Mother-child interactions while sharing print and electronic versions of books

The purpose of this study was to compare (1) mother-child interactions in three different contexts: sharing a picture book in traditional paper format, sharing an electronic book in CD-ROM format and sharing an electronic book in video-clip format; (2) a mother’s interactions with her 7- and 3-year-old child; and (3) how children’s initiations differ according to age. Two boys and their mother from a middle class Korean family that recently immigrated to Canada were involved in this study. The texts for shared reading activities were provided in Korean. Four session-observations of each activity were videotaped, with a one-week interval, between sessions. The videotapes were transcribed and analyzed based on verbal event categories that emerged from the data and that were informed by the literature on shared book reading. The conversations between the mother and the child during shared reading were examined to find any predominant characteristics in the content of their talk. Findings of the study include the following: (1) there were some differences in mother-child interactions across the three contexts and these seemed to be related to different formats and features of the books, (2) mother-child interactions during the shared reading differed according to the children’s ages, and (3) the children exhibited different initiations during the shared reading according to their ages. The findings of this study suggest that different factors, such as medium of the text, the age of the children, and the children’s sociocultural experiences may be related to mother-child interactions during shared reading and may influence children’s home literacy practices. This study provides insight of the potential differences in mother-child interactions during shared reading, depending on the medium and the children’s ages.Education, Faculty ofGraduat