The objectives of this study were to analyze what difficulties young children at multicultural families experience while growing in Korean society closely in all environmental contexts related to the children and to identify factors affecting their ad...
The objectives of this study were to analyze what difficulties young children at multicultural families experience while growing in Korean society closely in all environmental contexts related to the children and to identify factors affecting their adaptation to early childhood educational institution. For these purpose, we sampled 44 children attending a private kindergarten out of 79 multicultural family children attending a public or private kindergarten in the Gwangju area currently as of 2010 with the help of the Gwangju Education Office and the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, and also sampled at random 53 multicultural family children attending a childcare center in the same area in order to induce the representativeness and generality of the sampling. In addition, we surveyed the multicultural family children and their foreigner parents and class teachers.
The research tool used to measure the multicultural family children’s adaptation to early childhood educational institution was PAQ (Preschool Adjustment Questionnaire) developed by Jewsuwan, Luster & Kostelnik (1993) and adapted for Korean young children by Kim Ji-eun (2003) and Kim Hyeon-gyeong (2009). In order to enhance the validity of this study, we obtained concurrent validity through factor analysis and reliability test for the tool and used 4 factors related with adaptation to early childhood educational institution (prosocial adaptation, peer adaptation, self‐adaptation, and daily work adaptation). In addition, for identifying items that may influence multicultural family children’s adaptation to early childhood educational institution, we divided variables into organic variables, home environment variables, and institution environment variables in consideration of ecological variables used to multicultural family children in previous research (Kim Hyeon-gyeong, 2009; Shin Hye-jeong, 2007; Jeong Min-yeong, 2009). Among microsystem variables, organic variables related to multicultural family children were the children’s gender, age, birth order, Korean language level, and difference in appearance. In addition, home environment variables as multicultural family children’s microsystem variables were father’s and mother’s age, father’s and mother’s academic qualification, father’s and mother’s education level, total family income, foreigner parent’s occupation and Korean language level (Korean language skills in speaking, listening, reading, and writing), marital satisfaction, and cultural adaptation stress, and institution environment variables were class teacher’s age, academic qualification, marital status, teaching experience, job satisfaction, and teacher efficacy, the number of classes, the degree of bullying, and cultural adaptation stress.
According to the results of this study, first, with regard to the general tendency of multicultural family children’s adaptive behavior in early childhood educational institution, prosocial adaptation showed the highest score, and was followed by daily work adaptation, peer adaptation, and self‐adaptation.
Second, in order to see the relative influence of system variables on multicultural family children’s adaptation to early childhood educational institution, we performed correlation analysis among the system variables and then made hierarchical analysis of 5 child‐related variables, 9 home environment microsystem variables, and 9 institution environment microsystem variables. According to the results, among multicultural family children’s adaptive behaviors in early childhood educational institution, daily work adaptation was affected significantly by the children’s age, father’s and mother’s age, and class teacher’s job satisfaction and teacher efficacy. Self‐adaptation was affected significantly by father’s age, mother’s age, teacher efficacy, and experience in bullying, and peer adaptation was affected significantly by children’s age, father’s age, foreigner parent’s Korean language skill, teacher efficacy, and the child’s experience in bullying. Furthermore, prosocial adaptation was affected significantly by children’s gender, foreigner parent’s Korean language skill, teacher efficacy, and the child’s experience in bullying.
Third, in order to see the relative influence of variables affecting multicultural family children’s adaptation to early childhood educational institution, we performed stepwise regression analysis. According to the results, daily work adaptation and self‐adaptation were affected most by teacher efficacy, peer adaptation was affected most by teacher efficacy, the child’s experience in bullying, overall Korean language skill, and father’s age in their order, and prosocial adaptation by teacher efficacy, the child’s experience in bullying, overall Korean language skill, and children’s gender in their order.
The results of this study as presented above are meaningful in that they provide information for supporting young children from multi-cultural families to adjust themselves to their early childhood education institution so that they can find and solve their problems in all environmental contexts related to the children including their parents and teacher and they may grow into all-round society members through adjusting themselves to the early childhood education institution that they experience first other than their family.
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