1. Effects of a Parent Coaching Program on Numeracy Guidance on Young Children’s Early Numeracy and Literacy Skills Sum Kwing CHEUNG, Hong Kong Baptist University Katrina May DULAY, The Chinese University of Hong Kong Catherine MCBRIDE, The Chinese University of Hong Kong 5th Annual International Research-to-Practice Conference «Early Childhood Care and Education»

2. Background Before entering formal schooling, children from low- income families are at-risk of poorer numeracy competence (Jordan, Kaplan, Oláh, & Locuniak, 2006). This happens somehow because … (Ramani, Rowe, Eason, & Leech, 2015; Starkey & Klein, 2008) ~ their home environment is usually less conducive to early numeracy learning; ~ their parents are not always competent in fostering their number sense. How to help these children from low-income families? => Provide coaching to their parents on numeracy guidance?!

3. Presentation Outline Literature Review The Present Study Method Results Discussion

4. Literature Review

5. Importance of home numeracy experiences Past research studies (Levine, Suriyakham, Rowe, Huttenlocher, & Gunderson, 2010; Skwarchuk, Sowinski, & LeFevre, 2015) had shown that there were positive relations between … Young children’s engagement in formal home numeracy activities Young children’s symbolic number knowledge & Parents’ talk about counting and labeling of the number of objects Young children’s knowledge of cardinality & Young children’s engagement in informal home numeracy activities Young children’s competence in solving non-symbolic arithmetic problems &

6. Literature Review Direct benefits of parent coaching programs on numeracy guidance Vandermaas-Peeler, Ferretti, and Loving (2012) found that … Cheung (2013) found that … Provided training to parents on how to play number board games with kindergarten children Young children’s number sense  over a 4-week intervention period Taught parents the numeracy elements that could be introduced in a board game Parents’ guidance on children’s basic & relatively more complex numeracy skills during the game 

7. Literature Review Direct benefits of parent coaching programs on numeracy guidance Starkey and Klein (2000) found that … Indirect benefits of parent coaching programs on numeracy guidance Dulay, Cheung, & McBride (2015) found that … Provided parents with math kits & trained them on how to promote children’s math learning Children’s math competence  over a 4-month intervention period Provided training to parents on how to promote children’s number sense via card games Parents’ general parental self-efficacy, positive parenting & positive affect towards children  over a 10-week intervention period

8. The Present Study

9. Research Question 1 Can coaching parents of low SES on numeracy guidance promote their young children’s early numeracy skills? Research Question 2 Can coaching parents of low SES on numeracy guidance promote their young children’s early literacy skills?

10. The Present Study Participating Parents Received coaching on numeracy guidance Received coaching on dialogic reading Received no coaching

11. The Present Study Hypotheses As compared to children whose parents received coaching on dialogic reading or no coaching, children whose parents received coaching on numeracy guidance would have higher post-test scores on the following tasks: Numeral identification Object counting Rote counting Numerical magnitude comparison Identification of missing numbers in number sequences

12. The Present Study Hypotheses As compared to children whose parents received no coaching, children whose parents received coaching on numeracy guidance and dialogic reading would have higher post-test scores on the following tasks: As compared to children whose parents received coaching on numeracy guidance and no coaching, children whose parents received coaching on dialogic reading would have higher post-test scores on the following task: Receptive vocabulary Expressive vocabulary not related to the books read Expressive vocabulary related to the books read

13. Method

14. Participants 428 three- to five-year-old children and their parents Recruited from low-income communities in Cebu City, the Philippines Of the children … ~ 225 were boys, 203 were girls ~ 168 aged three, 154 aged four, 106 aged five at pre-test (Mean = 51.11 months, SD = 10.10 months) Of the parents … ~ 155 received coaching on numeracy guidance, 119 received coaching on dialogic reading, 154 received no coaching

15. Method Measures – Children’s early numeracy skills Numeral identification (20 items) Rote counting (4 items) Numerical magnitude comparison (10 items) Object counting (14 items) Missing number (12 items) Can you count forward from 8 to 17?

16. Method Measures – Children’s early literacy skills Receptive vocabulary (20 items) Expressive vocabulary not related to the books read (10 items) Expressive vocabulary related to the books read (10 items) Put your finger on the picture “cat”. Could you help me to name this picture (e.g. bus) in Cebuano please? Could you name the thing (e.g., tomato) that I point to in Cebuano please?

17. Method Procedures Sought consent from parents Tested children individually on numeracy & literacy tasks (Pre-test) 12-week intervention (Parents from the two treatment groups received coaching three times a week) Tested children individually on numeracy & literacy tasks (Post-test)

18. Results

19. Descriptive statistics – Pre-test scores Coaching-N ~ Coaching-R ~ Control

20. Results Descriptive statistics – Pre-test scores Coaching-N > ControlCoaching-N ~ Coaching-R ~ Control

21. Results Descriptive statistics – Post-test scores

22. Results Descriptive statistics – Post-test scores

23. Results To test the hypotheses, eight separate ANCOVAs (analyses of covariance) were performed. Dependent variable ~ Children’s post-test score on the numeracy / literacy measure Independent variable ~ Group Covariates ~ Children’s age ~ Parents’ educational level ~ Parents’ income ~ Children’s post-test score on the numeracy / literacy measure

24. Results Results of ANCOVAs Significant group effects were found on the following numeracy measures: ~ Numeral identification: F = 37.01, p <.001 ~ Object counting: F = 29.89, p <.001 ~ Rote counting: F = 17.75, p <.001 ~ Missing number: F = 9.65, p <.001 ~ Numerical magnitude comparison: F = 8.81, p <.001 Coaching-N > Coaching-R ~ Control

25. Results Results of ANCOVAs Significant group effects were found on the following literacy measures: ~ Receptive vocabulary: F = 5.58, p <.01 ~ Expressive vocabulary (Related to the books read): F = 23.10, p <.001 Coaching-R > Coaching-N ~ Control Coaching-N ~ Coaching-R ; Coaching-R ~ Control ; Coaching-N > Control

26. Results Results of ANCOVAs There was no significant group effect on the following literacy measure: ~ Expressive vocabulary (Not related to the books read): F =.32, p >.01 Coaching-R ~ Coaching-N ~ Control

27. Discussion

28. Effects of the parent coaching programs In line with the hypotheses and results of past studies … ~ children whose parents received coaching on numeracy guidance obtained higher post-test scores on all five numeracy tasks. This perhaps suggests that … ~ after being coached on numeracy guidance, parents of low SES would know more about effective strategies of how to promote children’s mastery of numeracy skills and thus provide children with more frequent and higher quality home numeracy experiences.

29. Discussion Effects of the parent coaching programs Different from the hypotheses … ~ children whose parents received coaching on numeracy guidance but not dialogic reading obtained higher post- test scores on the receptive vocabulary task than those whose parents received no coaching. ~ children from the three groups did not differ in their post- test scores on the expressive vocabulary task, in which the test items was not related to the books read. In line with the hypotheses … ~ as compared to their peers, children whose parents received coaching on dialogic reading obtained higher post-test scores on the expressive vocabulary task, in which the test items was related to the books read.

30. Discussion Effects of the parent coaching programs This perhaps suggests that … ~ the parent coaching program on dialogic reading designed in the present study was effective in promoting children’s vocabulary development but the vocabulary acquired by children might be confounded by the contents of the storybooks read. ~ when being coached on how to use number card games to guide children’s numeracy learning, parents might also learn how to interact with their children in more effective ways, which might in turn also help promote some aspects of children’s vocabulary development.

31. Discussion Implications Parents play a crucial role in children’s early numeracy learning. It is useful to provide coaching for parents, especially those of low SES, on numeracy guidance strategies. From coaching programs of this kind, parents might learn not only how to offer more stimulating home numeracy activities, but also some generic strategies on how to promote young children’s learning.

32. Discussion Limitations Recruited participants from low-income communities only Only coached parents on how to promote young children’s early numeracy learning via number card games Future studies To examine whether the effects of parent coaching are sustainable over time To compare the effectiveness of different parent coaching programs on numeracy guidance To investigate why some parent coaching programs are more likely than others to bring extra benefits, which are not directly related to the primary goals of the programs

33. Discussion Conclusion Providing coaching to parents of low SES on how to guide children’s early learning might bring a number of benefits on their children. In some cases, the benefits might even go beyond the primary goals of the parent coaching programs.

34. References Cheung, S. K. 2013. Maximizing the educational benefits of parent-child number board game playing to kindergarteners: The importance of parent training. Poster presented at the Biennial Meeting of the Society for Research in Child Development, Seattle, Washington, USA. Dulay, K. M. Cheung, S. K. &McBride, C. (2015). Indirect benefits of a numeracy-related parent training program on general parenting attitudes in the Philippines. Paper presented at the Quality Childhood Conference International 2015, Hong Kong, China. Jordan, N.C. Kaplan, D. Oláh, L.N. & Locuniak, M.N. 2006. Number sense growth in kindergarten: A longitudinal investigation of children at risk for mathematical difficulties, in Child Development 77/1, 153-175. Levine, S. C. Suriyakham, L. W. Rowe, M. L. Huttenlocher, J. & Gunderson, E. A. (2010). What counts in the development of young children's number knowledge?, in Developmental Psychology 46/5, 1309-1319. Ramani, G. B. Rowe, M. L. Eason, S. H. & Leech, K. A. 2015. Math talk during informal learning activities in Head Start families, in Cognitive Development 35, 15-33.

35. References Skwarchuk, S. L. & LeFevre, J. 2015. The role of the home environment in children’s early numeracy development: A Canadian perspective, in B. Perry, A. MacDonald & A. Gervasoni (eds.) Mathematics and transition to school: International perspectives, 103-117. Singapore. Starkey, P. & Klein, A. 2008. Sociocultural influences on young children’s mathematical knowledge, in O.N. Saracho & B. Spodek (eds.) Contemporary perspectives on mathematics in early childhood education, 253-276. Charlotte, NC. Vandermaas-Peeler, M. Ferretti, L. & Loving, S. (2012). Playing The Ladybug Game: parent guidance of young children's numeracy activities, in Early Child Development and Care 182/10, 1289-1307.

36. Acknowledgments This study was conducted in collaboration with the Arcanys Early Learning Foundation. This study was funded by the UBS Optimus Foundation.