Mexican parents’ and teachers’ literacy perspectives and practices: construction of cultural capital

Abstract

This article examines the relationships among the literacy practices engaged in by first-grade children and parents at home and the ways in which these practices are communicated, shaped, and fostered by teachers and administrators in two different sociocultural environments in urban Mexico. The differences observed between the home literacy experiences of children in a working-class and a middle-class community included transgenerational communication of assumptions regarding literacy and schooling, as well as attitudes associated with the parents’ own school experiences. Class-based expectations on the part of teachers not only shaped interactions with parents, but were also reflected in the way the national curriculum was delivered, with a greater emphasis on rote skills and traditional reading instruction in the working-class community. The authors argue that the school plays a role in the co-production of cultural capital in the home through its shaping of some of the literacy practices that children and families undertake.

Keywords:

• literacy practices
• Latin America
• home–school connections

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by a grant from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the Institute of Education Sciences, R01 HD044923, “Language and Literacy Development Among Mexican Children.” Our deepest thanks to the families and school personnel who made this work possible, as well as to our colleagues on the research team: Claude Goldenberg, Victoria Torres Armenta, and David Francis.