Home learning activities and parental autonomy support as predictors of pre-academic skills: The mediating role of young children's school liking

This study investigated the mediating role of children's school liking between parent-child interactions and children's pre-academic skills. Specifically, parent-child interactions included frequency of mothers' and fathers' formal and informal home learning activities with children, as well as their autonomy support during these activities. Three hundred first-year kindergarteners were tested on two aspects of pre-academic skills, namely oral vocabulary and object counting, while their mothers and fathers reported parent-child interactions and children's school liking. Structural equation modeling showed that after controlling for demographic variables, mother-child informal learning activities and mothers' and fathers' autonomy support were positively linked to children's pre-academic skills via school liking. Father-child informal learning activities and mother- and father-child formal learning activities were not related to children's school liking nor to pre-academic skills. Our findings suggest that more coaching can be provided to parents on how to promote children's school liking and pre-academic skills.