Reading To Young Children: A Head-Start In Life

Reading to Young Children: A Head-Start in LifeThe research sets out to explore the connections between parentsreading to their young children and their child’s later reading andother cognitive skills.Key FindingsThe frequency of reading to children at a young age has a direct causal effect on theirschooling outcomes regardless of their family background and home environment. Reading to children at age 4-5 every day has a significant positive effect on their readingskills and cognitive skills (i.e., language and literacy, numeracy and cognition) later in life.o Reading to children 3-5 days per week (compared to 2 or less) has the same effect onthe child’s reading skills at age 4-5 as being six months older.o Reading to them 6-7 days per week has the same effect as being almost 12 monthsolder. Children read to more frequently at age 4-5 achieve higher scores on the NationalAssessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) tests for both Reading andNumeracy in Year 3 (age 8 to 9). These differences in reading and cognitive skills are not related to the child’s familybackground or home environment but are the direct result of how frequently they havebeen read to prior to starting school.This research is a result of a partnership arrangement between the Department of Education and EarlyChildhood Development and the Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research.1

IntroductionCognitive skills of young children are an importantfactor in explaining success later-on in life. Skillattainment at one stage of the life cycle raises skillattainment at later stages of the life cycle (Cunha etal., 2006). Cognitive ability affects the likelihood ofacquiring higher education and advanced training,and the economic returns in terms of wages andquality of jobs (Heckman & Masterov, 2007; Cunhaet al., 2006).Cognitive skills are not fixed but can be influencedthrough investment in preschool training, educationin school, and significantly, parental efforts. Themost effective period for cognitive skill investmentby parents is early on in the life of their children(Cunha et al., 2006). Previous studies have found apositive association of parents reading to theirchildren and the child’s subsequent reading skills,language skills and cognitive development. Childrenwho are read to more frequently at an early ageenter school with larger vocabularies and moreadvanced comprehension skills (Mol & Bus, 2011).Research has found that reading storybooks tochildren is one of the most important activities fordeveloping the knowledge required for eventualsuccess in reading. Reading to pre-schoolers hasbeen found to be related to language growth,emergent literacy and reading achievement. (Bus etal., 1995). In addition, reading to children alsostimulates them to read books themselves andfurther develop their cognitive skills (Canoy et al.,2006).This study examines the effect of parental readingto children early in life on the child’s own readingand other cognitive skills. The research approachand analysis controls for a wide range of child,parent, household and childcare characteristics.The study focuses on parents’ reading to children at4 years of age and the subsequent development ofvery early reading skills (at age 4-5). This focus onearly reading skills is relevant since early remedialor stimulating activities may be important for laterreading skills/proficiency. In addition to readingskills at age 4-5, reading skills at later ages (up toage 10-11) are also examined. At most ages, morethan one reading skill measure is observed, whichallows for checking the consistency of results whenusing different measures.The literature on the association between readingto children and developmental outcomes is quiteextensive. The results all point in the samedirection: there is a strong association betweenreading to children and developmental outcomes.However, there is only scant evidence on whetherthis can be interpreted as a causal effect. This studyundertakes a number of analyses using economicand statistical methodology to investigate thisquestion in detail.MethodsThe analysis in this study used the LongitudinalStudy of Australian Children (LSAC) Child Cohort,and followed a group of over 4000 children whowere aged 4-5 years in 2004 through to age 10 to11. LSAC includes a wide range of informationrelating to the child’s family environment, earlychildhood and schooling experiences, and physical,socio-emotional and learning outcomes.This study considered the influence of thefrequency of reading to children at age 4-5 in termsof their current and future performance onmeasures relating to: Reading skills – children were rated by theirparents, and carers or teachers in terms oftheir reading skill levels. Different measuresare used at different ages: e.g. at age 4 anindex ranging from 0 to 3 is used - 0 equatesto low skill (cannot read yet) and 3 equates tohigh skill (can read complex words and simplesentences). Language skills – the Peabody PictureVocabulary Test was used to assess the child’slanguage skills. National Assessment Program – Literacy andNumeracy (NAPLAN) – the child’s scores inYear 3 NAPLAN (age 8-9) were also included. Other cognitive measures that supportlearning – these measures change with ageranging from measures of school readiness atage 4-5 through to teacher ratings of thechild’s approach to learning up to the age of11. Non-cognitive measures relating to physicaland socio-emotional outcomes.2

The data analysis was split into two phases:i) descriptive analysis – examining the patternsin the raw data, andii) multivariate analysis – to remove theinfluence of family and householdcharacteristics, which are correlated with thefrequency of reading to children, in order toreveal the causal effect of the frequency ofreading to children at age 4-5 on their futureabilities in the skills shown above. Thisestimation of causal effects exploits theexistence of factors that influence learningoutcomes only through their impact onwhether children were read to or not.The data also show that girls do slightly better thanboys independent of the frequency that they arebeing read to. This pattern is evident across allmeasures in the LSAC with girls doing better thanboys in all language-related skills.Figure 2: Reading skill by intensity with which children are being readto at age 4-5 (boys and girls) – Teachers scoreDescriptive AnalysisRelationship between reading to children andreading skills of the childThe raw data used in the descriptive analysisindicate a clear association between reading tochildren more frequently and higher early readingscores. As seen in Figures 1 and 2, children who areread to more frequently have higher reading skillsas measured by parents and teachers at age 4-5.Figure 1: Reading skill by intensity with which children are being readto at age 4-5 (boys and girls) – Parental scoreFor another example of this association, see theskills of girls and boys at age 8-9, as measured bythe NAPLAN reading tests. Figure 3 shows thatgirls who are read to more frequently are morelikely to score high on the NAPLAN reading test(i.e., the curve in the graph shifts to the right).Similarly, Figure 4 shows that boys who are readto more frequently are also more likely to scorehigh on the NAPLAN reading test.Figure 3: NAPLAN reading skill by intensity with which the child isbeing read to at age 4-5 – Girls at age 8-9Parents and teachers were asked about the child’sreading ability. Their responses were converted to ascale between 0 and 3 where:(0) could not read yet(1) could read simple words(2) could do two out of the three skills listed under(3)(3) could read all of simple words, complex words,simple sentences.3

Figure 4: NAPLAN reading skill by intensity with which the child isbeing read to at age 4-5 – Boys at age 8-9Figure 6: Cognitive skills (e.g., language and literacy, numeracy andcognition) by intensity with which girls are being read to at age 4-5– Skills at age 8-93The results also show a similar association fornumeracy skills. Girls and boys who are read tomore frequently are more likely to score high onthe NAPLAN numeracy tests, however theseeffects are smaller compared to the effects onthe NAPLAN reading tests.Relationship between reading to children andcognitive skills of the childThe raw data also show patterns indicating aclear association between reading to childrenmore frequently and higher cognitive skills at age8-9. Figures 5 and 6, presented below, show ashift to the right of the probability line as thefrequency of reading for both girls and boysincreases.Taken together, Figures 1 to 6 show that there isa clear association between reading to childrenat a young age, and the level of reading andother skills that these children develop over thefollowing years.Figure 5: Cognitive skills (e.g., language and literacy, numeracy andcognition) by intensity with which boys are being read to at age 45 – Skills at age 8-9Multivariate AnalysisFactors affecting frequency of reading tochildrenThe multivariate data analysis controls for theinfluence of family and household characteristics(such as the number of TVs in the home, theeducation level, age and income of the parents,number of siblings, and the primary languagespoken) in order to explore the effect of thefrequency of reading to children at age 4-5 ontheir future cognitive skills.For girls and boys, some similarities in resultswere found including: that the child is read toless when the child is older, there are more TVs inthe home, more TV is watched on weekdays, andthere are more siblings. The child is read to morewhen there are more books in the home and theeducation of either parent is higher.Factors influencing reading skills of childrenReading skills of boys are better, for example, whenthe child is older (within the 4-5 age range) and anon-English language is spoken at home. Broadlysimilar results are observed for girls.Although the education of the parent has no effect(or a small effect opposite to what is expected) onreading skill at age 4-5, positive effects of parentaleducation are estimated for later reading and otherskills.Effect of reading to childrenThe results confirm the strong association betweenreading to children and their own early reading4