The Effects of Home-based Academic and Regulatory Practices on Reading and Mathematics in Early Childhood: Self-Regulation and Executive Functioning as Mediators

To succeed academically, children must be able to pay attention, follow instructions, and ignore distractions. These skills require self-regulation and executive functioning. Research shows that parents' home-based practices predict children's self-regulation and executive functioning, as well as their reading and mathematics scores. However, studies have not yet explored whether parenting exerts its influence on children's reading and mathematics skills through its relations with self-regulation and executive functioning. This study investigated the potential mediating roles of self-regulation and executive functioning in the association between a composite of parents' home-based practices and children's reading and mathematics scores in kindergarten. The parenting composite included parent-reported warmth, family routines, and home reading and mathematics activities. Data came from the ECLS-K 2011 and included 14,080 children who were first-time kindergarteners in the fall of 2010. Analyses of parallel multiple mediator models revealed that both self-regulation and executive functioning significantly mediated the relation between parents' home-based practices and children's reading and mathematics scores in kindergarten. In order to explore potential racial/ethnic differences in parents' home-based practices, mean levels of warmth, family routines, and home math and reading activities were compared across Asian, Black, Latino, and White participants. Separate parallel multiple mediator models were conducted in each racial/ethnic group. Results revealed significant racial/ethnic differences in parents' home-based practices. Self-regulation was a significant mediator of the relation between home-based practices and children's mathematics and reading scores in all racial/ethnic groups. Overall, the study demonstrated that although parents' home-based practices differed significantly across racial/ethnic groups, they were consistently related to children's reading and mathematics scores through their relation with self-regulation.