Relationship between Parental Literacy Beliefs and Home Literacy Environment

Abstract

Parental literacy beliefs and home environment play an important role in stimulating children's literacy development. Parents who believe that children’s literacy development is highly dependent on them will be more likely to spend more time to create an atmosphere of literacy with their children. The main purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between parental literacy beliefs and home literacy environment. This study was conducted in Sungai Pelek, Selangor. Findings of this quantitative methods strategy study were based on data collected from 240 parents of KEMAS preschool children aged between five and six years. Data was collected with the aid of electronic questionnaire via Google Form. The Parental Reading Belief Inventory (PRBI) was used to measure parental literacy beliefs and the Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (HOME) was used to measure the home literacy environment. The results showed that the parental 's literacy beliefs have a significant relationship with the home literacy environment. It showed weak correlation between parental literacy beliefs and home literacy environment. In conclusion, the literacy environment at home is not highly dependent on parents’ belief in the important of literacy. It is recommended for future research can be expanded in various states in Malaysia with a larger sample size to increase generalization and produce more reliable data. Furthermore, it is recommended for future research to take into account of the predictive factors in children literacy development research.