• Children’s home environments are important contexts to understand, as they contribute to children’s academic outcomes (Tamis-LeMonda et al., 2017).

• Parent beliefs and attitudes about literacy and mathematics relate to how parents structure children’s home learning environments (LeFevre et al., 2002; Sonnenschein et al., 2012).

• Individuals’ positive attitudes about learning activities are linked to greater engagement in these activities (Shapiro & Whitney, 1997) and negative attitudes are linked to avoidance (Hembree, 1990).o This is likely true of parent enjoyment of academic subjects and activities

and the learning activities they choose to engage in with their children at home.

• However, parent enjoyment of literacy and mathematics has only been studied as a component of broader attitudes and behaviors related to these subjects (DeBaryshe, 1995; Skwarchuk et al., 2014; Weigel et al., 2016).

• Independent links between parent enjoyment of academic subjects and children’s home literacy environment (HLE) and home numeracy environment (HNE) has not previously been examined.

• Hypothesis: There are independent associations between parent enjoyment of reading and mathematics activities and engagement in these respective activities with their children at home.

Parent Enjoyment of Mathematics and Reading and Preschoolers’ Home Learning EnvironmentsJoyce Lin, Ph.D.1, Amy R. Napoli, Ph.D.2, Sara A. Schmitt, Ph.D.1, & David J. Purpura, Ph.D.1

1Purdue University; 2University of Nebraska-LincolnContact: Lin947@purdue.edu

SampleParents (n = 120) were recruited from 12 preschools.• Parents

o 84.2% mothers, 15.0% fathers, 0.8% grandparentso 36.6% < Bachelor’s, 21.7% Bachelor’s, 41.6% Master’s or higher

• Preschoolerso 46.7% femaleo 70.0% White, 3.3% Black, 3.3% Hispanic, 8.3% Asian, 12.5% multiracial,

2.5% othero Age: 3.01 to 5.17 years old (M = 4.10; SD = 0.58)

Measures• Home learning environments: frequency of parent-child engagement in

learning activities; 5-point scale (0 = “never”, 5 = “every day”); separate averages for four HLE and eight HNE items (see Table 1)

• Parent beliefs and attitudes about literacy and mathematics: strength of agreement with beliefs and attitudes about learning activities; 5-point scale (1 = “strongly disagree”, 5 = “strongly agree”)

1. Enjoyment- I find reading/mathematics activities enjoyable.2. Parent skill- When I was in school, I was good at language arts

activities such as reading/mathematics.3. Importance- It is important for my child to be read to/exposed to math

concepts every day.

Introduction

Methods

Table 1. HLE and HNE items• The current study examined the independent contribution of parent enjoyment

of academic subjects on children’s home learning environments.• Parent enjoyment of reading was uniquely related to the HLE.

o This is true even when accounting for parent beliefs regarding the importance of reading and how good they were at language arts growing up.

• Parent enjoyment of math was not related to the HNE.o Frequency of HNE activities was considerably lower and there may not

have been enough variability to detect differences in the HNE based on enjoyment of mathematics.

• Results offer a better understanding of the predictors of children’s home learning environments.

• There is a need to parse apart the role of specific attitudes regarding learning activities. o Certain attitudes may be driving the relation between composite measures

of attitudes and children’s home environments. o It is also likely that some attitudes are more strongly associated with

children’s HLE and HNE than others.

Results (cont.)Methods (cont.)

ResultsDiscussion

Reading Matht p d

M SD M SD

Enjoyment 4.28 0.88 3.60 1.21 t(119) = 5.19 < .001 0.48

Parent skill 4.08 0.95 3.77 1.18 t(119) = 2.14 .034 0.20

Importance 4.71 0.47 4.32 0.74 t(119) = 6.11 < .001 0.59

Frequency of learning activities 3.24 0.86 2.28 0.76 t(119) = 14.18 < .001 1.31

Analytic PlanSeparate multiple regressions were used to examine the role of parent enjoyment of reading on the HLE and parent enjoyment of mathematics on the HNE.• Controls:

o Whether parents felt they were good at the subject when they were in school and whether parents thought it was important for their child to be exposed to these activities every day

o Parent education, relationship to child, working from home, living with partnero Child gender, race/ethnicity, ageo Number of children in the home

• Follow-up supplementary analyses conducted for individual HLE and HNE items

# of items α Items

HLE 4 .66 reading storybooks, printing letters, identifying printed letters, identifying letter sounds

HNE 8 .73counting objects, identifying printed numbers, counting down, learning simple arithmetic, printing numbers, using number activity books, reading number storybooks, using terms “more than” and “less than”

HLE HNE

β SE β SE

Enjoyment 0.23* 0.10 0.09 0.08

Child is female -0.18* 0.15 -0.18* 0.15

Child age 0.39*** 0.13 0.32** 0.13

R2 0.31 0.18

Observations 120 120

Table 2. Distributions and comparisons of parents’ literacy and mathematics beliefs and attitudes, and activity engagement

Table 3. Factors associated with the HLE and HNE

• As compared to mathematics, parents reported enjoying reading more, thinking that it was more important to do with children everyday, being better at it when they were in school, and engaging children in it more (see Table 2).

• Regressions indicated that parents’ enjoyment of reading significantly predicted the HLE, but enjoyment of math did not predict the HNE (see Table 3).

• At the item level, parent enjoyment of reading significantly predicted the frequency of engaging their child in identifying letters of the alphabet, β = .22, p = .028, R2 = .34, F(16,103) = 3.25.o This was not the case for other HLE items or any HNE items.

Note. Only significant independent variables displayed; * p < .05; ** p < .01; *** p < .001

DeBaryshe, B. D. (1995). Maternal belief systems: Linchpin in the home reading process. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 16, 1–20. https://doi.org/10.1016/0193-3973(95)90013-6

Hembree, R. (1990). The nature, effects, and relief of mathematics anxiety. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 21, 33–46. https://doi.org/10.2307/749455

LeFevre, J. A., Clarke, T., & Stringer, A. P. (2002). Influences of language and parental involvement on the development of counting skills: Comparisons of French- and English-speaking Canadian children. Early Child Development and Care, 172, 283–300. https://doi.org/10.1080/03004430212127

Shapiro, J., & Whitney, P. (1997). Factors involved in the leisure reading of upper elementary school students. Reading Psychology, 18, 343–370. https://doi.org/10.1080/0270271970180402

Skwarchuk, S. L., Sowinski, C., & LeFevre, J. A. (2014). Formal and informal home learning activities in relation to children’s early numeracy and literacy skills: The development of a home numeracy model. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 121, 63–84. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2013.11.006

Sonnenschein, S., Galindo, C., Metzger, S. R., Thompson, J. A., Huang, H. C., & Lewis, H. (2012). Parents’ beliefs about children’s math development and children’s participation in math activities. https://doi.org/10.1155/2012/851657

Tamis-LeMonda, C. S., Luo, R., McFadden, K. E., Bandel, E. T., & Vallotton, C. (2017). Early home learning environment predicts children’s 5th grade academic skills. Applied Developmental Science, 1-17. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888691.2017.1345634

Weigel, D. J., Martin, S. S., & Bennett, K. K. (2006). Contributions of the home literacy environment to preschool‐aged children’s emerging literacy and language skills. Early Child Development and Care, 176, 357–378. https://doi.org/10.1080/03004430500063747

References