“You Can’t be Rich Only Doing Good Deeds”: Bilingual Kindergarteners’ Discussions About Poverty and Wealth

Abstract

This interdisciplinary study explores the intersection of economic equality, bilingual discussion, and early literacy instruction by examining Korean kindergarteners’ discussions about poverty and wealth during read-alouds. As part of a larger qualitative study, the current study was conducted in a kindergarten classroom at the Korean Language School, in the midwest of the United States. The study focused on Korean–English bilingual children’s read-alouds of picture books that dealt with poverty and wealth issues. The data were collected across four months through multiple sources, including audio/video recordings, open-ended interviews, children’s artifacts, and observational field notes. The findings suggest that bilingual discussions about children’s books on poverty and human equality in early-childhood classrooms are a medium to help children develop critical perspectives about poverty, wealth, and economic equality from an early age.