Abstract:
Learning to read and write seems to be the focal point of educating individuals
and children. According to Vygotsky‘s (1978) Sociocultural Theory,
children‘s learning begins at home and what takes place at school reflects
children‘s home living and literacy environmental factors. This reason sparked
the need to investigate the home literacy environment and its effects on the
English reading outcome of grade 2 pupils such as the relationship between
parental socio-economic status and pupils‘ reading achievement. Through
purposive sampling, the research selected 112 grade 2 pupils and their
respective parents to produce quantitative and qualitative information for the
study. The study organised the analyses into contextual factors (parental
education level, occupation, electricity, and television), home reading
materials, and home literacy activities (parental teaching, reading to child, and
singing, rhyming, telling stories, and visiting the library). The findings
revealed that most grade 2 pupils lived in poor home literacy environments
due to the low level of education of their parents and parental occupation.
However, the findings show that high or middle level of parental education is
a positive predictor of children reading outcome, as well as electricity
presence in the home. Although a marginal majority of homes had reading
materials, they did not have any positive significant effect on children reading
competencies but the number of books available in the home did. In terms of
the home literacy activities, the study revealed that only a few parents engaged
their children in literacy activities. Also, the frequency of engaging the
children in reading, parental teaching, and storytelling at home proved to be
significant positive predictors of early reading competencies. The study has
implication for pedagogy, policy making, and further research.
