Improving Narrative Quality for Chinese-English and Spanish-English Dual Language Learners in Head Start Programs

• In Event: English Language Learners and Literacy Proficiencies

Abstract

One third of American children ages between zero and five are DLLs (Giang & Park, 2022) who study two or more languages concurrently (Chung et al., 2019). Narratives are precursors of later literacy skills and are empowering learning tools allowing children to retell, summarize, and paraphrase (Kao, 2014). In support of improving young DLLs’ narratives, this study compared the advanced quality English narratives from 12 Chinese-English and 13 Spanish-English DLLs and less advanced quality narratives from 17 Chinese-English and 13 Spanish-English DLLs. The two groups differed in syntactic complexity, character delineation, direct and indirect quotes, and character emotions and intentions. Recommendations for supporting DLL needs will be discussed.

Author

• Mayu Lindblad, University of California - Davis