Acquisition of the majority language in Norwegian ECEC: Relating language-learning environment in ECEC to expressive vocabulary.

The aim of this study is to look at how the quality of the language environment in kindergarten affects the expressive vocabulary of three-year-olds and five-year-olds who, at home, speak languages other than the majority language spoken in the kindergarten.

The study shows that the quality of the language learning environment in kindergarten has a positive impact on the expressive vocabulary in the majority language at three and five years of age, but only for children where parents only spoke the majority language at home. At the start of the project, the majority group had significantly better expressive vocabulary in Norwegian compared to multilingual children. The difference in skills did not decrease from three to five years old – regardless of the quality of the language learning environment provided in ECEC (Early Childhood Education and Care).

The informants were taken from over 90 randomly selected public and private kindergartens, and the sample consisted of 1078 children. Of these, 863 children had parents who only spoke Norwegian, Danish or Swedish at home. The to bilingual groups consisted of 102 children with one parent who spoke the majority language and one who spoke another language, and 52 children with parents who only spoke other languages. Data were collected when children were 3 and 5 years old, using quality assessments (ITERS-R and ECERS-R) and individual assessments of children’s language skills, where they were shown images of objects they had to name. In addition, parents reported language use at home via a survey.

Hansen, J., Eliassen, E., Romøren, A. S. H., Kleppe, R., Garmann, N. G., & Bjørnestad, E. (2023). Acquisition of the majority language in Norwegian ECEC: Relating language-learning environment in ECEC to expressive vocabulary. Nordisk barnehageforskning, 20(1).