I recruit: A case study of teaching, and learning of business literacy in home context
Presentation by: Mahshid Ghaffartehrani
Session E | 11:25 – 11:45 | Room 207
Abstract:
Purpose: To report on a study in which I documented the family literacy practices in an Iranian immigrant family, with their eight-year-old bilingual son. I draw the attention to the multimodal literacy practices that are embedded in their daily lives as business people.
Method: The interviews were transcribed and the data were categorized into themes. A second rater independently coded the data set (Kontos, 1981); the inter-rater reliability was 78%.
Results: The following themes describe the family’s literacy practices;
• The story reading (traditional literacy) routine occurs frequently as a practice of bilingual literacy (Persian, English).
• Knowledge is considered “Power” to the family (Mctavish, 2009), and therefore Informational Literacy is the dominant form of the literacy available in multimodal forms.
• Audio- books, various iPad/laptop apps, You Tube, and google search greatly facilitated digital literacy practices at home which have bilingual, and communicative forms.
• “Business Literacy”, which includes practices that help achieve business goals, is highly reinforced through book reading, verbal instructions, digital games, taking part in meetings, and conventions.
• Unlike the Iranian perspective of more guided participations in children’s learning, this family has adopted a Western verbal scaffolding to child’s learning.
Significance: The study adds to our understanding of how immigrant families support their young children’s literacy development. The location of the families’ literacy practices within a “business milieu” contributes to understanding of literacy as social practices perspective (Street, 1995).
References
Kontos, S. (n.d.). The metacognitive environment: characteristics and relationships for pre-school children. Boston, MA.
Mctavish, M. (2009). “ I get my facts from the Internet ”: A case study of the teaching and learning of information literacy in in-school and out-of-school, 3–28. http://doi.org/10.1177/1468798408101104
Street, B. V. (1995). Social literacies: Critical approaches to literacy development, ethnography, and education. New York; London;: Longman.
