The relationship between achievement in second language acquisition and parental involvement: A case study of multilingual primary school learners in Sabah studying Mandarin

The project considers learning Mandarin Chinese as a second or additional language by non-Chinese children and investigates parental involvement in relation to their academic achievement. The aim is to identify pedagogical strategies non-Chinese speaking parents used to support their children through interactions in the home context. This mixed method research collected data in five phases from 11 Chinese vernacular schools in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. The study identifies usable strategies parents and teachers can adopt to support children in their process of learning Mandarin Chinese. Findings of this project add knowledge to the fields of multilingualism and applied linguistics.