Examining the relations of early literacy activities and skills to reading dispositions, engagement, and achievement among fourth-grade students in the United Arab Emirates
This study examined the relations of early literacy activities and skills to reading dispositions, reading engagement, and reading achievement among 17,469 fourth-grade students in the United Arab Emirates who took part in the English and Arabic versions of the 2016 Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS). The study also investigated the mediational roles of reading dispositions and reading engagement in the association between early literacy activities and skills and reading achievement among these fourth-grade students in the United Arab Emirates. Results of multigroup path analyses, after accounting for student and family demographic characteristics, suggested that early literacy activities and skills were significantly positively associated with reading dispositions, reading engagement, and reading achievement in English and Arabic among fourth-grade students in the United Arab Emirates who took the PIRLS 2016 reading assessments in English and Arabic. Moreover, one of the reading dispositions, confidence in reading, mediated the associations between early literacy activities and skills and reading achievement in English and Arabic among fourth-grade students in the United Arab Emirates. Implications of the findings for policy and practice are discussed.