4. Literacy practices and language ideologies of first generation Mexican immigrant parents

Abstract

Despite a well-established body of literature focusing on school-based Spanish and English bilingualism of Latino children in the United States, the biliteracy development and literacy practices at home have received little attention by the educational research community. This article presents the perspectives of first generation Mexican parents on the development of their children’s bilingualism and biliteracy practices at home and how these impact their development at school. The study takes a qualitative approach to the study of Mexican families living in southern Arizona through interviews conducted with the children’s parents and the teacher of their children. The goal of the study is to identify language practices and patterns of language use that directly or indirectly influence children’s development of language and literacy in Spanish and English. In addition, the study describes parents’ attitudes toward native language maintenance, bilingualism and biliteracy development from a sociocultural perspective. The findings are discussed with implications of what teachers and other educators can learn from these families in order to integrate this knowledge to children’s classroom experiences.