Chinese children's experiences of biliteracy learning in Scotland

Abstract

This thesis explores the experiences of Chinese children acquiring literacy in both Chinese and English in Scotland. A three-dimensional research design is adopted in order to take into account the influential domains where children are exposed to literacy learning. First, it investigates the attitudes and approaches to literacy learning in fourteen Chinese homes, with evidence gathered from semi-structured interviews with parents. Second, observations of and conversations with children and Chinese teachers in a Chinese complementary school in the central belt of Scotland provide insights into the approaches to teaching and learning Chinese literacy. Third, miscue analysis of reading and thinking aloud protocols are conducted in mainstream schools with six Chinese boys, aged eight to nine years, in order to analyse in depth the reading strategies deployed by children in their attempts to gain meaning from both Chinese and English texts. The findings reveal that Chinese parents provide a rich learning environment where children consolidate and in some cases extend the literacy learning experiences gained in the complementary Chinese school. What also emerges from the research is that while the children in the study have a great deal of metalinguistic and metacognitive knowledge gained from learning diverse writing systems, this knowledge is not recognised within policy or practice in mainstream schools. Finally, Hornberger’s Continua of Biliteracy are used as a model both in order to analyse the mosaic of qualitative data generated during the research process and to provide a framework for a discussion of educational policy and practice in multilingual Scotland.

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