In Shenzhen, China, only 9% of middle-class families with an average monthly income of more than 30,000 in 1044 months accompany their children aged 0-3 to study once a day, which surprised Catherine Si Nuo, a tenured professor at the School of Education of Harvard University, an internationally renowned authoritative expert on children's language and reading development education, and former president of the American Education Association, and her research team. In English-speaking countries, even parents of low-income families have 50% guarantee to read at least once a day in the same type of research.

2065438+On April 23, 2006, Shenzhen launched the "Reading Germination Plan", a public welfare project for children aged 0-6 years, which was jointly sponsored by Shenzhen Love Reading Foundation and several government departments. It is the largest public welfare project of early reading education for preschool children and their families in the world.

For more than a year, the research team led by Professor Catherine Si Nuo, a postdoctoral researcher at Harvard University School of Education and a tenured professor at Chen Sihe, has been tracking and evaluating budding reading projects. The study found that the 0-3 stage budding reading program effectively improved the language development of preschool children, and significantly enhanced parents' understanding of high-quality early reading education.

2017165438+1October 18 at the scene of the first national summit on the development and education of children's early reading, "Early reading and a better future", Southern Weekend reporters talked with Professor Catherine Si Nuo and researcher Chen Si to discuss the latest findings of early reading research and its impact on China's early reading education curriculum and teacher training.

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Family parent-child reading may make up for class differences.

Southern Weekend: What kind of influence will family parent-child reading have on children?

Katherine Si Nuo: The development of children's reading and writing is a complicated social study. Children need to learn to read, develop their reading and writing abilities and integrate reading with knowledge activities through active interaction with adults. In this process, the reading environment of adults, especially parents and families, teachers and schools, is very important for children's development.

Chen Si: Through a lot of research, we found that there is a direct relationship between family parent-child reading and children's language development in the short term. Enriching the family reading environment has a positive role in promoting children's phonological awareness, vocabulary development, writing awareness and cognitive development. At the same time, in the long run, children enter the primary school stage, and family parent-child reading is helpful for children's rapid identification, reading comprehension, independent thinking and expression and future lifelong development.

Southern Weekend: Is there any data showing how big this influence is?

Chen Si: In the latest educational intervention experiment, we found that the independent contribution of family parent-child reading to children's in-depth reading comprehension and vocabulary development exceeded 20%.

Southern Weekend: Independent Contribution of 20%?

Chen Si: In American studies, the difference between children from middle-class families and low-income families is about 33%. Family parent-child reading can independently contribute 20% of the difference, that is to say, 20% of the difference caused by social and economic status can be made up by family parent-child reading.

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Only 9% parents study with their children every day.

Southern Weekend: How did you get your sample?

Chen Si: The research group collected data from more than 20 early education institutions and kindergartens in Shenzhen 1044 families of children aged 0-3. The average age of these children is about 32 months, the average number of adults in the family is 3.29, and the average monthly income of the family is about 30 thousand yuan. In the sample, 64% mothers have a bachelor's degree or above.

Southern Weekend: This should represent the high education and high income of typical middle-class families in big cities in China, right?

Chen Si: It is generally believed that the average income of families attending early education institutions will be higher, so we consciously invite parents of low-and middle-income families, especially those in Guangming District and Longgang District, to hold a lecture at Foxconn. After the lecture, parents will be sent a questionnaire survey QR code to recruit additional parents. But in practice, the actual income level of most families who are willing to participate in and answer the questionnaire is still relatively high.

Southern Weekend: Is this a biased conclusion?

Chen Si: It should be noted that because the family income level is completely reported by parents themselves, some parents will be unwilling to report their family income, which will eventually become the missing value of the study and will not be included in the calculation of average income, so the final result may be biased.

Southern Weekend: How long is the cycle of the whole survey?

Chen Si: The design research started in July, 20 15, and officially started in May, 20 16. With the pre-test of the first phase of the bud reading program, we are still tracking the development and changes of the project, and it will take another year to complete.

Southern Weekend: What is the sample data?

Chen Si: According to the data reported by parents of these families, each family has an average of 47.3 Chinese picture books and 10.9 English picture books. Only 9% parents can read books with their children every day, and only 8% families can read books 2-6 times a week. These figures shocked us. In the same kind of research in English-speaking countries, even parents of low-income families guarantee to accompany their children to study every day, accounting for 50%.

Southern Weekend: Why is it so low?

Chen Si: It's really lower than we expected. The possible reason is that parents think that children aged 0-3 are still relatively young, and often they will not consciously cultivate their reading habits until they go to kindergarten. In addition, most children of this age are brought up by grandparents, and their parents are busy with work, so they really don't have time to sit down and read picture books with their children.

"budding reading plan": an intervention experiment of parents' significant changes

Southern Weekend: How to change this situation in research and design?

Chen Si: With the help of the largest known Chinese reading education intervention project "Bud Reading Plan", parents are provided with educational support through Bud Reading Package, online resource APP and free offline activities.

Southern Weekend: How to do it?

Chen Si: The reading package includes: two age-appropriate picture books, a picture guide for 60 kinds of books, a guide manual for early reading in stages, and an invitation letter to the library city, so that parents can know what resources are available in the surrounding communities. With APP, parents can get more electronic picture book resources, attend classes online, and socialize and interact with other parents. Offline activities allow parents to participate in lectures, picture book sharing and exchange activities, and explore parent-child reading concepts and better practice methods more intuitively.

Southern Weekend: What are the challenges in the research? How to overcome it?

Chen Si: There are two, how to establish a reliable causal relationship and how to accurately measure the changes in parents' ideas. In this regard, we have done three things. First of all, we conducted a baseline test from May to June in 2065438+2006, and distributed questionnaires to all parents, including the basic situation of the family, parents' ideas and children's vocabulary development test fed back by parents. After the end of the baseline test, from July 2065438 to July 2006, we randomly selected half of the parents to call them to tell them the bud reading plan, and then observed which parents would receive the bud reading package. Finally, we conducted a post-test, a post-test questionnaire and an investigation experiment in June 20 17 to observe the changes of parents' ideas and the development of children's vocabulary. After all these are completed, model fitting and data analysis are carried out.

Southern Weekend: The first test is 6 months. Why choose this time span?

Chen Si: Half a year is a very important period in language development. It can be observed that children have obvious changes, and I hope to make a thorough investigation three times a year, so the span of half a year is ideal.

Southern Weekend: What changes did the post-test find?

Chen Si: Compared with the children who didn't participate in the budding reading program, the vocabulary development of the children who participated in the budding reading program has made obvious progress. Through the bud reading program, parents have also gained an understanding of high-quality parent-child reading education: they generally agree that more picture books should be provided for children, there should be better parent-child interaction when reading, and they think that reading should be increased at the same time.

Catherine Si Nuo: An interesting discovery is the change of parents' attitude. Previous survey results show that it is difficult for parents to change their concept of parenting. However, in our survey, many parents have changed their educational concept, and it is in a positive direction. We are encouraged by this. Another possibility is that parents who participate in our research have the will to study with their children, but they have no practical ability. He wanted to know, so he came.

Southern Weekend: How do teachers in kindergartens or early education institutions participate in early reading?

Catherine Si Nuo: Increasing the frequency of communication and the number of conversations between adults and children, as well as more imaginative in-depth dialogue, can give children more support and development. In the kindergarten environment, children and teachers can read together, such as reading picture books, role-playing or in-depth conversation, which can help children develop their language and literacy skills.

Southern Weekend: It seems that some training should also be organized for parents?

Katherine Si Nuo: Books with no words or few words really need parents to learn more specific skills to understand how the story develops. Parents should be able to guide their children to pay attention to certain details, such as getting to the key points of the story, asking their children the core information, asking their children what will happen next, and making some predictions and guesses. Parents often think that reading picture books is the process of children learning vocabulary. In fact, this is only a small part. The real function of picture books is to let children learn more knowledge and understand topics that cannot be touched in daily life. Therefore, the focus of picture book learning is that adults need to participate in it and provide more opportunities for children to discuss and communicate.

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The lower the anxiety level of parents, the better the language development of children.

Southern Weekend: Many parents in China show competitive anxiety about education. Is this what we are studying?

Chen Si: Yes, we found that the less anxious parents are, the better their children's language development, especially expressive language. The more anxious the mother is, the less opportunities the child has to speak, and the development of the child's expressive language will be hindered.

Katherine Si Nuo: It is no accident that supportive mothers (that is, non-interfering mothers) will have better language expression and narrative skills. Mother's anxiety will have a negative impact on parent-child relationship and children's development. Of course, at present, only the correlation between the two has been found, not the causal connection, and we don't want this result to make them more anxious.

Southern Weekend: Any good advice for anxious parents?

Catherine Si Nuo: If you think raising children is not fun, you'd better not do it. Just ask the mothers to calm down. Chronic anxiety may be a source of stress for their children. The more relaxed a mother may be, the more she can think from the child's point of view. Many parents are anxious about how much knowledge their children have mastered when they are 5 or 6 years old, but parents should also think about whether their children are still interested in learning and curious about the world when they are 20 or 30 years old, and whether they are willing to try new things with a positive attitude. Compared with five or six-year-old children, they can speak three languages and two musical instruments, which is the most important thing.

Southern Weekend: Is there a cultural difference in educational anxiety?

Katherine Si Nuo: In the Asian cultural circle, parents have a stronger sense of authority and pay more attention to education, so their anxiety will be more serious, including Japanese and Korean parents. As for China's parents, my guess is that China's one-child policy in the first few decades will make them feel that they can't fail, which will bring greater parenting pressure.

American experience: social forces help early education

Southern Weekend: Recently, a speech by Professor Roscoe of Stanford University caused a heated discussion in China. He pointed out that 0-3 years old is a critical period for children's IQ development. Do you agree? Is there a critical period for language learning?

Katherine Si Nuo: At the age of 0-3, children can really learn a lot, including language, social knowledge and problem-solving ability, so this is recognized as a very important stage. Unfortunately, many people interpret it as that if a child has not acquired the corresponding knowledge at the age of 3, he will fall behind all his life and even have no chance to learn to catch up. This statement is wrong. This is an important stage, but it is not an absolute critical period. It doesn't mean that there will be no other development opportunities if you miss this period of time.

Southern Weekend: What is the current situation of early reading in the United States?

Katherine Si Nuo: In the United States, the level of early reading practice is much higher. Through 20 years' practice, many people have realized the importance of this problem. Parents of different social classes have different attitudes towards morning reading. In some Hispanic families, the methods and strategies for parents and children to read together are relatively simple and low-level. Therefore, the challenge facing the United States now is how to design programs for people of different social classes to help them achieve the ideal early reading effect.

Southern Weekend: How did the United States change the early reading concept of the whole society in 20 years?

Catherine Si Nuo: Besides parents' active practice, social support is also very important. In the United States, many social organizations and public libraries will provide opportunities to send books and stickers to children to encourage them to read. For example, the public library in Boston has always had a reading plan called "1000 books", which encourages children to read 1000 picture books before they go to primary school at the age of 6. I think this is something China society can learn from. Early reading is not only the responsibility of parents and teachers, but also the support of social forces.

Chen Si: Compared with other cities, Shenzhen's budding reading program has made great progress. Starting from 60 copies, there may be 600 copies in the future, 1000 copies. We also hope that this project can be extended to a wider rural area in the future.

Southern Weekend: Indeed, there are a large number of left-behind children in China, and most of them do not have the objective conditions for family parents to read. How to solve this? Can other research conducted in developing countries be used for reference?

Katherine Si Nuo: There have been explorations in academic circles, such as holding group activities, inviting parents of rural children to public libraries on holidays, and accompanying their children to participate in group reading. The situation in Chile is similar to that in China-parents from low-income groups rarely have the habit of accompanying their children to study. In this case, we try to invite parents to school to make picture books with children, describe some small things in life, write and draw pictures, and make picture books. We find that parents who are usually short of resources and rarely have the opportunity to know how to accompany their children to study are highly motivated. What they do in this environment will set a good example for their children.