The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government prioritizes L2 students’ early Chinese learning as a pathway to adaptation to the Hong Kong education system and social integration ( Hong Kong Legislative Council, 2012 Curriculum Development Council, 2017).
In addition, South Asian households with children experience a higher poverty rate (30.8%) than the local population’s average (15.2%) ( Research Office of the Hong Kong Legislative Council Secretariat, 2017). Research reports have documented that South Asians encounter tremendous challenges in acquiring the Chinese language, and the language barriers have limited their educational and career opportunities (e.g., Equal Opportunities Commission, 2012 Bhowmik and Kennedy, 2016). These L2 Chinese learners mainly comprise of South Asians and Southeast Asians, including Pakistanis, Nepalese, Filipinos, and Indians, whose home languages include Urdu, Nepali, Hindi, and English.
Currently, more than half of the local kindergartens have admitted non-native Chinese speaking students ( Hong Kong Legislative Council, 2021). In Hong Kong, where Cantonese is spoken by 93.7% of the local population, the ethnic minority population has risen steadily in the past two decades, making up 8.4% of the population ( Hong Kong Census and Statistics Department, 2022). The findings suggest the importance of supporting L2 children’s oral language at earlier stages of Chinese learning, and the need to provide instructional support to compensate for their relative weakness in literacy at school entry.Īmid growing international mobility, it is increasingly necessary to understand second language (L2) acquisition of culturally and linguistically diverse children to promote their academic achievement and social integration. This study highlights the Chinese learning needs of L2 preschoolers and provides understanding of their abilities in mapping among character written forms, sounds, and meanings. In addition, results indicate that diverging gaps between L1 and L2 learners’ Chinese character acquisition existed across class levels for the associations involving written character form, but not in regard to associations between character meaning and sound. Results showed that L2 learners had greater development in meaning and sound associations across class levels, implying that they may first develop oral language related abilities. The CCAA is comprised of six subtests and assesses children’s abilities to make associations among character written form (orthography), sound, and meaning. This study used the Chinese Character Acquisition Assessment (CCAA) to compare character acquisition of 491 L2 children aged from 3 to 6 years against that of 240 of their L1 peers from Hong Kong kindergartens.
The findings raise the question of whether L2 learners who fall behind their L1 peers in language abilities will be further disadvantaged, showing a weaker development gradient. Studies that compared the language abilities of first language (L1) and L2 students in English-speaking contexts have reported young L2 learners’ disadvantage in using the dominant language in oral language and comprehension at school entry. These children face challenges in acquiring L2, especially in Hong Kong, where the dominant Chinese language contrasts strongly with their home languages.
#READING COMPREHENSION FOR KINDERGARTEN 2 PROFESSIONAL#
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