcomes. Learning garten. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 27, 471-477. Environments Research, 19, 181-202. doi:10.1007/s10984- Kucirkova, N., Messer, D., & Whitelock, D. (2012). Parents reading 016-9206-9 with their toddlers: The role of personalization in book engage- Niklas, F., & Schneider, W. (2013). Home literacy environment ment. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, 13, 445-470. and the beginning of reading and writing. Contemporary Lever, R., & Sénéchal, M. (2011). Discussing stories: On how a dia- Educational Psychology, 38, 40-50. logic reading intervention improves kindergartners’ oral narra- Niklas, F., & Schneider, W. (2014). Casting the die before the die tive construction. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, is cast: The importance of the home numeracy environment 108, 1-24. for preschool children. 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Woodcock–Johnson III tests Educational Research, 71, 75-85. of achievement: Examiner’s manual. Itasca, IL: Riverside Partanen, E., Kujala, T., Näätänen, R., Liitola, A., Sambeth, A., & Publishing. Huotilainen, M. (2013). Learning induced neural plasticity of Mather, N., & Woodcock, R. (2001b). Woodcock–Johnson III tests speech processing before birth. Proceedings of the National of cognitive abilities: Examiner’s manual. Itasca, IL: Riverside Academy of Sciences, 110, 15145-15150. Publishing. Phillips, B. M., & Lonigan, C. J. (2009). Variations in the home McGrew, K., Woodcock, R., & Mather, N. (2001). Woodcock– literacy environment of preschool children: A cluster analytic Johnson III technical manual. Itasca, IL: Riverside Publishing. approach. Scientific Studies of Reading, 13, 146-174. Mol, S. E., Bus, A. G., de Jong, M. T., & Smeets, D. J. H. (2008). Phillips, L. M., Norris, S. P., & Anderson, J. (2008). Unlocking the Added value of dialogic parent–child book readings: A meta- door: Is parents’ reading to children the key to early literacy analysis. Early Education and Development, 19, 7-26. development? Canadian Psychology, 49, 82-88. Moon, C., Lagercrantz, H., & Kuhl, P. K. (2013). Language experi- Prevoo, M. J. L., Malda, M., Mesman, J., Emmen, R. A. G., Yeniad, enced in utero affect vowel perception after birth: A two-coun- N., van Ijzendoorn, M. H., & Linting, M. (2014). Predicting try study. Acta Paediatrica, 120, 156-160. ethnic minority children’s vocabulary from socioeconomic sta- Newman, R., Ratner, N. B., Jusczyk, M., Jusczyk, P. W., & Dow, tus, maternal language and home reading input: Different path- K. A. (2006). Infants’ early ability to segment the conversa- ways for host and ethnic language. Journal of Child Language, tional speech signal predicts later language development: A 41, 963-984. retrospective analysis. Developmental Psychology, 42, 643- Raikes, H., Pan, B. A., Gayle, L., Tamis-LeMonda, C. S., Brooks- 655. Gunn, J., Constantine, J., . . . Rodriguez, E. T. (2006). Mother– Niklas, F. (2015). Die familiäre Lernumwelt und ihre Bedeutung child reading in low-income families: Correlates and outcomes für die kindliche Kompetenzentwicklung [The learning envi- during the first three years of life. Child Development, 77, ronment provided by the family and its impact on the devel- 924-953. opment of child competencies]. Psychologie in Erziehung und Scarborough, H. S., & Dobrich, W. (1994). On the efficacy of read- Unterricht, 62, 106-120. ing to preschoolers. Developmental Review, 14, 245-302. Niklas, F., Cohrssen, C., & Tayler, C. (2016). Home learning Schatschneider, C., Fletcher, J. M., Francis, D. J., Carlson, C. D., environment and concept formation: A family intervention & Foorman, B. R. (2004). Kindergarten prediction of read- study with kindergarten children. Early Childhood Education ing skills: A longitudinal comparative analyses. Journal of Journal, 44, 419-427. Educational Psychology, 96, 265-282. Niklas et al. 11 Schmiedeler, S., Niklas, F., & Schneider, W. (2014). Symptoms Torppa, M., Tolvanen, A., Poikkeus, A. M., Eklund, K., Lerkkanen, of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and home M. K., Leskinen, E., & Lyytinen, H. (2007). Reading devel- learning environment (HLE): Findings from a longitudinal opment subtypes and their early characteristics. Annals of study. European Journal of Psychology of Education, 29(3), Dyslexia, 57, 3-32. 467-482. Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher Sénéchal, M., & LeFevre, J.-A. (2001). Storybook reading and par- psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University ent teaching: Links to language and literacy development. In P. Press. R. Britto & J. Brooks-Gunn (Eds.), The role of family literacy Wegener, B. (1988). Kritik des Prestiges [Criticism of the prestige]. environments in promoting young children’s emerging literacy Opladen, Germany: Westdeutscher Verlag. skills (pp. 39-52). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Whitehurst, G. J., & Lonigan, C. J. (1998). Child development and Sénéchal, M., & LeFevre, J.-A. (2002). Parental involvement in the emergent literacy. Child Development, 69, 848-872. development of children’s reading skill: A five-year longitudi- nal study. Child Development, 73, 445-460. Author Biographies Sénéchal, M., & LeFevre, J.-A. (2014). Continuity and change Frank Niklas is a developmental and educational psychologist at in the home literacy environment as predictors of growth in the University of Würzburg, Germany. He also has an honorary vocabulary and reading. Child Development, 85, 1552-1568. appointment at the University of Melbourne. He conducts research Sénéchal, M., LeFevre, J.-A., Hudson, E., & Lawseon, P. E. (1996). on the home learning environment, the development of children’s Knowledge of storybooks as a predictor of young children’s mathematical and literacy competencies, and children’s school vocabulary. Journal of Educational Psychology, 88, 520-536. readiness. Sénéchal, M., Pagan, S., Lever, R., & Ouellette, G. P. (2008). Caroline Cohrssen is a senior lecturer on the Master of Teaching Relations among the frequency of shared reading and 4-year-old (Early Childhood) at the University of Melbourne. Her research children’s vocabulary, morphological and syntax comprehen- interests include the influence of the home learning environment on sion, and narrative skills. Early Education and Development, children’s literacy and numeracy skills, children’s demonstrations 19, 27-44. of mathematical thinking and their implications for teaching and Sim, S., & Berthelsen, D. (2014). Shared book reading by parents learning in early childhood education, and teacher perceptions of with young children: Evidence-based practice. Australasian school readiness. Journal of Early Childhood, 39(1), 50-55. Stanovich, K. E. (1986). Matthew effects in reading: Some conse- Collette Tayler is professor at the University of Melbourne and quences of individual differences in the acquisition of literacy. holds the Chair in Early Childhood Education and Care in the Reading Research Quarterly, 21, 360-407. Melbourne Graduate School of Education. Collette’s work Torgesen, J. K. (2002). The prevention of reading difficulties. addresses program access and engagement; public and private Journal of School Psychology, 40, 7-26. investments; program standards and quality; the curriculum and Torppa, M., Poikkeus, A. M., Laakso, M. L., Eklund, K., & pedagogy applied in different services; leadership and staff devel- opment; child and family involvement and program outcomes. Her Lyytinen, H. (2006). Predicting delayed letter knowledge research seeks to explain both universal principles and contextual development and its relation to grade 1 reading achievement variations needed to provide exemplary care and education for among children with and without familial risk for dyslexia. young children. Developmental Psychology, 42, 1128-1142. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png SAGE Open SAGE

The Sooner, the Better: Early Reading to Children

Niklas, Frank; Cohrssen, Caroline; Tayler, Collette
SAGE Open , Volume 6 (4): 1 – Oct 1, 2016
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Abstract

As reading to children plays an important role in language development, primary caregivers are often encouraged to read to their children from a very young age. However, little is known about the age at which such reading should start. The linguistic skills of 104 children were assessed shortly before school entry. Their parents were asked how old their children were when they first read to them and how often they had read to their children. Almost half of the study children were read to before they were 6 months old. The age at which children were first read to was closely associated with family characteristics such as socioeconomic status, the frequency with which children were read to as preschoolers, and with children’s linguistic and cognitive competencies. The findings imply that reading books to very young children indeed contributes meaningfully to a favorable home literacy environment and supports children’s language development. Keywords storybook reading, onset of reading to a child, home literacy environment (HLE), parent–child interactions, linguistic competencies parent–child interactions (Farrant & Zubrick, 2012; Niklas, Introduction 2015; Niklas, Möllers, & Schneider, 2013). Children’s language and literacy competence does not begin Other theoretical frameworks relevant to a discussion of when children enter school—Children’s literacy learning the influence of the HLE include Vygotsky’s (1978) social starts well before formal schooling, and studies have shown constructivist theory and Bourdieu’s (1986) social theory. that children are sensitive to speech even prenatally (e.g., According to Vygotsky, children learn through observation Moon, Lagercrantz, & Kuhl, 2013; Partanen et al., 2013). and interaction with knowledgeable others in social contexts. Parents and primary caregivers (subsequently referred to as In the context of language and literacy learning, the impor- parents) are highly influential in a child’s early learning as tance of parents modeling literacy activities and supporting parent–child interactions are frequent and ongoing. Indeed, their children’s emerging literacy skills is clear. Bourdieu research shows that the home literacy environment (HLE) is theorized that the cultural capital to which an individual or a the context in which children first acquire the language and family has access is a key component of the HLE. This cul- literacy skills that equip them to make sense of, describe, and tural capital includes cultural objects and resources such as participate in the world (e.g., Liebeskind, Piotrowski, books and works of art, as well as the ability to utilize and Lapierre, & Linebarger, 2014; Niklas & Schneider, 2013; learn from such objects and resources. Consequently, a fam- Raikes et al., 2006). ily’s cultural practices such as reading and writing are closely Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) ecological theory offers a theo- associated with the family’s cultural capital. retical framework for the influence of the HLE on child The multifaceted HLE incorporates various literacy- development. According to Bronfenbrenner, children belong related activities such as parental reading behavior, library to a complex and evolving social and cultural ecology. His visits, teaching of letters and sounds, and owning books at theory posits that distal elements of a child’s ecological sys- home (Niklas, 2015). However, reading to children is a core tem such as extended family, community, and society have some impact on children, but proximal factors such as a child’s immediate family have the most influence on a child’s University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia development. Similarly, distal family characteristics such as Corresponding Author: family socioeconomic status (SES) based on income, occu- Frank Niklas, Melbourne Graduate School of Education, University of pation, or education and family migration background are far Melbourne, 4/100 Leicester Street, Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia. less influential than proximal family characteristics such as Email: frank.niklas@unimelb.edu.au Creative Commons CC-BY: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage). 2 SAGE Open element of the HLE (Bus, van IJzendoorn, & Pellegrini, their children’s language and later emergent literacy learning 1995; Niklas, Nguyen, Cloney, Tayler, & Adams, 2016). intensively by providing a high-quality HLE facilitate chil- Many studies have focused on the impact that reading to dren’s vocabulary acquisition (Mol, Bus, de Jong, & Smeets, children has on children’s linguistic competencies (e.g., 2008; Niklas & Schneider, 2015). Consequently, the HLE Edwards, 2014; Raikes et al., 2006), but little is known about appears to play an important role in children’s early linguis- the age at which parents should start reading to their chil- tic development. dren, whether the age of first reading predicts the frequency with which a child is read to later on, or whether the age of HLE and Reading to Children first reading predicts children’s competencies as preschool- ers (e.g., DeBaryshe, 1993). Research demonstrates that home learning environments are In this study, parents were asked how old their child was associated with children’s numeracy abilities (e.g., Kleemans, when first read to. This first-reading age was then tested to Peeters, Segers, & Verhoeven, 2012; Niklas & Schneider, explore its relationship with various child outcomes shortly 2014) and behavioral outcomes (e.g., Schmiedeler, Niklas, & prior to school entry. Schneider, 2014), and predict children’s literacy competen- cies (e.g., Niklas & Schneider, 2013; Sénéchal & LeFevre, 2002). For instance, Niklas and Schneider (2013) demon- Early Linguistic Development strated that aspects of the HLE such as parental reading, The ability to read and write letters, with comprehension, is reading to the child, and the number of books in a household the basis for success in formal education. Adults who show predicted preschoolers’ vocabulary and phonological aware- greater literacy competencies often earn higher incomes, ness as well as the further development of literacy competen- have better job prospects, lower risk of mental illness, and cies even when controlling for a range of child and family enjoy better health (Fawcett, 2003; Lyon, 2002). However, background variables. no clear-cut borders exist between the precursors of reading Sénéchal and LeFevre (2002, 2014) showed specific asso- and spelling, such as children’s vocabulary and phonological ciations of different aspects of the HLE with children’s lin- awareness, and children’s later reading and spelling skills guistic and literacy competencies. The informal literacy (Bowman, Donovan, & Burns, 2003; Schatschneider, environment consisted of variables measuring the shared Fletcher, Francis, Carlson, & Foorman, 2004; Torgesen, reading behavior in the family, whereas the formal literacy 2002; Torppa et al., 2007). Oral language skills such as environment took parents’ literacy teaching into account. vocabulary and code-related skills such as phonological Parents’ literacy teaching predicted letter knowledge and awareness are interrelated domains of emergent literacy. phonological awareness, whereas the informal literacy envi- Consequently, the early ability to understand language and to ronment was associated with vocabulary growth. use or manipulate language expressively is very important Despite the fact that the HLE is a multifaceted construct, (Whitehurst & Lonigan, 1998). Understanding the initial reading to children is still a fundamental element of this con- stages of linguistic development and identifying aspects of struct. Exposure to books supports vocabulary acquisition early literacy experiences that support children’s later read- (Bus et al., 1995; Farrant & Zubrick, 2012; Prevoo et al., ing proficiency present opportunities to have a positive 2014) as books typically contain more complex vocabulary impact on early linguistic skills of very young children. than common usage vocabulary (Sénéchal, LeFevre, Hudson, As language and literacy experiences in the first three & Lawseon, 1996). Early meta-analyses conducted by years of life set the scene for children’s later literacy compe- Scarborough and Dobrich (1994) and Bus and colleagues tencies, these experiences are critical. Passive listening and (1995) revealed that reading to children explained about 8% nonverbal communication are a child’s first step toward of the variance in children’s linguistic competencies. This becoming an active talker, and differences in children’s abil- finding is important as reading to children can be more easily ity to segment conversational speech signals are predictors manipulated than, for instance, family SES. In addition, one of later language development (Newman, Ratner, Jusczyk, can assume that early effects of a positive learning environ- Jusczyk, & Dow, 2006). As children develop, language com- ment are cumulative over time (Sénéchal & LeFevre, 2001; prehension becomes increasingly important. For instance, in cf. Stanovich, 1986). a study conducted by Flax, Realpe-Bonilla, Roesler, In addition to the frequency of reading and quality of read- Choudhury, and Benasich (2009), children’s language com- ing (Lever & Sénéchal, 2011; L. M. Phillips, Norris, & prehension at three years of age predicted various language Anderson, 2008; Sim & Berthelsen, 2014), the onset of read- and reading measures at seven years of age. Furthermore, ing seems to play an important role (DeBaryshe, 1993; Niklas, children with stronger early linguistic skills tend to outper- Cohrssen, Tayler, & Schneider, 2016; see also B. M. Phillips form children with weak early linguistic skills on assess- & Lonigan, 2009). In their study, B. M. Phillips and Lonigan ments of literacy abilities in school, and this gap appears to (2009) analyzed the relationship of different measures of the widen over time (Bast & Reitsma, 1998; Torppa, Poikkeus, HLE—among these the onset of reading to children—with Laakso, Eklund, & Lyytinen, 2006). Parents who support various background characteristics of the family. Here, higher Niklas et al. 3 quality HLE was associated with greater family income, better were read to in the year before school as well as to children’s caregiver education, and lower educator stress level. However, linguistic abilities, and would predict these even when con- no child outcome measures were included in the analyses, and trolling for child and family characteristics. As shared reading the focus was not on the onset of reading to children. seems to be a fairly specific predictor for children’s linguistic In her study, DeBaryshe (1993) found that the age at competencies, we expected weaker associations with other which 41 two-year-old children were first read to was a bet- cognitive child abilities such as concentration, numeracy ter predictor of oral language skills than the frequency with competencies, and intelligence. We also anticipated that the which children were read to or visited the library. It should onset of shared reading would not predict these abilities sig- be noted that correlational data only were used and no con- nificantly when controlling for child and family characteris- trol variables for family or child characteristics were included tics. In an additional exploratory approach, we tested whether in this analysis. Given the small sample size, the young sam- and how the associations between the onset of shared reading ple, and the fact that important family characteristics such as and the outcome variables changed for different subgroups of family language or migration background were not taken children by incrementally excluding children whose parents into account, the findings of DeBaryshe need to be regarded started reading to their children comparatively late. as preliminary—important as they are. In a German study (Niklas, Cohrssen, Tayler, & Schneider, Method 2016), the age children were first read to was a significant predictor of reading frequency in kindergarten, children’s Participants rhyming abilities, vocabulary, and, to a lesser extent, other All 104 preschoolers attended one of four child care centers cognitive abilities such as numeracy skills and intelligence located across one local government area in Melbourne. as well. However, the onset of shared reading was assessed After obtaining approval from local government, formal con- according to categories only and about 75% of the sample sent to conduct the study was obtained from the center coor- fell into the earliest category (shared reading started before dinators, directors, and teachers. Each family registered as the child age of two years). In addition, although research using the various early childhood settings was invited to par- indicates that the association of the HLE with children’s lin- ticipate in the study. Members of the research team were on guistic and cognitive outcomes seems to be comparable hand to obtain consent from parents and caregivers and to across countries, there is also evidence that the HLE might answer questions at morning drop-off and afternoon pickup be more closely associated with children’s vocabulary in times. German-speaking contexts than in English-speaking con- Children were assessed toward the end of their final term texts (Niklas, Tayler, & Schneider, 2015). in kindergarten. In the sample, boys (55.8%) outnumber girls Although these studies indicate that starting shared read- (44.2%), with a mean age of approximately 5 years 2 months ing early seems to be beneficial for children’s linguistic (SD = 4.0 months) at the time of assessment. About 6% of the development, little is known about whether the age at which sample spoke a language other than English as the main lan- parents first read to children is a specific predictor of English- guage at home. In 37% of the sample, at least one of the speaking preschoolers’ linguistic competencies, even when parents, or the child, was born outside Australia. However, controlling for child and family characteristics. In addition, when participants born in a country in which English is an we do not know whether children start to benefit from par- official language were excluded from the migrant group, the ents reading to them from a particular age. overall percentage of children with a migration background decreased to 20.6%. The Current Study The assessment of children took place in the kindergarten rooms during November and December 2014, and thus about Research has shown that literacy-based parent–child interac- two months before the children entered school as the school tions in general, and reading to children in particular, support year in Australia starts at the end of January. Multiple assess- the development of children’s linguistic competencies (Bus ment tasks were used and those relevant to the analyses are et al., 1995; Liebeskind et al., 2014; Sénéchal, Pagan, Lever, briefly described below. In addition, parents were asked to & Ouellette, 2008). However, despite a few studies analyz- complete surveys on family background characteristics and ing the onset of reading (e.g., DeBaryshe, 1993; Niklas, their reading behavior at three points during 2014. Cohrssen, Tayler, & Schneider, 2016), there are still ques- tions to answer. This study uses data from an Australian study to analyze the association of the onset of parent–child Measures—Assessment of Children’s Linguistic reading with (a) the frequency with which children were read and Other Cognitive Competencies to in the year prior to commencing formal school education, and (b) various child outcomes. Several subtests were drawn from the Woodcock–Johnson We expected the age at which children were first read to III Tests of Cognition and Achievement (WJ III; Mather & would be closely related to the frequency with which children Woodcock 2001a, 2001b; McGrew, Woodcock, & Mather, 4 SAGE Open 2001). The WJ III is a standardized, normed measure fre- presented with a subitizing task. Dotted cards were revealed quently used to assess children’s achievement (e.g., Chien for 3 s and the children were first required to state how many et al., 2010; Duncan et al., 2007). dots had been seen and then to compare the number of dots presented. The sum scores of each of the four subtests were Verbal Comprehension. This test has four subtests: Picture combined in a total sum score that measured children’s early Vocabulary, Synonyms, Antonyms, and Verbal Analogies. numeracy ability (Cronbach’s α = .70). Each subtest starts with a sample item to demonstrate how to approach the question and for the researcher to provide feed- Measures—Parent Survey back to the child. Thereafter, no feedback is provided. Together, these subtests measure different aspects of children’s Parents were requested to complete surveys about child and acquired vocabulary skills. For four- to six-year-old children, family characteristics and the HLE, and 98 surveys were estimated reliabilities on Verbal Comprehension range from returned. In addition to providing information on migration .89 to .90. background and main language spoken at home (see sample description), respondents were asked about their occupation Sound Awareness, subtest: Rhyming. Here, children had to pro- and their partner’s occupation to assign prestige values to vide a word that rhymed with a given word or sentence. This these occupations (cf. Wegener, 1988). Here, values from 20 subtest becomes increasingly complex the further one (an unskilled laborer) to 186.8 (a physician) are assigned. advances through it. The median reliability for WJ III Sound The household occupation awarded the highest prestige was Awareness is .81. used as an indicator of family SES (M = 99.7, SD = 33.5). Parents were asked whether they read to their child, inde- Concept Formation. This task requires rule application and pendent of the language used, and how old the child was when frequent switching from one rule to another. It is a broad first read to (parents were required to enter years and months measure of the ability to reason, form concepts, and solve in the space provided). Only one family reported not having problems, using unfamiliar information or novel procedures. read to their child. More than one third of the sample (37.5%) For each presented item, the child tries to figure out the rule indicated that they started reading to their child within the first that divides a set of symbols into two groups. Other than in three months after the child’s birth and four families reported similar assessment tools, during the assessment of concept that they read to their child from birth. This early start was formation, the child receives feedback on the performance, sometimes attributed to the participating child having older and in case of wrong answers the correct one is pointed out siblings whom they joined for reading sessions. Another third and explained (median test reliability = .94). of the families started reading to their child when they were In addition to the WJ III subtest, two other assessments four to six months old. Six months was the mode (24%) and were used to measure children’s short-term concentration 6.34 months the mean (SD = 5.90) for this sample. These find- and their numeracy abilities. ings align very well with the reported average onset of reading in a study by B. M. Phillips and Lonigan (2009). Almost all Concentration. The Frankfurt Tests for Five-Year-Olds–Con- families had started reading to their children by the time the centration (FTF-K; cf. Esser, 2002) measures children’s abil- children were 15 months old (93.8%). Two parents reported ity to work quickly, to remain goal-oriented, and to starting to read to their children when they were 18 months concentrate. In this timed, paper-and-pencil worksheet test, old, three parents first read to their children when they were children are required to draw a line through as many pears as two years old, and one family started reading to their child possible in 90 seconds while disregarding the apples. Pears when he was three years old (see Figure 1). and apples are black line drawings presented in rows and fill- Finally, on three occasions during 2014, parents were ing one side of an A4 page (retest reliability for up to 3 asked to report the number of days during the preceding weeks: r = .79-.85). week on which the study child had been read to. The average tt of these three values (Cronbach’s α = .89; r = .65-.80) was tt Numeracy abilities. Four subtests were used to assess children’s used to indicate the average number of days a child was read numeracy abilities: Counting, Identifying Number Symbols, to in a typical week during the year prior to commencing Stating Number Values, and Estimating Amounts. In the school. Almost half of the families reported having read to Counting subtest, children were asked to count forward and their child every day (49%). Another 25% of the respondents backward and to name numbers that immediately precede or read to their children on five or six days per week, and 11.2% follow a spoken number word. They were also shown number read to their child on three days or fewer. symbols from 1 to 21 in a nonnumerical sequence and asked to name the number. The number values task required children to Analytic Approach match cards depicting different numbers of stick-figure draw- ings of children with a spoken quantity or with an indicated First, correlations and descriptive statistics for all study vari- numeral on a number line from 1 to 10. Finally, children were ables are reported. Pearson’s r was used as correlation Niklas et al. 5 cognitive abilities were highly correlated. Current shared reading frequency showed similar associations with the study variables as onset of shared reading with the exception that the frequency children were read to was significantly associated with children’s numeracy abilities. In a next step, correlations were again calculated, this 15 time for subsamples excluding families who started reading to their children late. As can be seen in Table 2, excluding families from the analysis who started reading to their chil- dren after their child’s first birthday, or after the child was 9 months old, did not change the picture much although first 0 reading was no longer significantly associated with family 0123456789 12 14 15 18 24 36 background variables. However, including only those fami- Child age in months when the child was first read to lies who started reading to their children when the child was 6 months old or younger led to small, nonsignificant correla- Figure 1. Distribution of child age in months when the child was tions of first reading with the frequency with which the child first read to. was read to in the final year of preschool and with children’s verbal comprehension. Rhyming and concept formation coefficient for all correlations except for the correlations of were still significantly associated with the onset of reading in onset age of shared reading with the other variables as this that children who were read to earlier within this subsample variable was slightly positively skewed (skewness = 2.3). still showed greater performance on these assessment tasks. Here, Spearman’s rho was used instead. Thereafter, correla- Finally, when we included only those families who started tions (Spearman’s ρ) of first reading to a child with the other reading to their child when the child was three months old or variables are reported for reduced samples, excluding fami- younger, no significant correlations were found at all. In lies that report late onset of first parent–child reading. Here, addition, most correlations were close to 0. we started with the full sample of children with available In a last step, regression analyses were used to predict data (child age when the child was first read to ≤36 months) reading frequency in the final preschool year, and children’s and reduced the sample to children aged 12, 9, 6, or 3 months linguistic and cognitive abilities by first reading, when con- and less when read to for the first time. This exploratory trolling for child and family characteristics (see Table 3). approach tested whether the associations of the study vari- Even after controlling for various child and family character- ables change for these subsamples. Finally, regression analy- istics, the age at which a child was first read to was a very ses were conducted to predict both current reading frequency strong predictor of parent–child reading frequency in the and children’s linguistic, and other cognitive competencies year prior to school (large effect size) and a significant pre- by the age the child was first read to, while controlling for dictor of children’s rhyming abilities and verbal comprehen- child age, sex, and main language as well as family SES and sion (small to medium effect size). In comparison, first migration background. Here, in a first model, the control reading was not a significant predictor of children’s concen- variables are used as predictors, and in a second model, first tration and numerical abilities (p > .60) and only a margin- parent–child reading is introduced into the model as addi- ally significant predictor of children’s concept formation (p tional predictor. < .10; 3% of additional explained variance by age the child was first read to; small effect). In addition, older children showed greater competencies Results but were not read to more frequently, and there was a ten- Table 1 presents the correlations and descriptive statistics for dency that children who spoke English as their main lan- all study variables. The later that parents started reading to guage and came from higher SES families performed better their child, the less frequently they read to their child in the in the linguistic tasks. Finally, boys were read to more fre- year prior to school. No significant associations of first read- quently in our sample, and girls performed better on the ing with child sex, age, and main language and with concen- rhyming task and slightly better on concept formation and tration and numeracy abilities were found. However, children concentration. who were read to earlier showed greater rhyming ability, ver- bal comprehension, and concept formation. In addition, first Discussion reading was significantly associated with family background variables. Here, families with a migration background or Early support of children’s linguistic competencies is essen- with a lower SES began reading to their children later. tial as linguistic and literacy skills play a major role in every- Children in these families also showed significantly lower day life and are important for later academic achievement verbal comprehension. As expected, all linguistic and and life success in general (Fawcett, 2003; Lyon, 2002). 6 SAGE Open Table 1. Correlational Analyses and Descriptive Statistics (Means and Standard Deviations) for all Study Variables. 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 M SD First read to (child age in months) −.41** .10 .06 .25* −.16 −.29** −.36** −.33** −.38** −.15 −.13 6.34 5.90 Reading frequency (2) .12 .00 −.05 .21* .28** .26* .35** .21* .12 .23* 5.74 1.59 Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) (3) .26** .14 −.14 −.12 −.23* −.13 −.20* −.16 −.07 0.56 0.50 Age in months (4) −.01 .08 −.22* .12 .16 .14 .18 .28** 52.74 3.96 Migration background (5) −.25* −.06 −.15 −.24* −.23* −.13 −.09 0.37 0.49 Main language (6) .06 .18 .33** .12 .11 .11 0.94 0.24 SES (7) .29** .26* .19 .03 .11 99.71 33.53 Rhyming (8) .63** .34** .36** .39** 6.55 4.17 Verbal comprehension (9) .51** .40** .49** 22.09 5.64 Concept formation (10) .31** .43** 9.93 6.36 Concentration (11) .43** 28.41 5.87 Numeracy abilities (12) 21.45 5.97 Note. SES = socioeconomic status. 0 = no migration background; 1 = one or both parents and/or child born abroad. 0 = another language than English is child’s main language; 1 = English is main language. *p < .05. **p < .01. Table 2. Correlational Analyses (Spearman’s ρ) for Age, the Child Was First Read to in Months, With the Study Variables for Different Subgroups of Children. First reading (child age in Reading Age in Migration Main Verbal Concept Numeracy a b c months) n frequency Sex months background language SES Rhyming comprehension formation Concentration abilities Age ≤36 96 −.41** .10 .06 .25* −.16 −.29** −.36** −.33** −.38** −.15 −.13 ≤12 88 −.30** −.03 .01 .25* −.04 −.14 −.29** −.25* −.35** −.07 −.08 ≤9 81 −.22* .00 −.09 .17 −.07 −.03 −.31** −.25* −.39** −.11 −.18 ≤6 68 −.04 .06 −.02 .12 −.04 −.04 −.32** −.17 −.31* −.13 −.14 ≤3 36 −.06 .14 .19 .07 −.02 .28 −.07 .05 −.24 .08 .24 Note. SES = socioeconomic status. 0 = female; 1 = male. 0 = no migration background; 1 = one or both parents and/or child born abroad. 0 = another language than English is child’s main language; 1 = English is main language. *p < .05. **p < .01. Results in this study demonstrate that early onset of parent– In a set of additional regression analyses, we included the child reading is favorable for children’s linguistic competen- current frequency with which the child was read to as an addi- cies (cf. DeBaryshe, 1993; Niklas, Cohrssen, Tayler, & tional predictor of child outcomes. This led to the onset of Schneider, 2016). Whereas onset of shared reading explained shared reading becoming a nonsignificant predictor of chil- a similar amount of variance in both, children’s rhyming dren’s linguistic competencies. Whereas children’s vocabu- abilities and verbal comprehension, research indicates that lary was predicted by current frequency of shared reading, no the onset of shared reading should be a better predictor of significant amount of variance of rhyming was explained any children’s linguistic abilities such as vocabulary, as opposed longer by these two variables. These findings may be partly to literacy competencies such as sound awareness (Niklas, due to multicollinearity for which we found evidence. Cohrssen, Tayler, & Schneider, 2016; Sénéchal & LeFevre, However, they also indicate that current reading behavior 2002, 2014). seems to be a better predictor of child outcomes than the onset Furthermore, the age at which children were first read to of shared reading, while the onset of shared reading may be was highly correlated with the frequency with which they more of an indicator of the later HLE. Small sample size may were read to in the year before school. This finding indicates partly explain the reduced and nonsignificant amount of that the early parent–child reading onset may be regarded as explained variance in child linguistic competencies by onset a marker for general literacy habits in a family. Clearly, the of shared reading, given that in a larger German study, onset age at which children were first read to represents an impor- of shared reading remained a significant predictor of child tant aspect of the HLE (cf. Niklas, Cohrssen, Tayler, & vocabulary and rhyming abilities when current frequency of Schneider, 2016; B. M. Phillips & Lonigan, 2009). shared reading was controlled (cf. Niklas, Cohrssen, Tayler, Niklas et al. 7 Table 3. Regression Analyses to Predict Frequency, Children Were Read to in the Last Year Before Formal Schooling, Children’s Rhyming Abilities, Verbal Comprehension, Concept Formation, Concentration, and Numeracy Abilities. Unstandardized regression Explained Gain ΔR by 2 a Variable coefficient B SE t value variance R first reading Reading frequency Model 2 .32** .17** Age −0.00 0.04 −0.03 Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) 0.72 0.30 2.39* Migration background 0.18 0.30 0.59 Main language 0.66 0.63 1.05 SES 0.01 0.01 1.21 First reading −0.13 0.03 −4.62** Rhyming Model 2 .24** .04* Age 0.24 0.11 2.31* Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) −1.71 0.83 −2.05* Migration background −0.42 0.84 −0.50 Main language 0.71 1.76 0.40 SES 0.03 0.01 2.10* First reading −0.17 0.08 −2.15* Verbal comprehension Model 2 .28** .04* Age 0.32 0.14 2.33* Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) −0.93 1.10 −0.85 Migration background −1.47 1.11 −0.13 c † Main language 4.57 2.31 1.97 SES 0.03 0.02 1.92 First reading −0.21 0.10 −2.04* Concept formation Model 2 .18* .03 Age 0.37 0.17 2.21* Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) −2.36 1.32 −1.79 Migration background −2.12 1.33 −1.59 Main language −0.75 2.78 −0.27 SES 0.03 0.02 1.23 a † First reading −0.21 0.12 −1.70 Concentration Model 2 .09 .00 Age 0.35 0.16 2.15* Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) −2.25 1.28 −1.76 Migration background −1.00 1.29 −0.77 Main language 0.71 2.69 0.26 SES 0.00 0.02 0.21 First reading −0.06 0.12 −0.49 Numeracy abilities Model 2 .13* .00 Age 0.51 0.16 3.20* Sex (0 = female; 1 = male) −1.46 1.27 −1.14 Migration background −0.49 1.29 −0.38 Main language 0.85 2.68 0.32 SES 0.03 0.02 1.29 First reading −0.05 0.12 −0.40 Note. SES = socioeconomic status. First reading to child (child age in months). 0 = no migration background; 1 = one or both parents and/or child born abroad. 0 = another language than English is child’s main language; 1 = English is main language. p < .10. *p < .05. **p < .01. 8 SAGE Open & Schneider, 2016). Finally, current reading frequency also Also aligning with results from earlier research, both the significantly predicted children’s numeracy abilities. This onset of parent–child reading and reading frequency were finding may be due to shared reading being associated with closely associated with background variables such as family numeracy-related activities in the home which were not con- SES and migration background (Aikens & Barbarin, 2008; trolled (Niklas, 2015) or to the numeracy abilities assessed Edwards, 2014; Niklas et al., 2013; Prevoo et al., 2014). depending to some extent on children’s verbal skills. However, the association of the age at which children were In exploratory analyses, the onset of shared reading first read to with children’s linguistic outcomes remained proved to be closely associated with later reading frequency significant when “late onset reading” children were excluded and with children’s linguistic competencies, even when from the sample, whereas the association with family back- excluding those families from the sample who started read- ground variables diminished. In addition, first reading ing to their children comparatively late. Consequently, the remained a significant predictor of children’s linguistic out- significant associations were not due to child and family comes when controlling for SES, migration background, and characteristics in the few cases in which the child was first child’s main language. The onset of shared reading is thus an read to very late. The associations changed meaningfully important predictor of both later shared reading frequency only when all children were removed from the sample who and child linguistic competencies, independent of the family were first read to at 6 months of age or later. This may be due background. in part to the somewhat diminished variance in onset of read- Some further interesting results were observed. As ing in the remaining subsamples. However, the variance in expected in samples of children as young as these, child age all other study variables remained stable for all analyzed sub- was a significant predictor of all child outcomes. In addition, samples, suggesting that the findings are not the result of boys were read to more frequently, whereas girls showed lack of variance only. Consequently, parents should be somewhat greater cognitive abilities. We can only speculate encouraged to start reading to their young children early. on these findings. Given the small sample size, these results Although it is unlikely to make much difference whether may be random. Alternatively, the parents of boys in our parents start reading to children at the age of two or four sample may have thought that their children would need months, our findings indicate that reading aloud to a child greater support and thus read to them more frequently. before the child reaches the age of six months appears to be advantageous to the child’s linguistic development. Research Limitations shows that children are sensitive to language even prenatally (Moon et al., 2013; Partanen et al., 2013), yet in the first few The onset and frequency of parent–child reading were self- months after a child is born, general language experiences reported in parent surveys and such survey responses are sus- are more likely to make a difference than reading aloud. ceptible to perceived social desirability. Prospective However, as no negative effects of a very early start of read- longitudinal studies would be needed for more accuracy as ing to a child are to be expected, the sooner the better appears parents might also not remember correctly the age of their to be best. child when they first started reading to him or her. However, Whereas some studies found comprehensive measures of previous home learning environment studies have shown that the HLE to be a predictor of children’s numeracy abilities as surveys provide reliable data and lead to findings that are well (Anders et al., 2012), the onset of reading to a child closely related to those obtained with other measures (cf. proved to be a specific predictor of children’s linguistic com- Burgess, 2002). Consequently, although our approach cer- petencies, but not of numeracy competencies or of concen- tainly has to be regarded as exploratory and preliminary, and tration. Obviously, shared book reading events present rich the findings interpreted with caution, our correlational analy- opportunities for children to acquire new vocabulary, to ses with subsamples may help to better understand the associa- rehearse new words in extended conversations, to play with tion of onset of shared reading and various outcome variables, language, and to experience the purpose of print media. All and may provide a first hint at the child age at which shared of these experiences support children’s linguistic develop- reading supports children’s linguistic development. ment (Bus et al., 1995; Mol et al., 2008; Schatschneider Beyond the limitation of self-reported, retrospective esti- et al., 2004; Torgesen, 2002; Torppa et al., 2007). mations of the onset of shared reading by parents, other limi- The age at which children were first read to was also tations mark this study. The sample size was small and related with children’s concept formation in correlational characterized by, on average, middle to high SES families. analysis. Furthermore, first reading was a marginally signifi- One may expect to find later onsets of reading and less fre- cant predictor of concept formation, after controlling for quent reading to children in samples with a low to middle child and family characteristics (p < .10, small effect size). family SES (Niklas, Cohrssen, Tayler, & Schneider, 2016). This aligns with recent studies that reported small to medium Further research needs to test whether the associations found effect size associations of the home learning environment in this study would change with a wider range of family SES. with intelligence (Frumkin, 2013; Kleemans et al., 2012; Nonetheless, the onset of reading and the frequency with Niklas, Cohrssen, & Tayler, 2016). which children were read to align very well with figures Niklas et al. 9 reported in other international studies (Duursma, 2014; B. Funding M. Phillips & Lonigan, 2009). The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support In addition, it is not possible to interpret our results caus- for the research and/or authorship of this article: This work was ally due to the high likelihood of gene–environment interac- supported by a fellowship within the Postdoctoral Programme of tions, that is, inherent parent and child characteristics the German Academic Exchange Services (DAAD). influencing both, the HLE and child outcomes. Future research should test whether onset age of shared reading var- References ies between families with or without a genetic risk for dys- Aikens, N. L., & Barbarin, O. (2008). Socioeconomic differences in lexia and analyze possible interactions. reading trajectories: The contribution of family, neighborhood, We also did not assess whether children in families with a and school contexts. Journal of Educational Psychology, 100, background of migration were read to in English or in an 235-251. Anders, Y., Rossbach, H. 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Richardson (Ed.), consider other aspects of shared book reading that play a Handbook of theory and research for the sociology of educa- major role in children’s linguistic development such as the tion (pp. 241-258). New York, NY: Greenwood Press. Bowman, B. T., Donovan, M. S., & Burns, M. S. (Eds.). (2003). quality of the reading (e.g., Mol et al., 2008; L. M. Phillips Eager to learn: Educating our preschoolers. Washington, DC: et al., 2008) or the appropriateness of the book (Kucirkova, National Academies Press. Messer, & Whitelock, 2012). Future studies need to explore Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979). The ecology of human development. the relationship between onset of shared book reading and Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. the quality of the book reading. Burgess, S. R. (2002). The influence of speech perception, oral Unfortunately, we were not able to include children’s language ability, the home literacy environment, and pre-read- actual reading or spelling abilities in school or literacy com- ing knowledge on the growth of phonological sensitivity: A petencies in kindergarten as outcome measures to test one-year longitudinal investigation. Reading and Writing: An whether the age children were first read to also predicts these Interdisciplinary Journal, 15, 709-737. outcomes. However, children’s rhyming abilities and vocab- Bus, A. G., van IJzendoorn, M. H., & Pellegrini, A. D. (1995). Joint ulary are important predictors of later reading and spelling book reading makes for success in learning to read: A meta- analysis on inter-generational transmission of literacy. Review abilities (e.g., Bowman et al., 2003; Schatschneider et al., of Educational Research, 65, 1-21. 2004). Consequently, the onset of shared reading should also Chien, N. C., Howes, C., Pianta, R., Burchinal, M., Ritchie, S., be associated with later academic achievement in school. Bryant, D., . . . Barbarin, O. (2010). Children’s classroom engagement and school readiness gains in prekindergarten. Conclusion Child Development, 81, 1534-1549. DeBaryshe, B. D. (1993). Joint picture-book reading correlates Despite these limitations, this is one of the first studies to of early oral language skill. Journal of Child Language, 20, focus first on the influence of the age at which children were 455-461. first read to on the development of children’s linguistic Duncan, G. J., Claessens, A., Huston, A., Pagani, L., Engel, skills, and second on how this first reading is associated M., Sexton, H., . . . Duckworth, K. (2007). School readi- with later literacy experiences in the home. The findings ness and later achievement. Developmental Psychology, 43, 1428-1446. indicate that starting early can support the development of Duursma, E. (2014). Parental bookreading practices among fami- children’s language abilities and that the onset of shared lies in the Netherlands. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, reading seems to be a good and specific indicator of the 14, 435-458. overall HLE. Consequently, parents should be encouraged Edwards, C. M. (2014). Maternal literacy practices and toddler’s to start reading to their children when they are very young— emergent literacy skills. Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, the sooner, the better. 14, 53-79. Esser, G. (2002). BUEVA – Basisdiagnostik für umschriebene Declaration of Conflicting Interests Entwicklungsstörungen im Vorschulalter [BUEVA—Basic The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect diagnostics for developmental disorders at preschool age]. to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. Göttingen, Germany: Beltz. 10 SAGE Open Farrant, B. M., & Zubrick, S. R. (2012). 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Journal of Journal, 44, 419-427. Educational Psychology, 96, 265-282. Niklas et al. 11 Schmiedeler, S., Niklas, F., & Schneider, W. (2014). Symptoms Torppa, M., Tolvanen, A., Poikkeus, A. M., Eklund, K., Lerkkanen, of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and home M. K., Leskinen, E., & Lyytinen, H. (2007). Reading devel- learning environment (HLE): Findings from a longitudinal opment subtypes and their early characteristics. Annals of study. European Journal of Psychology of Education, 29(3), Dyslexia, 57, 3-32. 467-482. Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher Sénéchal, M., & LeFevre, J.-A. (2001). Storybook reading and par- psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University ent teaching: Links to language and literacy development. In P. Press. R. Britto & J. Brooks-Gunn (Eds.), The role of family literacy Wegener, B. (1988). Kritik des Prestiges [Criticism of the prestige]. environments in promoting young children’s emerging literacy Opladen, Germany: Westdeutscher Verlag. skills (pp. 39-52). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Whitehurst, G. J., & Lonigan, C. J. (1998). Child development and Sénéchal, M., & LeFevre, J.-A. (2002). Parental involvement in the emergent literacy. Child Development, 69, 848-872. development of children’s reading skill: A five-year longitudi- nal study. Child Development, 73, 445-460. Author Biographies Sénéchal, M., & LeFevre, J.-A. (2014). Continuity and change Frank Niklas is a developmental and educational psychologist at in the home literacy environment as predictors of growth in the University of Würzburg, Germany. He also has an honorary vocabulary and reading. Child Development, 85, 1552-1568. appointment at the University of Melbourne. He conducts research Sénéchal, M., LeFevre, J.-A., Hudson, E., & Lawseon, P. E. (1996). on the home learning environment, the development of children’s Knowledge of storybooks as a predictor of young children’s mathematical and literacy competencies, and children’s school vocabulary. Journal of Educational Psychology, 88, 520-536. readiness. Sénéchal, M., Pagan, S., Lever, R., & Ouellette, G. P. (2008). Caroline Cohrssen is a senior lecturer on the Master of Teaching Relations among the frequency of shared reading and 4-year-old (Early Childhood) at the University of Melbourne. Her research children’s vocabulary, morphological and syntax comprehen- interests include the influence of the home learning environment on sion, and narrative skills. Early Education and Development, children’s literacy and numeracy skills, children’s demonstrations 19, 27-44. of mathematical thinking and their implications for teaching and Sim, S., & Berthelsen, D. (2014). Shared book reading by parents learning in early childhood education, and teacher perceptions of with young children: Evidence-based practice. Australasian school readiness. Journal of Early Childhood, 39(1), 50-55. Stanovich, K. E. (1986). Matthew effects in reading: Some conse- Collette Tayler is professor at the University of Melbourne and quences of individual differences in the acquisition of literacy. holds the Chair in Early Childhood Education and Care in the Reading Research Quarterly, 21, 360-407. Melbourne Graduate School of Education. Collette’s work Torgesen, J. K. (2002). The prevention of reading difficulties. addresses program access and engagement; public and private Journal of School Psychology, 40, 7-26. investments; program standards and quality; the curriculum and Torppa, M., Poikkeus, A. M., Laakso, M. L., Eklund, K., & pedagogy applied in different services; leadership and staff devel- opment; child and family involvement and program outcomes. Her Lyytinen, H. (2006). Predicting delayed letter knowledge research seeks to explain both universal principles and contextual development and its relation to grade 1 reading achievement variations needed to provide exemplary care and education for among children with and without familial risk for dyslexia. young children. Developmental Psychology, 42, 1128-1142.

Journal

SAGE Open – SAGE

Published: Oct 1, 2016

Keywords: storybook reading; onset of reading to a child; home literacy environment (HLE); parent–child interactions; linguistic competencies

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