Measuring Preschool Children’s Engagement Behaviors During Classroom Shared Reading: Construct and Concurrent Validity of the Shared Reading Engagement Rating Scale

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Publication year

2023

study description

Factor Analysis

core topic(s)

Early Literacy , Shared Reading

Population Characteristics

Toddler/Preschool , Urban

Exposures, Outcomes, Other

Language and Literacy Development , Parent Behaviors and Skills , School Readiness and Educational Outcomes , Screening and Tools , Validity, Reliability, Feasibility, and Acceptability

metric(s)

Woodcock Johnson Tests (WJ)

additional materials

Son_2023_table

objectives

We examined the construct and concurrent validity of the Shared Reading Engagement Rating Scale with Head Start children.

exposure

Shared Reading Engagement Rating Scale

outcomes evaluated

Construct and concurrent validity

setting

Participants in this study were 263 three- and four-year-old children (mean age = 49 months, SD = 6.86) enrolled in 21 preschool classrooms housed in three head start (HS) sites in urban settings in the Mountain West region.

methods

In this study, we examined the Shared Reading Engagement Rating Scale, a measure of young children's engagement in classroom shared reading, and tested its validity using data collected from Head Start children (n = 263). We conducted explorative factor analysis and identified two factors, active and interactive engagement.

sample size

n=263 (children)

measures

• Measure of Engagement in Classroom Shared Reading: teacher report of behaviors indicating interest and involvement in reading aloud and related discission using the 21 item Shared Reading Engagement Scale (SRERS) reflecting physical involvement, cognitive behaviors, and emotional behaviors.
• Measure of Literacy Engagement: parent and teacher completion of separate surveys on home and classroom literacy activities, respectively, including reading, writing, learning letters and words.
• Measure of Child-Reported Literacy Engagement: 6-item survey with pictures administered via one-on-one interview with the child about literacy enjoyment and literacy behavior.
• Measure of Early Literacy Skills: skills assessed include letter-word identification, picture vocabulary, sound awareness using the Woodcock-Johnson Tests of Achievement III (WJ-III). Print awareness was also assessed using the preschool word and print awareness measure (PWPA).
• Measure of Covariates: covariates considered included child gender, home language, age of child, classroom nesting, Head Start site, regression analysis of spring literacy skills.

results

Confirmatory factor analysis validated the proposed constructs of children's shared reading engagement. Multilevel simultaneous modeling showed that children's interactive engagement (not active engagement) significantly predicted early literacy skills in letter-word identification, picture vocabulary, sound awareness, and print awareness.

conclusions

The levels of shared reading engagement and their predictability of early literacy did not differ by children's gender or their home language.

limitations

While measures of multiple approaches were utilized, including teacher-reported, parent-reported, and child-reported surveys, no observation measures of children's reading engagement were collected due to our focus on comparing SRERS to brief survey measures...The brief survey measures of literacy engagement consider engagement in various literacy activities, not just in shared book reading as SRERS does. Although shared book reading is one of the most prominent literacy activities, young children may show different levels of engagement for various types of literacy activities, such as reading versus writing (Zhang & Quinn, 2020). The different target activities in SRERS versus brief survey measures could have contributed to the current results of moderate correlations...The current sample of HS children might influence the findings. Most participants were children from low-income families and from various socio-cultural backgrounds. Participants may have different cultural expectations and experiences related to shared reading (Phillips & Lonigan, 2009)...Finally, SRERS mainly focuses on children's engagement behaviors, but not on teachers’ behaviors. The current study is based on the previous findings that child engagement is represented as more of stable behavioral characteristics of children rather than context-dependent behavioral features governed by the quality of a reader (i.e., teacher practices) or a reading context (i.e., classroom environments) (Kaderavek et al., 2014). Yet, teachers play an essential role in determining the quality of language and reading environments and instruction (Justice et al., 2008), which may affect the development of shared reading engagement (Finn & Zimmer, 2012). Teacher practices and classroom environments can be possible contributors to children's shared reading engagement.