Parents’ Attitudes and Shared Reading Practice after Early Literacy Promotion in a Well - child Clinic Setting

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Early literacy promotion is one of the recommendations in child health supervision.

OBJECTIVES: To compare parents’ attitudes and shared reading practice before and after early literacy promotion in a well - child clinic setting.

METHODS: A prospective cohort study was conducted with parents of children aged two months to six years visiting the well - child clinic at Burapha University Hospital, Chonburi Province, Thailand. Between June and December 2020, early literacy promotion including appropriate children’s books provided to each child was emphasized in the well - child clinic. Opinions of parents’ attitudes and shared reading practice were obtained by two questionnaires conducted three months apart.

RESULTS: There were 171 participants enrolled in the study. After the early literacy promotion, more parents routinely read with their children from 80.7% to 96.5% (p < 0.001). Parents used more time in reading with their children from 11.8 min/day to 13.9 min/day (p = 0.23). Nevertheless, there was a significant reduction of the screen time from 23.3 min/day to 11.2 min/day (p = 0.001). Most of the parents agreed that reading took an important part of developmental promotion, and children aged 6 - 23 months were the best age to start reading together.

CONCLUSIONS: Early literacy promotion in the well-child clinic could improve parents’ attitudes, shared reading practice, and also could reduce children’s screen time. Moreover, it was found that the age of six months and above was the most applicable age for early literacy promotion.