A Study Of Young Children’s Reading Responses To Traditional Chinese Culture Picture Books

Excellent traditional culture is the essence of culture that has been accumulated during the development of China’s history for thousands of years,and is the spiritual pillar and source of strength of a nation.In recent years,the relevant national policies have clearly proposed to educate young children about traditional culture through "creating a series of picture books" and "writing Chinese culture books for young children".The cultural contents and tendencies in picture books implicitly influence children’s cultural perceptions.As one of the main venues for traditional culture education,kindergartens need theoretical support and practical strategies to select and apply related reading materials,and children’s responses to traditional culture picture books are an important way to understand their cognitive performance and interest preferences in traditional culture-related contents.In order to systematically present children’s understanding of traditional culture picture books and to optimize the selection and application of picture books in kindergartens,the study collected children’s linguistic responses in group and random independent reading activities of traditional culture picture books through semi-participant observation and video analysis,and supplemented with questionnaires and interviews to understand the basic status of children’s reading of traditional culture picture books.With reference to Kiefer B’s(1995)framework of linguistic responses to picture book reading for young children,the reader response and cultural sign theory as the theoretical basis,Nvivo12 software was used to code and analyze the actual linguistic expressions of young children to generate the classification of young children’s reading responses to traditional culture picture books in this study.The children’s linguistic expressions to the traditional culture content were presented in four dimensions: information-based responses,associative and imaginative responses,inspirational responses,and emotional and attitudinal expressions.The study combined the questionnaire and interview data with the children’s reading records to analyze the influencing factors in four aspects: the differences in children’s individual pre-experience,teachers’ cultural literacy,the textual characteristics of traditional culture picture books,and the creation of reading environment and selection of picture book resources.Based on the presentation and analysis of children’s reading responses,we found that there are problems of teachers’ stereotypical perceptions of traditional cultural contents in picture books,lack of attention to children’s actual reading orientation of traditional cultural picture books,and insufficient integration of picture book reading with traditional cultural education.In order to make the selection and use of traditional culture picture books in kindergartens more adaptable,the researcher proposed corresponding suggestions in terms of traditional culture picture book resources,teachers’ literacy and reading styles: in the selection of picture books,teachers should try to take into account children’s differences and different characteristics of the text;in teachers’ literacy,they can improve their interpretation of traditional culture picture books through learning traditional culture knowledge;in reading styles,they try to In terms of reading style,we try to break through the utilitarian orientation of traditional culture picture book reading on the premise of respecting children’s thinking,so as to provide better help and support for children’s traditional culture picture book reading.