Early childhood literacy practices in a multilingual township in Gauteng province of South Africa

Abstract : This study draws on sociolinguistic theories with the aim to investigate the nature of young children’s early encounters with literacy in their homes and the implications of these encounters for their later development as readers and writers in schools. This is depicted by five Grade 3 learners in a multilingual township1 in the west of Johannesburg, South Africa. In order to realise this aim, the study has four objectives. The first is to map out the literacy practices in which young children engage at home, in their township and at school. The second is to examine the implications of children’s encounters with literacy for their careers as readers and writers, in-school and out-of-school. The third is to examine how the children’s literacy practices manifest in their educators’ teaching practice. The last objective is to examine how children’s out-of-school literacy practices can contribute to developing schooled literacy. The investigation employs a case study design framed by New Literacy Studies (Gee, 1996; Street, 1993), characterised by an understanding of literacies as multiple and situated within social and cultural practices and discourses (Hull & Schultz, 2002). The study, conducted over two years, focuses on children’s in-school and out-of-school literacy practices using, as participants, five learners in the Foundation Phase, together with their parents, educators and Gauteng Department of Education officials. Data for this study were collected through interviews and personal observations of classroom practices and out-of-school literacy practices of the children. Findings suggest that the research approach employed in this study has the potential to examine classroom instruction that allows learners to successfully acquire literacy that meets the international, national and local testing standards...Ph.D. (Educational Linguistics