Parental Involvement in their Young Children’s English Language Learning in a Rural Region of Kazakhstan: A Qualitative Inquiry
Gulbanu Kuspan
Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Multilingual Education
Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Education
May, 2020
Word Count: 26 466 words
Acknowledgment
First of all, I would like to thank the professors of the Multilingual Education MA program whose courses led me to write this thesis and provided me with the necessary information to complete it. Particularly, I would like to express my gratitude to my supervisor, Anas Hajar, who could always find time and patience to support me in writing the thesis.
Next, I would like to thank my grandparents Kuanyshbay Bagniyazov and Zagimash Bagniyazova – the people without whom I might not have a chance to complete even the program not mentioning writing the thesis. Besides, my husband’s belief in me and my sons’
existence has always motivated me to work hard to finish this research work.
And finally, I would like to thank the gatekeeper and parents who voluntarily agreed to participate in the research and made sharing its results with others possible.
Abstract
Parental Involvement in their Young Children’s English Language Learning in a Rural Region of Kazakhstan: A Qualitative Inquiry
The integrated curriculum is a recent initiative of the Government of Kazakhstan that includes trilingual education. This reform entails students learning school subjects through three mediums of instruction (Kazakh, Russian, and English) in secondary school. Accordingly, these languages are introduced from the first grade to ensure their successful acquisition. This thesis reports on a qualitative inquiry into Kazakhstani parents’ attitudes towards the introduction of the English language to their young children in Grade 1. It also examines parental challenges in assisting their children with English language learning (ELL), and the strategies used in this regard.
In the present study, rural parents’ involvement in their young children’s ELL was investigated to familiarize the public and policymakers with the consequences of implementing the integrated curriculum in Kazakhstan. Semi-structured interviews with 15 rural parents were used to collect data. The findings suggest that almost all parents were aware of the importance of ELL by their children in the modern world. Due to the challenges parents faced in helping their children with ELL, some of them supported the view that their children should have been introduced to the English language at least from the second grade. The findings of this study also reveal that the cooperation between formal and informal social actors (i.e. between teachers and parents) needs to be promoted in Kazakhstan because some parents lack knowledge of English and of effective strategies to prevent their children from being demotivated from learning English. Hence, schools need to become platforms for parents to exchange ideas concerning the best procedures for implementing the trilingual policy and enabling students to actively utilize the English learning resources available to them both inside and outside the classroom. Conducting further mixed methods research which includes the perspectives of parents, teachers, and children themselves would enrich the available database.
Қазақстанның ауылдық жеріндегі ата-аналардың жас балаларының ағылшын тілін үйрену үдерісіне қатысуы: Сапалық зерттеу
Аңдатпа
Кіріктірілген бағдарлама үш тілді білім беруге бағытталған, Қазақстан Республикасы Үкіметінің соңғы жылдардағы бастамаларының бірі болып табылады. Аталмыш реформа оқушылардың орта мектепте пәндерді үш тілде оқуын меңзейді (қазақ, орыс және
ағылшын тілдері). Сәйкесінше, оқушылардың білімін жетілдіру мақсатында тілдер бірінші сыныптан бастап қолданысқа енеді. Бұл зерттеу жұмысы қазақстандық ата-аналардың өз балаларына бірінші сыныптан бастап ағылшын тілінің оқытылуына қатысты
көзқарастарын сапалық тұрғыдан зерттеу нәтижелерін ұсынады. Сол секілді зерттеу жұмысында ата-аналар балаларына ағылшын тілін үйрету (АТҮ) мезетінде тап келген қиындықтар мен пайдаланылған стратегиялары туралы баяндалады.
Аталмыш зерттеу жұмысында елдімекендердегі ата-аналардың балаларына ағылшын тілін оқыту әрекетіне қатысуы қарастырылады, сол арқылы қоғамды және заң шығарушы органдарды Қазақстанда кіріктірілген оқыту жүйесін енгізу нәтижелерімен таныстырады.
Сәйкес мәліметті жинақтау үшін елдімекендерде тұратын 15 ата-анамен жартылай құрылымдалған сұхбаттар жүргізілді. Зерттеу нәтижелеріне сүйенсек, барлық ата-аналар заманауи талаптарға сәйкес балалардың ағылшын тілін білу қажеттігіне баса назар
аударатындығын жеткізді. Ағылшын тілін оқуда кездесетін қиындықтарға сүйене отырып, кей ата-аналар шет тілін мүмкіндігінше екінші сыныптан бастап оқытуға ұсыныс жасады.
Сол секілді нәтижелер осы әрекеттің ресми және бейресми қатысушылары (ата-аналар мен мұғалімдер) арасындағы байланысты күшейту қажеттігін көрсетеді, өйткені кей ата-
аналар ағылшын тілінде сөйлемейді және балаларының ағылшын тілін үйренуіне қызығушылығын төмендетпеу үшін қажетті стратегиялардан хабарсыз. Сондықтан мектептер ата-аналардың үш тілде оқыту саясатын жүзеге асыруға қатысты идеяларын
бөлісетін, сол секілді оқушылардың мектепте және мектептен тысқары орындарда
ағылшын тіліндегі оқу ресурстарын белсенді пайдаланатын ортасына айналуы тиіс. Келесі аралас зерттеу әдісі мұғалімдердің, оқушылар мен ата-аналардың пікірлерін қамтыса, жинақталған мәліметтерге үстеме болып табылар еді.
Аннотация
Участие родителей в процессе изучения английского языка своих малолетних детей в сельской местности Казахстана: Качественное исследование
Интегрированное обучение является одним из недавних инициатив Правительства Республики Казахстан, основанное на трехязычном обучении. Данная реформа
предполагает обучение учащихся средних школ посредством использования в качестве языка инструкции трех языков (казахский, русский и английский). Для обеспечения качественного обучения языки изучаются с 1 класса. Данная исследовательская работа представляет результаты опроса казахстанских родителей касательно внедрения преподавания английского языка с 1 класса. В то же время исследовательская работа представляет сложности, с которыми родители столкнулись в процессе поддержки своих детей в изучении английского языка (ИАЯ) и использованные ими стратегии.
В настоящем исследовании, с целью ознакомления представителей общественности и правительства с результатами внедрения интегированного преподавания и обучения в Казахстане, было исследовано участие родителей, проживающих в сельских местностях, в изучении английского языка их детьми. С целью сбора данных были проведены 15 полу структурированных интервью с родителями с сельских местностей. Результаты
показывают, что почти все родители понимают важность изучения английского языка в современном мире. В связи со сложностями, возникающими при поддержке своих детей, изучающих английский язык, некоторые родители поддержали мнение о внедрении
иностранного языка начиная со 2-го класса. Также результаты показывают необходимость усиления связей между формальными и неформальными участниками (между родителями и учителями) данного процесса, так как некоторые родители не владеют английским языком и эффективными стратегиями, чтобы предотвратить потерю мотивации своих детей в изучении английского языка. Как следствие, для успешного внедрения
трёхъязычного обучения, школы должны стать площадкой для обмена идеями и лучшими стратегиями между родителями, также школа должна обеспечить доступность ресурсов для обучения учащихся, как в стенах школы, так и вне школы. Проведение дальнейших исследований с использованием смешанного метода исследования, включающего мнения родителей, учителей и самих детей, обогатило бы имеющуюся базу данных.
Table of Contents
List of Tables xi
List of Figures xii
Chapter 1: Introduction 1
Background Information 1
Gap in the Research 3
Statement of the Problem 4
Purpose of the Study 6
Research Questions 6
Significance of the Study 7
Outline of the Study 7
Chapter 2: Literature Review 9
The Role of the English Language in the Educational System in Kazakhstan 9 The Attitudes of the Kazakhstani Parents Towards the New Language-in-Education Policy 11 The Challenges Parents Face in Assisting their Children with English Language Learning 12 The Role Parents Play in Their Children’s English Language Learning 14
Direct types of involvement. 16
Indirect types of involvement. 17
Neutral to negative type of involvement. 18
Parental Involvement in Their Children’s Education 21
Chapter 3: Methodology 27
Research Design 27
Sampling procedures. 28
Research site. 30
Data collection instruments. 30
Data collection procedures. 32
Limitations. 33
Data Analysis 34
Ethical Considerations 37
Chapter 4: Findings 40
Attitudes towards Introducing the English Language from Grade 1 41 Parents’ positive attitude towards integrating English from Grade 1. 41 Parents’ negative attitude towards integrating English from Grade 1. 43 Parents’ Challenges While Involving in Their Young Children’s English Language Learning47 The challenges in understanding the program of the English language. 47
The challenges with explaining the English phonology and teaching the English words. 50 The Parental Practices regarding the Mediation of their Young Children’s English Language
Learning 55
Parent-English Teacher Communication 55
Parental Practices in Assisting with English Language Homework 57
School-based strategies. 57
Experience-based strategies. 59
Strategies. 62
Resources. 63
Private tutoring. 63
Chapter 5: Discussion 65
Attitudes Towards the Integration of English Subject from Grade 1 65 Parental Challenges in Helping Their Young Children with English Language Learning 68 Parental Involvement in Their Children’s English Language Learning and the Strategies Used
74
Chapter 6: Conclusions 82
Major Conclusions 82
Limitation of the Research 84
Implications of the Research 85
References 87
Appendix A 97
Appendix B 102
Appendix C 106
List of Tables
Table 1. Participants' characteristics 29
Table 2. Parents' opinions on the introduction of the English language (EL) in the first grade 45
Тable 3. The challenges reported by the participants 53
Table 4. Participants' parental practices in their involvement 61
List of Figures
Figure 1. Continuum: From involvement to engagement. Goodall and Montgomery (2014) 24 Figure 2. Thematic map of the data analysis (designed with https://app.lucidchart.com) 37
Figure 3. The Kiswahili alphabet 72
Figure 4. The building of Astana Opera in Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan 74
Chapter 1: Introduction
This chapter provides background information to the study that involve information about the implementation of the trilingual education that resulted in the integration of the English language along with the Kazakh and Russian languages from the early years of schooling. This chapter also highlights the need of conducting the research that investigates the implications of the trilingual policy implementation on rural parents, with the focus on their attitudes towards the integration of the English language, the challenges they face in assisting their children’s English language learning and their strategies in this regard. In addition, this chapter introduces with the research purpose, the research questions guided this study, the significance of this study and presents the outline of the study.
Background Information
Trilingual education is a recent language education policy in Kazakhstan that reflects the aims of the Kazakhstani Government to develop a trilingual nation. In 2011, Nazarbayev, the former president of the Republic of Kazakhstan, set the objective that 100 % of Kazakhstani citizens would speak Kazakh, whereas 85,5% of them would speak Russian and 25,5% would become fluent in English by 2020 (MoC, 2011). Thus, this trilingual policy supports the simultaneous development of the national languages – Kazakh and Russian – and the English language in the educational domain (Kirkpatrick & Liddicoat, 2017), though highlighting the status of the Kazakh language (KL) as a state language (MoES, 2020).
According to the Strategic Plan of the Ministry of Education and Science for 2020-2024, and within the frame of updating the content of education in secondary schools in Kazakhstan, trilingual education is gradually being integrated into the curriculum: the teaching of the History of Kazakhstan through Kazakh-medium of instruction and the World History through Russian- medium of instruction had been piloted during the academic year 2019-2020 in several schools
of Kazakhstan, while science subjects in the high classes (of Grades 10 and 11) are taught through English-medium of instruction with full immersion into this language depending on the preparedness of schools and their students’ willingness in the same academic year . Therefore, Kazakhstani school children study English and Russian as school subjects along with KL from the first grade.
The integration of the English language (EL) in the early years of primary school might derive from the aim of the state to increase the competitiveness of Kazakhstani citizens in addition to the economic situation of Kazakhstan through developing their English language skills (MoES, 2015). In this regard, Nazarbayev (2017, April 12) in his article “Course Towards the Future: Modernization of Kazakhstan’s Identity” noted that people need to know English along with their native language in the modern world (para. 6). Additionally, he stated that if Kazakhstani people know English, they will feel themselves as being “fish in the water” in the global labor market (Kuramysova, 2015, para. 5).
Regarding the establishment of the educational policy, its success might depend on the main actors’ attitudes towards education, their “motivation and skills”, and their “reaction to the policy” (Viennet & Pont, 2017, p. 32). Viennet and Pont (2017) claim that the policy can be
“effectively integrated” when the main actors at the school level (i.e. headteachers, teachers, and parents) support the educational initiative instead of refusing its implementation (p. 33).
However, for a long time, the role of parents in their children’s education has been undervalued by many people compared to that of schoolteachers as learning is only believed to be possible in the school context (Benson, 2011). Since many empirical studies (e.g. Ji & Koblinsky, 2009; Hill
& Taylor, 2004; Hill & Tyson, 2009; Ma, Shen, Krenn, Hu, & Yuan, 2016; Menheere & Hooge, 2010; Wilder, 2014) revealed that parents can play a focal role in their children’s overall
academic achievement including in foreign language learning (Curdt-Christiansen & Wang, 2018; Gao, 2006, 2012; Kalaycı & Öz, 2018; Lai, Zhu, & Gong, 2015), understanding the
parents’ “views, interests and capacities” might play a pivotal role in understanding the implications of education policies (Viennet & Pont, 2017, p. 3).
Gap in the Research
To date, most studies (e.g. Al-Fadley, Al-Holy, & Al-Adwani, 2018; Borup, 2016; He &
Lazo, 2015; McDowall & Schaughency, 2017; O'Connor & Geiger, 2009; Rahman & Sarker, 2019) have assessed the involvement of parents in their children’s education from the
perspectives school teachers, who are the formal actors of the education process. Despite the recent recognition of parents as main actors in developing their children’s language and literacy development at home (Emerson, Fear, Fox, & Sanders, 2012; Goodall & Montgomery, 2014), there remains a paucity of research on parental involvement from the parents’ perspectives.
Several studies (Al-Fadley, Al-Holy, & Al-Adwani, 2018; Schneider & Arnot, 2018; Smith, 2006) have uncovered that some teachers may underestimate the parents’ role in their students’
education as they only perceive parental involvement as parents’ physical presence at school events. Thus, teachers might not see or have not access to the “invisible” part of learning that occurs beyond the school (Benson, 2011, p. 8).
However, the topic of parental involvement in developing the foreign language skills of their children has been insufficiently investigated in the context of Kazakhstan. Like other Asian countries such as China, Taiwan and Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan is establishing the English
language-in-education policy from the early years of primary school despite its limited use, or–
lack of it, in the community. The research that has been carried out in Kazakhstan on parents’
perceptions about trilingual education (Agaidarova, 2019; Ayazabayeva, 2017) and their
involvement in their children’s education (Kaus, 2018) differs from this research as this research focuses specifically on the involvement of parents in their children’s ELL.
In investigating rural stakeholder’s language ideologies and practices in one secondary school in a rural area of Kazakhstan, Agaidarova’s (2019) study revealed that some parents
neglect the usage of the Russian language at home but pay for their children’s private English classes. Similarly, Ayazbayeva’s (2017) study found that all parents believe that their children would benefit from knowing the EL, though, their opinions on the Kazakh and Russian
languages vary depending on their language ideologies. Ayazbayeva’s (2017) study sought to examine urban parents’ perceptions and expectations of the trilingual policy through the lens of language ideologies, which guided them to choose the medium-of-instruction (MOI) of
schooling for their children of the first grade. The findings of these studies (Agaidarova, 2019;
Ayazabayeva, 2017) clearly indicate that Kazakhstani parents are supportive of the integration of the EL in school education.
However, Ayazbayeva’s (2017) study revealed that some parents are concerned that the trilingual education policy might affect the future of the KL in a negative way, while anticipating the revitalization and development of it. Thus, Kazakhstani parents seem to hold contradictory opinions on these languages. These varying opinions may affect their attitudes towards
integrating the EL in the first grade and their home practices for facilitating their children’s ELL.
As the EL is not widely employed by Kazakhstani people compared to the Russian and Kazakh languages, the integration of this language in the first grade might lead to challenges on the part of Kazakhstani parents, especially those who live in rural areas. Therefore, this study aims at learning parents’ perceptions of the trilingual education policy, their challenges with its implementation and their strategic language learning involvement to mediate their children’s acquisition of the English skills in the rural regions of Kazakhstan.
Statement of the Problem
According to some researchers (Besser & Chik, 2014; Fan & Williams, 2010), the extent of parental involvement in their children’s English language learning and development largely relies on their educational and socioeconomic backgrounds. To exemplify this point further, some financially comfortable parents may decide to send their children to outstanding private
schools which use English as a medium of instruction for many taught subjects (Besser & Chik, 2014). Thus, some parents might afford such means of English acquisition that include the immersion into an English environment, whereas others might face challenges in providing their children with private tutoring in English.
Moreover, the distinction in academic performance between the students of rural and urban areas of Kazakhstan has led to the question of the implications involved in integrating the EL from the first grade for rural parents across the country. For example, in the country policy profile prepared by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Kazakhstani students who lived in rural areas performed 8.98 points lower than students who lived in urban areas in the Unified National Test (UNT) in 2017 (OECD, 2018). Even though the rural students’ UNT scores have increased more expeditiously (to 0.97 points) than their urban peers between 2012-2013, the students in urban regions still outperformed the students in rural regions (OECD, 2018, p. 8). Similarly, PISA-2015 results indicate that school and college students in rural regions (at 447 points) had fallen behind the urban school and college students (at 466 points) for more than six months. Nazarbayev University Graduate School of Education (2014) suggests that this division might be the result of a low quality of teaching in the rural regions of Kazakhstan because rural schools are not supplied with adequate facilities and materials.
In this regard, several studies (Chang, Park, Singh, & Sung, 2009; Hill & Tyson, 2009;
Schneider & Arnot, 2018; Smith, 2006) have noted that this division in access to resources might be decreased by the communication between home and school and parental involvement in their children’s education. While Bakytzhanova’s (2018) study revealed that the teachers of
Nazarbayev Intellectual Schools (NIS) worked collaboratively with the parents of their students considering them as “partners in trilingual education” (p. 63), the studies conducted in
Kazakhstan have not examined home-school collaboration in mainstream schools of the country.
Since Kazakhstani parents might rely only on their own experience of language learning in their involvement in their children’s learning, their experience might be insufficient to support their children’s ELL and to keep them motivated to learn this language. Thus, parents’ practices and strategies employed at home might need correction or modification as well as assistance from school members. Therefore, there is an urgent need to investigate parental practices in assisting their children’s ELL and the nature of their communication with teachers as this collaboration might be a prerequisite of the successful implementation of the trilingual policy in the rural regions of Kazakhstan.
Purpose of the Study
Understanding the implications of educational policies might occur through the
exploration of the main actors’ attitudes towards the education policy, their challenges in dealing with it and their abilities to accomplish its implementation. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to explore the attitudes of rural parents towards the integration of the EL in the first grade along with the Kazakh and Russian languages. In addition, this study aims at learning the challenges faced by rural parents in assisting their children with ELL and the strategies they use in their involvement.
Research Questions
The present study sought answers to the following questions:
1. How do parents perceive the notion of having their children introduced to English at an early stage of their education?
2. What challenges do parents face while involving themselves in their young children’s English language learning?
3. What are parents’ practices regarding the mediation of their young children’s English language learning?
Significance of the Study
The results of the study could contribute to the understanding of the consequences of the implementation of the trilingual policy in the rural regions of Kazakhstan from the parents’
perspectives. Few studies (Agaidarova, 2019; Ayazbayeva, 2017), as discussed in previous sections, have attempted to investigate parental perceptions of trilingual education after it has been piloted in several Kazakhstani schools. Since these studies did not focus on parents’ roles in their children’s education, the findings of the current study might provide new insights on
parental challenges and strategies in their involvement in their children’s ELL. Consequently, these findings will be useful for educational researchers, teachers, and policymakers because they might provide information on the implications of the establishment of the trilingual
education policy on the rural parents of Kazakhstan. Furthermore, this study may emphasize the potential of boosting the cooperation between formal and informal actors (i.e. teachers,
policymakers, and parents) in terms of selecting the best procedures that can be undertaken to implement the trilingual policy in Kazakhstan.
Outline of the Study
The overall structure of the current study takes the form of six chapters, which include the introduction, literature review, methodology, findings, discussion, and conclusion. This chapter begins by presenting the background information on the topic, and then moves on to describe the relevance and importance of investigating this topic, and finally presents research questions that guide this study and outline the structure of this study. The second chapter presents a brief overview of the role of the EL in Kazakhstani school education and the role of parents in their children’s education. It then goes on to describe parental strategies in helping to develop their children’s English skills by analyzing the studies conducted on this topic. Finally, the theoretical framework of this study is introduced. The design, site and participants of the research are described in the third chapter which deals with the methodology. This chapter also
deals with the procedures of data collection, data analysis and ethical issues. The fourth chapter presents the findings of the research, focusing on the three key themes that guided this study. In the fifth chapter the findings of the study are examined through the lens of previous local and international studies, while noting its contribution to the existing literature. The conclusions of the study along with the limitations and implications of this study are respectively drawn and presented in the final chapter.
Chapter 2: Literature Review
In the previous chapter, the context, research problem, research purpose and the research questions of the study were discussed. Additionally, the gap in the research was identified. This chapter focuses on the role of the EL in the educational system of Kazakhstan and the challenges that parents often face in facilitating their children’s ELL, together with the strategies they adopt in this regard. Further, the present chapter sheds light on diverse types of parental involvement and provides an explanation of the conceptual framework that guides the current research.
The Role of the English Language in the Educational System in Kazakhstan The inclusion of the EL in the primary school curriculum has become a general phenomenon among many non-English speaking countries around the world. Kazakhstan belongs to this list of countries because the EL has been integrated in the language-in-education policy of the country despite its having only 1% of the population that is fluent in English as in a second language (Eberhard et al., 2020). Kirkpatrick and Liddicoat (2017) assert that the
popularity of English in Central Asia resulted from its instrumental value around the world, its prestige, and its benefits for the economy of their countries. Consequently, many countries around the world instil a form of “privilege” to English as a foreign language by integrating it into their primary school curriculum (p. 7). Moreover, the polities in these countries seem to believe that the learning of the EL should start “as early as possible” (Wong & Benson, 2019, p.
5).
Similarly, the Kazakhstani government presented the gradual shift Kazakh and Russian MOIs to English MOI in high schools and higher education institutions as one of the steps towards increasing the competitiveness of Kazakhstani specialists and to increase the
attractiveness of the education sector globally in the 100 Steps of The Nation Plan (Nazarbayev,
2015). However, the Kazakhstani language policy aims at developing the EL along with the Russian and Kazakh languages in the country. For instance, Nursultan Nazarbayev, the former president of Kazakhstan introduced the idea of the trinity of languages in his address “New Kazakhstan in a New World” in 2007, which defined the role of each official language: Kazakh as the national language, Russian as the language of interethnic communication, while English is the international language.
As a result, these languages are being introduced concurrently from the first grade of school education so that school graduates of Kazakhstan become fluent in the Kazakh, Russian and English languages by 2050 (MoES, 2020). Thus, the EL is taught from the first grade in Kazakhstan to prepare students to be taught science subjects (information and communications technology, physics, chemistry and biology) through English-medium of instruction in the higher classes (MoES, 2020). According to the Strategic Plan for 2020-2024, the education process will occur on the basis of the 4 C’s model of Content and Language Integrated Learning (MoES, 2020), which involves teaching content subjects in additional language, that is, in English.
Therefore, the EL is taught two hours a week in the first grade, thereby constituting 66 hours a year according to the Standard Educational Program for the English subject for Grades 1- 4 of primary school (MoES, 2018). In addition, this document states that the English curriculum is organized to develop students’ English skills towards the A1 level with focus on their
listening, speaking, and reading skills. Based on the above document, these students are expected to recognize the letters and their order in the English alphabet after finishing the first grade. They are also supposed to understand basic English phrases that are used in the classroom and to be involved in short conversations about themselves in present simple. Furthermore, they are expected to be able to count to 20, to describe objects and people, to ask basic questions with
question words, and to make simple requests in English. (See MoES, 2018, Appendix 5, Chapter 2, Section 7 to learn more about the program for the first graders).
In summary, this section has presented the role of English in the educational system of Kazakhstan and provided the details regarding the introduction of this language in the first grade of primary school. The following sections discuss the Kazakhstani parents’ attitudes towards the establishment of trilingual education in the school system, and then the challenges parents encounter with the introduction of English in primary education worldwide.
The Attitudes of the Kazakhstani Parents Towards the New Language-in-Education Policy Many Kazakhstani parents seem to support the implementation of the trilingual education policy. For instance, Kuchma (2016) reported that the 66 % of Kazakhstani parents who
participated in the sociological study, “Public Opinion”, conducted by the Research Institute supported the idea of children learning three languages. Surprisingly, 81% of them stressed the salience of their children learning and mastering English. This study was aimed at learning the attitudes of Kazakhstani parents and students on the transition to trilingual education by
conducting a phone survey with 1000 parents across the country (53.5% from a city; 46.5% from a village). However, one fourth of the participants of this study expressed a negative attitude towards this reform mentioning the unpreparedness of teachers and teaching programs as drawbacks to its implementation.
Other studies (Agaidarova, 2019; Ayazbayeva, 2017) also found that Kazakhstani parents who supported the new trilingual policy, especially the inclusion of the EL from the first grade were predominant. The study done by Agaidarova (2019) investigated rural stakeholders’
perceptions and practices of trilingual education at the school level. She sampled ten participants, three of which were parents, and two of them positively accepted the early introduction of the EL. Regarding Ayazbayeva’s (2017) study, she sampled ten parents from urban regions of Kazakhstan to investigate their views on the trilingual policy. The parent participants in their
study believed in the capability of young children’s minds to learn three languages. One of the parents in Ayazbayeva’s (2017) study was proud that his child would be fluent in three
languages as a result of trilingual education. This finding may imply that many parents seem to buy into the idea of the earlier the better in terms of their children’s language learning,
particularly for English. However, in her study, another participant stated that learning three languages simultaneously from the first grade created a mess in her first-grade child’s mind. As her child started to confuse the letters of three languages, she believed that it is “a great burden”
for children to learn three languages simultaneously (p. 45).
In summary, this section has discussed the Kazakhstani parents’ attitudes towards trilingual education, which also involves the integration of the EL in the first grade along with the Kazakh and Russian languages. Despite the predominance of positive attitudes towards this policy, the literature suggests that some parents in Kazakhstan seem to resist its implementation, especially the simultaneous introduction of three languages in the first grade. Therefore, the next section will discuss the challenges parents might face in assisting their children’s ELL.
The Challenges Parents Face in Assisting their Children with English Language Learning To date, several studies (Curdt-Christiansen & Wang, 2018; Gao, 2006; 2012) have investigated parents’ role in their children’s ELL and their strategies to develop their English skills. However, there is a dearth of knowledge on non-English-speaking parents’ challenges in their involvement with developing their children’s English skills. Therefore, this section
evaluates the parental challenges based on studies by (Hsieh et al., 2018; O’Connor & Geiger, 2019; Rahman & Sarker, 2019) that investigated the teachers’ challenges in teaching English to non-English-speaking students.
A lack of support from some parents in their children’s ELL has been found to be one of the challenges faced by teachers (Castillo & Gamez, 2013; Hsieh, Ionescu & Ho, 2018;
O’Connor & Geiger, 2019; Rahman & Sarker, 2019). For instance, in interviewing Kenyan primary school teachers, Hsieh et al. (2018) found that one of the challenges faced by these teachers is students’ negative attitude towards the EL. These teachers upheld the view that their students are not motivated to learn the EL because of their parents’ lack of interest in their children’s ELL. Thus, the parents of their students seem to not value the knowledge of English.
Similar views were found in the study of Rahman and Sarker (2019) conducted in Bangladesh to investigate teachers’ practices to develop their primary school students’ writing skills. The teachers in their study reported that the parents of their students do not create a supportive and encouraging environment for their children’s learning.
However, other studies (e.g. Castillo & Gamez, 2013; He & Lazo, 2015; O’Connor &
Geiger, 2019) found that a limited English proficiency might prevent parents from involving themselves in their children’s ELL. In the study of He and Lazo (2015), for example, according to the report of 149 primary school students on their parents’ English skills, 22 parents could speak English, while 127 could not. Moreover, Castillo and Gamez (2013) in their study of parental involvement in their children learning English as a second language in Colombia found that some parents face difficulties in assisting their children with homework. The parents in their study admitted that they lacked motivation to assist with this language as it requires considerable time and they do not understand the language, though they recognized the importance of their involvement in their children’s education.
Taken together, these studies indicate that non-English-speaking parents may face challenges in assisting with their children’s target language acquisition. If some studies show that parents do not participate in their children’s ELL, some show that their involvement might be deterred by their limited English proficiency. The next section describes the role of parents in their children’s ELL.
The Role Parents Play in Their Children’s English Language Learning
Several studies (Castillo & Gamez, 2013; Hsieh, Ionescu & Ho, 2018; Mahmoud, 2018;
O’Connor & Geiger, 2019; Rahman & Sarker, 2019) have found that the involvement of parents and their support in their children’s ELL might affect their children’s motivation to learn the EL and succeed in its acquisition. For instance, Wilder (2014) found that students’ academic
progress was highly dependent on parental involvement in all levels of schooling. When parents are interested in their children’s education and actively participate, these children tend to
be more successful at school and in their lives and later secure highly-paid employment than children whose parents did not show any interest in their children’s education and schooling.
As Lai et al. (2015) pointed out, parents can act as “gatekeepers” in their involvement in their children’s learning beyond the school (p. 296). Investigating the quality of 82 EL learners’
out-of-school ELL experiences in China, they found that the “nature” of students’ ELL outside the school was predominantly influenced by their parents and teachers (p. 300). Similarly, in interviewing 16 secondary school Chinese children in one elite school, Gao (2012) found that parents used several strategies to help their children succeed in learning English vocabulary. He identified three types of strategies: social support strategies, discursive support strategies and material support strategies.
The social support strategies included the activities that were done in collaboration with teachers. One student’s response showed that his mother helped him to memorize the unknown words, highlighted by the schoolteacher to be learnt, by doing dictations with him. Nevertheless, the findings revealed that many parents were ‘much more proactive’ than collaborative with teachers to meet the needs of their children (p. 587). Regarding discursive support strategies, these included supporting children’s learning by oral encouragement, sharing expectations, giving explanations and employing methods to memorize the vocabulary. As Gao (2012) pointed
out, some strategies the students had learnt from their parents helped them in their further life when learning new vocabulary. As for material support strategies, they consisted of a wide range of authentic English materials provided by parents to support their children’s learning. Some parents procured English newspapers, magazines, CDs, and recordings, whereas others would reward their children’s success in vocabulary learning to keep them motivated.
Another study conducted by Gao (2006) revealed that family members can be positively influential in their involvement in ELL. In his study, he interviewed Chinese undergraduate students with a high competence in the EL on their past experiences of ELL. Gao (2006) found that parents may affect their children’s English language learning both directly and indirectly.
When parents involved themselves indirectly, that is, motivated, advised or supported their children’s language learning, they acted as ‘advocates’, ‘facilitators’ and ‘collaborators’ of language learning for their children (p. 289). Accordingly, when parents involved themselves directly, they showed their ELL strategies or taught them themselves as ‘shadow teachers’, or as private tutors who are aware of the students’ learning skills, or they compelled their children to learn the EL and acted as ‘advisors’, ‘coercers’ and ‘nurturers’ of language learning (Gao, 2006, p. 289).
Likewise, Hajar (2019a) identifies three types of involvement: a) a positive, indirect kind of involvement, which entails verbal stimulation that encourages learners to learn the foreign language or paying for learning materials and tutorship; b) a positive, direct kind of involvement, which refers to taking part in the learning process and/or communicating to develop fluency in English, and c) a neutral to negative kind of involvement which involves actions that hinder their children’s learning of English (p. 290). These actions may involve parents’ negative attitude towards the language (e.g., the language of colonizer) or actions that do not support any kind of foreign language learning activities. These distinctions of direct, indirect, and negative types of
involvement (Hajar, 2019a) will be explained further drawing examples from other studies that include parental strategies in facilitating their children’s EL development.
Direct types of involvement. Many studies (e.g. Curdt-Christiansen & Wang, 2018; Gao 2006, 2012; Hajar, 2019a; Lai et al., 2015) on parental involvement indicate that parents largely show a positive, indirect type of involvement. According to the literature reviewed, many parents who support their children’s ELL are found to be those who value the knowledge of the EL as an international language (Curdt-Christiansen & Wang, 2018; Gao, 2006; 2012; Hajar, 2019a; Lai et al., 2015). Having a positive attitude towards their children’s EL acquisition, these parents seem to employ a wide array of materials and strategies to enhance their children’s English skills (Curdt-Christiansen & Wang, 2018; Gao, 2006; 2012; Hajar, 2019a; Lai et al., 2015). For
instance, Gao (2006) identified three types of parents who directly involved themselves in his participants’ ELL. The first type of parents acted as language learning advisors who helped their children by sharing their own experiences of learning language or searched for the best methods of ELL on the Internet. The second type of parents acted as language learning coercers by compelling their children to learn English vocabulary. One of the participants admitted that this coercion contributed to her success in English at school. The last type of direct involvement depicted parents as nurturers who acted in accordance with their beliefs about learning
languages. For example, one participant reported that her mother shared her hobby of listening to English songs with her. This participant recognized that despite initial difficulties understanding the lyrics of the songs, she could later benefit from this practice by understanding English songs.
Another participant’s father used English songs as background music so that his child could learn the language by listening to it. This parent believed that the skills in the target language are developed through becoming familiarized with it.
Indirect types of involvement. According to the results revealed from studies (Borup, 2016; Chowa, Ansong, & Osei-Akoto, 2012; Gao, 2006, 2012; Hajar, 2019; Smith, 2006, Wilder, 2014), the indirect involvement of parents can also play a considerable role in their children’s success in ELL. Despite the fact that some studies (e.g., Borup, 2016; Wilder, 2014) revealed that parents’ direct types of involvement such as tutoring might be effective in their children’s learning, other studies show that indirect types of involvement such as sharing parental expectations (Wilder, 2014) and conversations about their children’s achievements at school (Chowa et al., 2012) positively affect students’ academic achievement. Thus, parents might not need either high proficiency in the foreign language (Castillo & Camelo, 2013) or higher education levels (Epstein, 2009). For instance, parents can motivate their children to learn English by just telling them about its importance (Gao, 2006; Mahmoud, 2018; Smith, 2006) or by setting high goals for their children to achieve (Mahmoud, 2018). In addition, parents’
interest, and control on whether their children are completing homework may be sufficient rather than their physical presence while the latter is working (Borup, 2016).
Another notable example of indirect types of involvement entails parents’ provision of materials, resources, and the financing to create an encouraging environment for their children’s ELL. According to the responses of Gao’s (2012) participants, their parents provided them with media resources in English, paid their private English classes and enabled their access to foreign TV channels to develop their skills in English. In the same way, Curdt-Christiansen and Wang (2018) found that Chinese parents in an urban city of China provided their young children with a wide range of materials to make their ELL “enjoyable” (p. 249). The language learning materials these parents employed were not limited to the textbooks, but also involved digital learning materials such as mobile applications, YouTube channels, websites and podcasts following the advice (recommendation) provided at the education centers their children attend.
One of the widely encountered strategies employed by parents worldwide seems to be sending their children to private English classes. For instance, Chen (2013) found that many Taiwanese parents pay a considerable amount of money for these classes. The study investigated the teaching of English in primary schools in Taiwan. Likewise, Kazakhstani parents seem to view private tutoring in English as one of the options for developing their children’s English language skills. In Agaidarova’s (2019) study, all three parents admitted that they sent their children to English private classes, as noted by one of them it is a “must-have” in learning science subjects through English-medium of instruction (p. 55). Similarly, Kuchma (2016) reported that 34% of the Kazakhstani parents participating in the phone survey were found to have sent their children to private English classes.
Neutral to negative type of involvement. Although many of the studies demonstrated that parents involve themselves positively in their children’s ELL, Hajar’s (2019a; 2019b) studies revealed that some parents might impede their children’s ELL, thus exhibiting a neutral to negative type of involvement. In an analysis of family members’ influence on the students’
ELL in Gulf Arab countries, Hajar (2019a) found that some of his participants’ parents
handicapped their children’s ELL. For instance, the father of Nadia prohibited watching movies in English due to their showing “women in revealing clothes” (p. 294). As for other participants of Hajar’s (2019a) study, their parents preferred their children to learn science subjects than English because the grades for science subjects were higher than for English subjects. Thus, parents’ perceptions and their attitudes towards the EL might or might not be effective in their children’s ELL. Since some Kazakhstani parents seem to hold nationalistic ideologies regarding language, such as that everyone should speak Kazakh with each other in Kazakhstan
(Ayazbayeva, 2017), this study may shed the light on the extent parents’ attitude affect their involvement in their children’s ELL.
Together, these studies highlight the role of parents in their children’s education and academic success. However, some studies (e.g. Borup, 2016; Mahmoud, 2018) revealed that their involvement might also lead to negative consequences to their children’s further academic lives. For instance, in a study investigating the involvement of parents in primary school
children’s ELL in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Mahmoud (2018) reported that some parents hindered their children’s ELL by employing strategies such as “grammar translation or spoon- feeding” (p. 108). In this regard, he suggests that the parents’ lack of awareness of the
methodology of teaching a foreign language results in their “instant help”, which does not allow their children to learn by themselves (p. 107).
In the same way, in one qualitative study by Borup (2016), it was found that the teachers recognized the parents’ value in supporting their children’s learning only in the case where these parents are informed on the strategies and methods of effective teaching. This study investigated the perceptions of the teachers on the involvement of parents in their children’s education in one online school . These teachers, especially those who teach such subjects as mathematics and science admitted that they would prefer the parents to tell their children to seek help from the teachers or notify them to explain the topic in case their children have misunderstood it Otherwise, these teachers held the view that their students may get more confused due the differences in the parents’ and teachers’ explanations. Thus, the “helicopter” style of parenting (p. 76), which refers to the style where parents attempt to teach everything by themselves, might not be effective as it may cause students’ overreliance on their parents or result in their deeper misunderstanding of the topic.
These findings indicate that parents might need training from school members on how to work with children at home and on the types of strategies they can employ to enhance their children’s learning. In addition, the communication between teachers and parents might help
them understand their families, thereby leading to their “desire” to assist these families (Smith, 2006). Therefore, drawing on the importance of parents’ communication with schoolteachers, the next subsection discusses the benefits of such communication.
Home-school Communication Benefits. Many scholars (Epstein, 2009; Goodall &
Montgomery, 2014; Kraft & Dougherty, 2013; Mahmoud, 2018; McDowall & Schaughency, 2017; Nitecki, 2015; Smith, 2006) highlight the prominence of parent-teacher communication in school students’ education. Thus, parents’ involvement in their children’s education might also occur in the form of home-school communication. According to Epstein (2009), effective parental involvement requires “useful information and guidance” (p. 20). That is, parents might need teachers’ assistance in their involvement. Similarly, Kraft and Dougherty (2013) note that the parent-teacher interaction may raise children’s motivation in learning, improve their
academic performance and inform parents about their behaviour at school. Similarly, one teacher in the study of Smith (2006) admitted that the students’ awareness of the existence of
communication between their parents and teachers results in a high homework completion rate and hard work at school (p. 53). In an analysis of the correlation between parental involvement and children’s academic performances in early years of primary education, Ma, Shen, Krenn, Hu, and Yuan (2016) concluded that “the behavioral involvement, home supervision, and home- school connection are the keys for strong relationship between learning outcomes and parental involvement” (p. 791).
In summary, this subsection presented the advantages of home-school communication on all parties that involve themselves in the education process at the school level. The following section will discuss the distinctions between the terms of parental involvement and parental engagement, thus introducing the framework that guides this study and the rationale for it being employed in this study.
Parental Involvement in Their Children’s Education
This section elaborates on the terms related to parental participation in their children’s education. A considerable amount of literature has been published on parental involvement.
These studies describe parents’ participation in their children’s education with the terms
‘parental involvement’ and ‘parental engagement’. Many scholars (Emerson, Fear, Fox, &
Sanders, 2012; Goodall & Vorhaus, 2011) have attempted to draw fine distinctions between
‘parental involvement’ and ‘parental engagement’, though some of them (Emerson et al., 2012, Goodall & Montgomery, 2014) have highlighted the relevance of considering both terms as inseparable and connected elements of the whole. In addition, depending on the aims of the studies, some researchers (Antony-Newman, 2019; Epstein, 2009; Jay, Rose & Simmons, 2018;
Smith, 2006) prefer to use the general term ‘parental involvement’ rather than differentiating these terms by activity types. That is, some studies link the terms ‘parental involvement’ and
‘parental engagement’ with certain types of activities, others (e.g., Perkins, 2014) use them interchangeably, or identify them as a general term. However, this subsection presents the difference between the activities that each term represents in the scholarly literature to shed light on the framework that guides this research.
As mentioned above, Goodall and Vorhaus (2011) suggest that parental engagement
‘with learning’ and parental involvement ‘with schools’ are not the same things. For instance, Goodall and Montgomery (2014) argue that the word engagement implies “a greater
commitment, a greater ownership of action” than the word involvement (p. 400). Thus, engagement relates to the actions that have profound effects on children’s learning, and which cannot be produced from “simple involvement” (p. 400). This view is supported by Emerson et al. (2012), who claim that parental engagement, which particularly takes place at home, ‘brings about positive changes in children’s academic attainment’, whereas parental involvement in the school environment may impact community and society (p. 8). Thus, parental engagement can
be considered as the actions which take place at home such as homework assistance, reading books, tutoring, verbal encouragement, whilst parental involvement as the actions taken at school such as volunteering for the school, participation in school events, and attending parent-teacher meetings. In this sense, parental engagement is centred on parent-child communication, whereas parental involvement refers to parent-teacher communication.
However, Barton, Drake, Perez, Louis and George (2004) view engagement as “a set of relationships and actions that cut across individuals, circumstances, and events that are produced and bounded by the context in which that engagement takes place” (p. 6). This means that parents’ participation at home may influence school practices, and activities at school may impact home practices respectively. Therefore, parental engagement cannot only look at parents’
actions, or only the behaviours of parents, but also their interaction with other stakeholders (e.g.
teachers, other parents, school administrators and community members). In the same vein, Perkins (2014) notes that teachers’ communication with parents that aim to assist each other can improve children’s academic performance and wellbeing. Teachers may help parents in their engagement at home. In addition, they may inform each other on activities they employ to
‘complement each other’ (p. 4).
Similarly, Epstein (2009) believes that partnerships between school, family and
community members can be beneficial when they see each other as partners in achieving the one common goal to bring up educated and successful young people at school and later, in general life. Accordingly, Epstein proposes the theory of overlapping spheres of influence, which confirms the role of students and how they can be influenced by school, family and community members to make them succeed at school and in their further lives. She continues by explaining that ‘successful’ students cannot be produced by schools, families and community members, but these partnerships furnished with love, care and encouragement can help students succeed. Thus, she holds the view that “students are the main actors in their education, development, and
success in school” (p. 10). When students receive attention or interest in their learning, they will probably be motivated to ‘work hard’ in school (p. 10). Although Epstein’s framework is widely used and recognized, this framework cannot be applied in this study due to its inclusion of community members.
Affirming the importance of community in children’s learning, though, Goodall and Montgomery (2014) contend that parental involvement should be considered from the “triad of child, parent and school” (p. 401). They propose the model of a continuum where parental agency in children’s education moves from parental involvement with schools to parental engagement with children’s learning (see Figure 1). They define the parents’ agency as “the capacity of parents to act (in a beneficial manner) in relation to their children’s learning” (p.
401). Thus, while moving along the continuum, there will be a shift in the agencies of both the teachers and parents, for example, when the teachers’ agency decreases, the parents’ agency increases. They emphasize that parental engagement is parents’ actions, not the schools’, regarding the child’s education and learning that will strive to not be equal but contribute to the
‘equitable’ contribution of agencies (p. 402). This does not mean that schools will gradually loosen their responsibility regarding children’s learning, but rather that parents will be more involved in their children’s learning experiences and move towards collaborating and sharing responsibilities with teachers. Therefore, there will be a shift in the nature of parental
involvement – from school-based activities to home-based activities through home-school
communication and collaboration. However, Goodall and Montgomery state that the last point of the continuum may occur in any place beyond the school.
Goodall and Montgomery (2014) identify three points in the continuum: 1) Parental involvement with schools. At this point, school controls the interactions, the information that parents receive, and the events that they attend. There is no information exchange between the home and school environment, rather there is a distribution of information by the school; 2)
Parental involvement with schooling. This point involves the interaction between parents and schools in the sharing of knowledge about the students at home. Parents start engaging in their children’s learning by assisting in their homework but by strictly following the school’s guidance; 3) Parental engagement with their children’s learning. At the last point, parents take the leading role in shaping their children’s learning.
However, their actions may be formed by the school’s recommendations and advice.
Parents figure out their children’s needs from the knowledge they acquired at the second point, parental involvement with schooling, and act correspondingly. In addition, parents’ activities and involvement go beyond school activities, involving parent-child interaction rather than that of home-school communication. Still, these authors advocate that the movement along the continuum should be gradual instead of dramatic.
Figure 1. Continuum: From involvement to engagement. Goodall and Montgomery (2014)
In view of all that has been mentioned so far, one may suppose that parental involvement can take place at home, at school or in the form of home-school communication. In addition, this process can be considered as a dynamic process that can be changed and improved by the parents themselves or members of schools. For example, Emerson et al. (2012) assert that “it is not necessarily meaningful to make a clear distinction between home and school-based engagement, particularly where the two are mutually reinforcing: promoting the engagement in the home
often requires communication between teachers and parents that may take place in the school environment and which then fosters positive changes at home and elsewhere” (p. 26). This claim, in my opinion, agrees with the theory of considering parental engagement and parental
involvement as part of the continuum proposed by Goodall and Montgomery (2014). These scholars convey the idea that the terms parental engagement and parental involvement can hardly be separated as they affect each other bilaterally. Therefore, this study will name parental
participation at both home and school as parental involvement (for the convenience of the readers, too).
As parents’ involvement in their children’s English language learning might be the result of integrated curriculum introduction, parental practices may largely intersect with school English teachers’ instructions. Therefore, this study will be guided by the framework of Goodall and Montgomery (2014), which covers the parental practices that occur within and beyond the school environment. Thus, this framework is not restricted to school-based activities, but it involves parental practices which are aimed at developing their children’s English skills from birth (see the descriptions by Gao (2006, 2012) and Hajar (2019) in the previous section). In addition, as this framework explores teacher-parent-child relationships, it might contribute to an understanding of parents’ attitudes towards and challenges emanating from the introduction of the English language in the first grade and recognition of the nature of stakeholders’
collaboration at the micro level. Finally, this framework is flexible and user-friendly and can be adapted for the specific areas and needs of researchers. For example, Jay, Rose and Simmons (2018) adapted this framework to explore parental involvement in supporting children’s
mathematics learning by differentiating parents’ practices into the school-centered approach (the first point of the continuum) and parent-centered approach (the third point of the continuum).
Similarly, this study adopts this framework to explore parental involvement specifically in their children’s English language learning through semi-structured interviews. Thus, this study will
investigate parent-English teacher interaction, parental practices with assisting with their children’s English homework completion and in developing their children’s English language skills, respectively.
Conclusion
This chapter has focused on the process of implementing trilingual education and
discussed challenges faced by parents and teachers in this regard. Then, the parents’ role in ELL was identified and some advantages of home-school communication were described. After that, the chapter continued with the description of different types of parental involvement, and finally presented the conceptual framework that guided this research.
Chapter 3: Methodology
The previous chapter focused on a review of the literature relevant to the involvement of parents in their children’ education, in terms of English language learning. This study is the first qualitative study that has attempted to uncover the challenges and the practices of parents in their involvement in their children’s English language learning from the first grade in the Kazakhstani context. To achieve this aim, the following research questions, initially presented at the end of Chapter 1, have needed to be answered:
1. How do parents perceive the notion of having their children introduced to English at an early stage of their education?
2. What challenges do parents face while involving themselves in their young children’s English Language learning?
3. What are parents’ practices regarding the mediation of their young children’s English language learning?
This chapter sets out the methodological issues related to this study by discussing the following: the research site, participants, data collection and sampling procedures, limitations of the data collection method and ethical issues.
Research Design
A qualitative research design was employed to answer the research questions of the study. A qualitative research design can be accommodated to gain a deeper understanding of a problem and a central phenomenon (Creswell, 2014). Thus, compared to a quantitative research design, qualitative one can enable the researcher to describe and interpret their findings to understand the phenomenon (McCombes, 2019, February 25). Furthermore, similarly to the present study, the studies (e.g. Cleland, 2018; Jay, Rose & Simmons, 2018) that adopted Goodall and Montgomery’s (2014) framework of the continuum employed a qualitative research design based on one-on-one (Cleland, 2018) and group (Jay, Rose & Simons, 2018) interviews.
Since “interview questions can ask for experiences, opinions, feelings, knowledge, sensory, or demographic data” (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016, p. 136), this tool was adequate for obtaining the participants’ subjective answers about their attitudes, successes and struggles in helping their children, their home practices in assisting their children’s ELL, and their reflections on school activities. To learn each parent’s experience in their involvement with their children’s ELL, it was decided to choose one-on-one semi-structured interviews as a data collection instrument. In addition, this choice was aimed at understanding the parents’ attitudes towards their children learning three languages simultaneously in the first grade as well as the challenges and struggles they have been facing in their involvement of their children’s ELL. Therefore, an interview protocol with 11 open-ended questions was prepared so that they could answer the research questions of the study. After that, the data was collected from fifteen participants through one-on-one interviews, ten of which were conducted face-to-face, while the other five were conducted by mobile phone (see Table 1). The section below moves on to describe the participants and the criteria used in selecting them.
Sampling procedures. The rural parents of the first-grade students were chosen as the participants of this study for several reasons. First, due to the division in academic performance between urban and rural students as described in Chapter 1, this study was aimed at learning the implications of trilingual education in the rural regions of Kazakhstan with a focus of its
implications on rural parents. Next, the population of this study had to be the parents of the first- grade students who started attending the school in September 2019. As the EL is the least employed language in Kazakhstan, having 1,870,900 users as this second language (Eberhard, Simons, & Fennig, 2020), the present study attempted to explore how rural parents are managing with their involvement in their children’s ELL when the EL is introduced concurrently with the Kazakh and Russian languages in the first grade. Finally, to avoid obtaining one-sided, biased results, the parents were not selected according to such characteristics as gender, education and
knowledge of languages. Consequently, this study sampled 15 rural parents from 13 households (families) whose first grade children studied at a state school which followed the trilingual model of education. Even though their children attend the same school, their occupation and knowledge of the EL differed from each other (See Table 1).
As a result, the current study employed the purposeful sampling method. With purposeful sampling, the population and research sites are “intentionally” chosen to acquire valuable data (Creswell, 2014, p.228). Regarding the parents who were involved in the current research, the researcher employed homogenous sampling (Creswell, 2014). Using this sampling strategy enabled the researcher to gain access to the parents of one “subgroup” to explain how the parents in a rural community understand the incorporation of the English subject at an early educational stage, their challenges in assisting their children’s ELL and the extent to which these parents either enabled or hindered their young children’s English language learning. Despite their being members of one community, as can be seen from Table 1, they were varied in their demographic characteristics and were likely
