Iranian-American Parents Attitudes

Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

Running head: IRANIAN-AMERICAN PARENT’S ATTITUDES AND BEHAVIORS

Iranian-American Parent’s Attitudes and Behaviors towards

Persian Language Development and Maintenance in Their Children

Maryam Salahshoor

EDRS 812

Dr. Joe Maxwell

George Mason University

December 08, 2011 Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

Abstract

This study used an interpretive/qualitative methodology to explore the attitudes, practices, and challenges of developing and maintaining Persian/Farsi as a heritage language for

Iranian-American immigrants living in the Washington, DC area. The findings were based on data collected through five semi-structured interviews with four Iranian-American mothers in

Washington, DC area. The research showed that the choice to maintain Persian was not necessarily easy, nor was it straightforward. The main findings of the study were threefold. First, all of the parents expressed a desire for their children to know Persian, and most had either established a Farsi only policy at home or tried to teach Farsi literacy to their children at some point. Second, the children heritage language skills and maintenance were largely driven and influenced by social settings outside the family. As the children grew older and attended school, they tended to shift to English more. Finally, it was found that despite parents’ ideologies in maintaining their heritage language, the day -to-day demands of family life, limited resources, and the lack of immediate need for heritage literacy made it increasingly difficult for parents to continue to teach and maintain these skills, such that some of them eventually “gave up”. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

Introduction

“Millennia of human experiences are wrapped up in the plant’s many languages, and this

linguistic diversity may be as essential to our cultural health as biological diversity is to our physical health. No language is an exact map of any other; each is, in a sense, its own world. By

allowing so many of these worlds to slip away, we may be forfeiting a lot more than just

words.”(Sampat, 2001, p.34)

According to the 2000 census, one out of five children in the United States had immigrant parents, and 80% of these children were United States citizens. (Passel & Capps, 2003). As a result of this ever increasing migration to the US and upward of 150 heritage languages other than English are spoken or at least understood. From the perspective of language educators, the term “heritage language” describes the “endangered or immigrant languages” and a heritage language learner is a person “who is raised I n a home where a non-English language is spoken, who speaks or at least understands the language and who is to some degree bilingual in that language and in English” (Valdes, 2001, p. 38). Research shows, however, that as a rule within two to three generation most non-English-speaking immigrants to the U.S. will have lost or almost lost their heritage language. According to Veltman, (2000), immigrant families typically undergo a three generation (three fold) shift to English resulting in loss of heritage language. The first generation is heritage language dominant with some knowledge of English. The second generation is bilingual in both the heritage language as the strongest communicative mode.

However, the second generation literacy is high on the English side and low in heritage language side. The third generation tends to become fluent in English, with little or no knowledge of the heritage language spoken by the grandparents. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

This pattern of language lost does not develop in all communities with the same speed.

In fact some studies in the United Sates show that many language minorities acquire English rapidly, and at the same rate, lose their first or heritage language or take into hiding – using it only in the private spaces of their home and family and small circles of heritage language

-speaking friends (Roca & Colombi, 2003). Veltman (2000) also points out that as the rate of immigration increases; the rate of language shift is also increasing toward a two-generation shift.

During the 1960s and early 1970s, many Iranians as the recent group of immigrants came to the U.S. to pursue educational and professional advancement. In my observation, many of these families remained in the U.S. almost unintentionally at first - giving birth to children, enjoying educational and professional successes, living comfortably, and returning to Iran for regular visits. Iranian-Americans constitute an affluent and educated immigrant population in the

United States.

Iranians are very proud of their classical and modern literature and most native born

Iranians can easily read and understand classical Persian literature which is very rich in terms of use of riddles and proverbs. A survey conducted by the Iranian Studies Group at MIT reported that among Iranians living in the United States, language, traditions, festivities, and family values were the most important aspects of the home culture (Mostashari, 2004). Similarly when asked what aspect of the home culture they would emphasize in educating their children about

Iran, respondents indicated Persian language and traditions as their top choices.

However, there is a wide difference in the extent of language maintenance between the first and second generation Iranian-American. First generation Iranian-Americans most frequently use Persian as the language of their choice. Yet eventually, these families watch their children make American friends, attend American schools, and speak English as their first and Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes sometimes only language. Despite increased awareness of the necessity of heritage maintenance and development, the problem of Iranian heritage loss cannot simply be reversed by the desire of the families and individuals to maintain their heritage language. In order to understand the problem of heritage language in ethnic communities, it is necessary to examine the issues and challenges that each community faces.

My rationale, background, and theoretical framework

My decision to examine Persian heritage language learning and maintenance through my research project was based on my own personal, practical, and ideological reasons. Ideologically,

I choose this topic because I believe that language lost is a worldwide problem that negatively impacts both the language minority group(s) and the dominant language group(s) concurrently. I believe that immigrant people who lose their language might eventually be separated from their cultural heritage and this language lost might prevent them from living their cultural identity to the fullest extent. So far, few studies, indirectly related, have studied Iranian communities in the

U.S. with regard to language.

Additionally, my interest in the topic of heritage language learning and maintenance is a personal issue for me and is rooted in my own identity as an Iranian-American citizen woman.

My cultural, linguistic, and racial characters construct my nationality and my civil rights and duties form my citizenship. I consider identity and culture not as fixed concepts, but rather fluid process. My identity changes as my experiences vary. My past experiences have constructed my current identity as an Iranian-American woman. I grew up in a middle class family in Iran. Upon getting my college degree in the field of special education, I came to the United States 22 years ago; got married; worked and raised three children. At first it was hard to assimilate with the new environment and gain the same human capital characteristics such as language skills, educational Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes achievement, and occupation and income level that native-born English speaking people had.

Eventually, I perfected my English, attended school, worked and raised three children in the US.

Currently, my three children are in college, high school, and elementary school and are doing very well. In short, I became an American; yet, this was not satisfactory for me. I wanted my children to acquire their heritage language and traditions of their home country. As a result, I tried to acculturate my children with Iran and Iranian culture by speaking Farsi (Iranians’ language) to them and celebrating events like Noroz (Iranian’s New Year) and other cultural activity and gatherings. I brought many story books from a visit back home and used to read them to my children when they were younger. Yet, in my efforts to embrace my children with their home language and culture, I have learned a difficult lesson; children do not necessarily acquire the language and culture of their home country. For instance, I had to enforce the use of

Persian at language at home while my husband and children resisted speaking Persian. My husband considers learning Persian unnecessary, and at times refrains from speaking Persian in public spaces due to the backlash from public opinion about Iran. As I look back at my past experiences in raising my children, I am not completely satisfied in my efforts to teach my native language and culture to my children. I fear that any amount of heritage language skills that my children have acquired might be lost due to disuse. As a result of my own experiences and challenges in teaching and maintaining Persian heritage language for my children, I want to know what conflicts, both linguistic and cultural aspects other Persian speaking parents have encountered and how they have dealt with those issues. I believe that preventing a heritage language requires constant awareness and practice, which can only really be accomplished among family and close friends. Unfortunately many Iranian-American families either don’t have extended families in the US or their relatives are spread all over the United States. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

Therefore, many Iranian-American families might find it hard to teach and maintain their heritage language to their children. Judging from my own experiences, I already believe that most parents would like for their children to learn their heritage language and would speak Farsi to them at least at home and that their attitudes and perceptions regarding Persian heritage language had a direct effect on their children’s language of choice. However, I assume that the parent’s perceptions on this subject is a reflection of many social, political, cultural, and psychological influences coming from the large society. For instance, since the “Iranian Hostage

Crisis” in 1980, Iranians immigrants have been subjected to discrimination and prejudice in the

U.S. Some Iranians in my belief have chosen to disassociate themselves from their nationality and chose not speak their heritage language or teach it to their children in order to avoid negative stigma associated with being Iranians. I have observed this behavior in many Iranians. For example many times if I meet somebody at the mall or in the store which I can tell they are

Iranians and when I initiate a conversation they refuse to talk Farsi fearing they might draw attention to themselves. I assume that not all parents hold the same beliefs about the importance and purpose of heritage language learning. I do not have all the answers to how these experiences have shaped my perspectives about this topic. Review of the literature on this topic could provide me with some directions in where to begin or what to look for. Many research address the heritage language learning in other ethnic communities such as Korean or Chinese.

However, the research on Persian heritage language learning or maintenance is scares or even non-existent in the U.S. In my opinion the lack of such studies in Persian language is related to many factors. First, Iranian scholars traditionally pursue higher education in engineering and medical field. Second, due to the long-standing animosity between the U.S. and Iran, many

Iranian American scholars prefer to avoid controversial topics that may deal with language such Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes as heritage language. I suppose that conducting this research, not only sheds some light on my personal question and help me gain a better understanding about the heritage literacy teaching efforts and experiences while living in mainstream U.S., but also it will be an effort to break ground on this subject and add to add to the overall body of knowledge on heritage language.

Furthermore, as a part of my doctoral program at George Mason University, this fall I am taking my third class in my major (Multicultural/Multilingual Education). In one of my classes

“EDUC 882 Seminar in Bilingualism SLA Theory and Research” I leaned about the importance of maintaining heritage language of children at home and at school. I would like to use this study as a pilot study for my dissertation research, which I believe I will probably employ a mixed method for it, therefore, the insights that I gain from this process would benefit me in my future research.

As a result of these experiences, I am interested to find out about the ways other Persian speaking parents perceive heritage language learning and maintenance in their children. I believe that my familiarity with the subject and my own experiences and challenges might jeopardize the validity of my findings and interpretation blaming children’s lack of proficiency in Persian heritage language on parent’s lack of persistence, inadequate resources within the community, or children’s lack of motivation. With this in mind, I have tried to formulate my research question in such that they don’t create a tunnel vision, allowing me to pay attention to a wide range of data (Maxwell, 2005).

Research Questions:

To achieve the goal of the study the following questions will be explored:

1. What are parent’s attitudes and beliefs and desired outcomes regarding their children’s Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

language and literacy learning in Persian in the U.S. context?

2. What do the parents think of their children’s abilities in Persian?

4. How do parents act or what they have done based on their attitudes and beliefs to

support and maintain their children’s Persian language and literacy learning?

3. What are some factors that parents think influence their children’s Persian language

learning and literacy maintenance?

The Participants

Participants in my study were all, but one, living in the same general neighborhood as me. I chose the participants in this study based on the following criteria: (a) Iranian, (b) married to another Iranian, (c) bilingual in English and Persian, and (d) parent to a child living at home who was 10 years of age or older at the time of the interview, and who may or may not have communicative and literacy skills in Farsi. I set the first two criteria in order to control for the cultural background at home. The third criteria served as tool to identify how the participants used both the heritage language and the majority language at home, the fourth criteria was necessary to make sure that the parents reporting were fairly recent and not those that had occurred many years ago as in case with grown children who had moved out. The age factor is important in this study because it allows for the child to have been at the age that literacy teaching is appropriate and possible. Also in my previous observations, I noticed that although language minority parents might communicate to their children in their heritage language before the school age, they usually do not attempt to teach reading or writing to them, fearing that it might interfere with their ability to learn reading and writing in English.

Originally, I had planned to interview four Iranian and one Afghan mother whom I knew would fit my research criteria. However, I had to drop my Afghan participant since my Afghan Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes friend declined to be taped for the interview. Although she agreed to participate in my study first, once she found out that the interview would be tapped she changed her mind and declined the interview.

All of the participants in my study were in their 40s and 50s, and most had immigrated to the United States after the age 25. All of the participants had married an Iranian man, stayed married, and had children with them. Three of the participants had become U.S. citizens and one was in the U.S. on the basis of her husband’s work visa. All of the participants were Muslim. The education level of the group varied widely. Out of four two had a B.S. degree; one had a M.A. degree; and one had a high school diploma.

Emma migrated to the United States 16 years ago when she was single, got married, and has raised two children here. Her daughter is 15 and her son is 10 years old and they were both born and raised in the U.S. She earned her B.S. degree in mathematics science in Iran and since she did not further her education in the U.S. she settled to have a teacher assistant position in an elementary school. Emma is fluent both in English and Farsi.

Mitra is the only participant in this study that does not have a U.S. green card or citizenship. She has a high school diploma from Iran. She got married in Iran nine years ago; had her two children; and migrated to Canada. After four years her husband got a work visa as a civil engineer and brought his family to the United Sates. Their work permit is temporary and they have to update it every three years. She does not have a work permit herself, therefore, cannot work and remains a housewife. She has two sons. The older son is 19 years old and since the time of the interview has moved back to live with relatives in Canada since they cannot afford Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

the non-resident tuition for his college education. The younger son is 13 years old and lives with

his parents. Mitra is fluent in Farsi, but, her English language skills are not as advanced as other

participants in this study.

SHERRY

Sherry migrated to the United Sates more than 30 years ago and became a U.S. citizen.

She has earned both her B.S. and M.A degrees in accounting field in the U.S. She works part

time as an accountant for two doctor offices. She is married and has two children. Her older son

is 21 years old and is graduating from college and her daughter is 19 years old and is in first year

of a community college. Sherry is both fluent in Farsi and in English and her ability to speak

English is the highest among the participants in this study.

Azi earned her B.S. in Farsi literature in Iran and married a friend from college. About 20

years ago she migrated to the U.S.; opened jewelry; shop and became a U.S. citizen. She is the

only participant with only one child. Her son was born in the U.S. and is 15 years old. Azi is

proficient in both Farsi and English language. Azi’s husband also works with her in her jewelry

The table below provides basic information about the participants in this study. All participants’

names have been changes to pseudonyms.

Table 1. Demographic data

Name Age Marital Children’s Children’s Occupation Education Years in Immigration (pseudo) Status Age Birth Place the U.S Status 2 EMMA 45 Married Girl,15 U.S. Teacher B.S. 16 U.S. citizen Boy,10 assistant 2 MITRA 44 Married Boy,18 Iran House wife Diploma 5 Work visa Boy,14 Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

2 SHERRY 52 Married Girl,18 U.S. Accountant Masters 30 U.S. citizen Boy,21 1 AZI 49 Married Boy,15 U.S. Jewelry B.S. 21 U.S. citizen store owner

Researcher Relationship to Participants

The length and nature of my past relationships with my subjects vary. I know Azi for

more than 10 years as we used to live in the same neighborhood and our sons were playmates.

Although we have moved from that neighborhood since, our sons are still good friends and visit

each other from time to time. I met Emma, Mitra, and Sherry, in the community pool of our new

neighborhood about two years ago. I have maintained a good relationship with them ever since

and occasionally visit them in their house or through our parties. I decided to choose the

participants from the people whom I already have personal relationships with so it would be

easier for me to gain their trust and openness for the interview. I thought that they would be

willing to discuss their beliefs and heritage language practices with me if they already knew me

and my family and would expect that I had similar experiences and understand them. I also

believed that since I share many of the cultural and characteristics and ethnic believes as my

subjects, I would be better able to identify and understand the parent’s point of views and be able

to ask appropriate questions and make comments that develop our mutual understanding further.

But this may have also hindered their willingness to be open and honest with me regarding their

personal believes and experiences. I tried to minimize this threat by emphasizing that all of the

data that I gathered would only be seen by me and would be destroyed after the study was

completed. I also was concerned that my position as a doctoral student might be the source of a

power differential perceived by my participants. To address this potential threat to the validity of Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes my data, it was important for me to build a trusting and non judgmental relationship with my participants. I tried to ensure that my participants feel comfortable, valued, and appreciated. I communicated my intentions about the study through phone calling since I thought that they would be more comfortable to say no if they chose not to participate than face to face communication. I was careful to minimize my power status as a PhD student researcher by avoiding use of academic language and explaining the research goals and procedures in a casual and informal manner. I made sure that I explained the nature and purpose of my study to my participants. I emphasized that as an Iranian mother, I had understanding and could relate to their challenges and wanted to learn more about their experiences. I made them feel valuable to my research and mentioned that the knowledge that they have is very valuable both to my research and to the field of heritage language study since the most data in this area comes from those who experienced it firsthand. I emphasized that my intention was not to judge how successful they were in teaching and maintaining Farsi skills to their children, but to learn from their views and practices and gain an understanding of realities that they face in their efforts and that this knowledge would be guiding me in planning my future dissertation research.

Data Collection

The primary source of data was a semi-structured interview that I conducted face-to-face with each of the participants. Under the guidance of peers and my professor, I designed my interview questions in such way that they would be open-ended and flexible enough to allow participants lots of freedom in expressing their positions and beliefs on the subject. I also created an interview guide as a tool for my research. At the beginning of each interview session, I reminded each participant of the purpose of the research while I stressed the anonymity and confidentiality of the interview. I started by some friendly conversation to break the ice followed Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes by asking the interviewee the factual section of the guide such as demographic information. I then followed by probing questions to cover the behavioral section of my interview questions to learn about the family’s language use encouraging the interviewee to discuss the circumstances of the usage, patterns, interesting expectations, etc. I then continued with the attitude section of my questions, prompting them to elaborate on their responses.

Before conducting each interview, I called each of participants to set up a date and time that was convenient. This worked in most parts; however, the first interview did not go as planned. Emma called me the day before the set date for the interview and said that they had an emergency repair scheduled for that day and either she had to come and meet with me today within half an hour in my house or she had other commitments and could not meet with me until next week. I agreed to meet with her the same day, but was not ready for the interview as my recorder was still in its box and I had not figured out how to work with it yet. It took me 20 minutes after she arrived to start the interview. At the same time my husband and children came home and although they tried to stay away from our interview room, we were still distracted by the sound of the T.V. they were watching in the other room. Yet, I tried my best to stay focused on the topic and ignore the distractions. After the interview, I listened to our recorded conversation and realized that she gave very limited and narrow answers to my question and would not elaborate her responses. I suspected that this might have been either due to the distraction and the fact that we had audiences or that I conducted my interview in English mode and she did not feel comfortable taking the chance in giving elaborate descriptions of the event and opinion fearing that she might make a mistake in her language. My second interview went much smoother. I contributed this to the fact that our interview date and time happened as planned and also to my decision to conduct my remaining interviews in Farsi, the language that Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes was most comfortable for my participants. I did not encountered anymore unexpected problems in the rest of my interviews and the decision to change the interview mode to Farsi seemed to work perfectly. I met with the participants in their house, had casual conversation about our family life while having tea before the interview and as the direction of our conversation changed toward the study; I would turn on the recorder casually without bringing much attention to it so the rest of our conversation would seem the continuation of our casual talk and not the beginning of our interview. I also learned from my first interview not to use my interview guide to ask questions and just have it on table and check every topic that was covered as the participants talked about them. I thought that this would make our communication less formal and rigid. .

Data Analysis

After the first three interviews were completed, I entered my files to the computer and started the transcription. I had purchased a foot stopper that supposedly would allow me to stop the audio playing while I was catching up with the typing, however, I could not figure how to use this device as it would not work on my computer, therefore, I decided not to use it. This made my transcription job much longer that I had expected. Another problem that I encountered in transcribing my data was the difficult task of translating my interviews from Farsi to English.

The translation by itself was not that hard, however, I had to stop frequently and think whether my translation of a word or phrase was accurate or not? I was worried that my persistent to translate every word as close to the source as possible would distort the original meaning the whole message. I transferred my interview transcript into a grid, with my interview questions in one column and mother’s answers in column two, and one more column which I left blank for my coding next to each response. Once I finished the transcription, I read each one several times Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes and began to compare and contrast the interviews to see patterns and schemes. I started coding the data according to similarity of each data with another or the topic of the data and not what the actual massage was. At some points even opposite accounts or messages were collected under one substantive according to their similarity on the topic. For example, I created a substantive category called “mother as care giver”. Then the data form one mother reporting that she had to work outside of the house and had to leave her kids in daycare with English speaking people; and the data from another mother on the same topic but this mother was reporting that she stayed home and was the main caregiver of her children, were both listed under the substantive category

“mother as care giver”. Labeling data in such way was somehow confusing to me, since I did not know how to deal with data that had related topic but different messages or opposite events.

To solve this problem I started some remediation that proved disaster to me later, I decided to highlight my data in two different colors for each substantive category. So each substantive (my interpretation of what was going on) or emic category (which was taken from actual phrases and words of the participants) had two sections. One section highlighted in light green that I considered “helpful” to the development of heritage language and another highlighted in light blue that I considered “not helpful” to the development of heritage language and resulted in children speaking English rather than their heritage language. To make the matters even more complicated, I tried to gather all the responses that belonged to one substantive category and list them in a table format for each participant. So each participant ended up with 14-18 substantive categories highlighted into two colors with all the remarks they made about each category recorded in a few words. For example the data below consists of everything that EMMA said about Farsi classes that were not helpful and then there would be another section for the positive things she said about Farsi school. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

EMMA classes closed -not much students -volunteers Farsi School did not charge - Kids play after school, more -Instructions above the child’s level interested to socialize, -emphasizing on history and (Shah) -school was mostly for speaking -complicated vocabulary Farsi -different levels and ages in one class -they wrote the book themselves - complicated book -their main purpose political

I even complicated the processes even more by creating another table for each 14-18 substantive category and coping and pasting each participant’s remarks on that category. This is the point that I realized that I was making the matters complicated and I might never be able to finish this project at this rate. Fortunately with the inputs from Dr. Maxwell and my peers, I realized that I don’t have to hold on to everything they said and should just pay attention to what stood out for me. Beside Dr. Maxwell pointed to me that by separating each category into two “helpful” and not “helpful” I might run into the risk of seeing the data in a very narrow and tunnel vision preventing me from seeing the whole picture.

Therefore, I started all over again. This time I just stayed with my emic and substantive categories without pre-analyzing them. I coded three interviews and started seeing that some codes just came up briefly in one participant’s remarks and not in the others. After initial coding,

I reviewed the codes and eliminated less useful ones and combined smaller categories into larger ones, or if a very large number of responses were assigned the same code, I subdivided that category in to new categories.

After completing all the interviews, I created another matrix (Appendix A), this time a much simpler one. I listed all the codes in a column and the names of the four participants across Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes the top. Under each participant’s name I pasted the actual quotes for the interview that was corresponding to that code. This was very helpful since I was able to visualize all the concepts in the interview in one glance. At this point I was seeing similarities and differences in responses to a particular topic or code. Some codes had responses from all participants and other codes were only presented in a few participant responses. Altogether, the data yielded 22 codes which I categorized under three main theoretical categories (personal character, social life, and family life), according to my interpretation of each codes and how I saw he relations between them. For example, I categorized the following codes (school work, Iranians school, Home vs. Public,

Public Resources, Immigration, Future needs, and Socialization) under “social life” category since I believed that these concepts were are related since they all related to the aspects of social life outside of the family. My final themes and categories included the following:

 Personal character

o Personality/birth order/motivation/age/language proficiency level

 Social life

o School work/Iranian school/home vs. public/Canadian experience/public

resources/immigration/future needs/socialization and parties/Media/Technology

 Family life

o Talking at home/ mother as main care giver/extended family/visiting Iran/parent’s

attitude/ home literacy environment/time and resources/parent’s effort/ Iranian

values and culture

By spreading responses as initial codes across this large matrix organized by substantive categories and their correspondent theoretical categories I was finally able to see the differences Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes and similarities between responses, make connections, and draw early conclusions. Viewing data from a distance allowed me to see a larger picture and understand how this picture relates to my research’s central question.

In order to create a logical chain of evidence and to see how these factors relate to each other, I then created a visual map shaped like pyramid divided in to three sections. I believe that heritage language learning starts at home; therefore, factors under this category in my opinion have the most direct impact and are the basis of children’s heritage language learning and maintenance. Factors under this category included; the nature and amount of interactions and language use that close family members have with each other at home; the challenges they face in their day-to-day life; their attitudes and desired outcomes; the amount of time they spend talking in their heritage language. Also, whether the mother is the main caregiver; whether grandparents live with or visit the family; whether they visit Iran and hoe often; and etc. The social aspect of life outside of the family is the second important category which I placed in the middle following by the personal characters on the top. All of these categories and their element together created the circumstances which resulted in “heritage language learning or maintenance” in the children.

Findings

Question 1: What are parent’s attitudes and beliefs and desired outcomes regarding their children’s language and literacy learning in Persian in the U.S. context?

Parent’s attitude and Desired Outcomes:

The mothers interviewed in this study, all spoke often about their attitudes toward heritage language learning and desired outcome that they envisioned for their children related to that. The language outcomes that mothers desired for their children were similar across all of the Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes five participants. Without exception, every mother expressed strong desire for their children to speak Persian.

[EMMA] “Because you know when you speak different languages actually you open the

pathway to learn the culture of this country”

[MITRA] “I think I also liked if they spoke only Farsi at home and not English.” from

the first day that we arrived I stressed that they should try not to forget their Farsi

[SHERRY] “The only thing that was important to me was that that my kids must learn

Farsi even before they learn English”

[AZI] “Right now I enjoy it so much. We give him so many prizes so he keeps speaking

Farsi, we love it so much …You know it is SHAMEFULL, that the child of two Iranian

people speak only English”

In regards to literacy skills, most parents expressed a desire for their children to be able to read and write in Farsi as well.

[EMMA] “I wish they could at least read”

[MITRA] “I would rather that both of my kids could read and write in Farsi”

[AZI] Reading and writing is even more important. When they have literacy skills, their

communications does not get interrupted; they do not forget the language’

However, SHERRY’s opinion differed than others. SHERRY expressed opposing views regarding the need for Persian literacy skills. On one hand she had mentioned that it would be good for the children to learn Persian literacy skills.

[SHERRY] “Yes I would prefer my child be literate in Farsi. Of course I would let them

learn to read or write it especially that it is their mother’s tongue…… My kids also think

if they knew how to read and write in Farsi they could easily turn it to their benefit like in Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

college they could use this as a second language requirement and pass it since it would

be so easy for them. They could get +A all the way through”.

On the other hand, she believed that learning to speak Farsi and communicate with parents and relatives is good enough for the children to learn their parent’s culture and family values. She stated that literacy skills in Persian was not really necessary since the Iranian- children live in an English majority society and they may never get a chance to use these skills, so in her opinion this would be a “waste of time” and resources. She believed that Persian schools should teach Persian etiquette and culture rather than teaching literacy skills.

[SHERRY] “Farsi reading and writing does do have any use here. I have been living

here for 32 years and the only time that I needed to read and writes something was when

I needed to go to the Iranian embassy and fill out a legal document. …We don’t have

anything in here that is in written Farsi. Me…, if my child tells me that he/she does not

want to ever go back to Iran, and have the opportunity in here to learn Farsi as a

Foreign language instead of other languages, I would tell my kid to study French or

Spanish and do not waste your time on learning Farsi….. I think it is a nonsense and

worthless thing to do….. for somebody that wants to stay in the United States”.

Future Needs:

Most parents believed that being able to read and write Farsi would “benefit” their children in the future in regards to future education and job opportunities as they described this ability as a “leeway for jobs”.

[EMMA]”You know you have more leeway when you are going to get jobs. So when the

opportunity may come to you in life, so speaking second or third languages can be

helpful to them”. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

[SHERRY] “If you notice when you apply for a job, they ask you what languages you

can speak. They never ask you whether you can speak English; they know that you are

applying for a job here so you must know English pretty well; but they all ask you what

language(s) you can speak”

Living in D.C. metropolitan area was another reason for maintaining their children’s heritage language.

[MITRA] “Well, we live in D.C. area where dual language skills are really in need and

I think whatever extra language that you can speak specially your mother tongue if you

can speak and write it could be an advantage for you. If a person can speak and write in

two or more languages they might have an advantage over others and companies who

need dual language speakers might prefer to higher them.

Iranian Culture and Values:

Mothers viewed language maintenance as a way of preventing lost of cultural identity and “following” and melting into the dominant culture.

[EMMA] “I tell them that hey we are not just here for following their (Americans)

culture. Get some of the good culture from them and some of ours”

[SHERRY] “I thought that they could learn English at school anyway, so we need to

teach them Farsi to learn their culture and their heritage background…… Although my

kids don’t have are not literate in Farsi,; but they know what they are doing; they know

how behave with Iranian; how to behave with grown up.; and there are thing that are

just specific to Iranian culture that are very important”. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

[AZI] “as long as he learns how to read and write in Farsi, since we have roots in Iran,

his grandparents and aunts and uncles are still there”.

Question 2: How do parents act or what they have done based on their attitudes and beliefs to support and maintain their children’s Persian language and literacy learning?

Iranian School:

As a result of lacking school support for developing and maintaining heritage language, the development and maintenance of the heritage language was up to the family. In this study, it seemed that some parents were more involve with their children’s heritage learning as it was evident by their children’s heritage language proficiency. When these parents saw that their children are losing their heritage language, they often made strong efforts to remedy the situation. The two most common means of trying to remedy this loss was increased insistence on use of the heritage language “They cannot or are not allowed to speak English at home at home”

[SHERRY] and enrolling children in a heritage language school. These schools teach literacy and oral skills in the heritage language as well as values and culture. Children go to these schools after regular school or on Saturdays. For several reasons however, mothers felt their children did not benefit much from them. For example, in the case of MIRTA’s son the school did not provide differentiated instruction for children who were at different levels of Persian language proficiency.

[MITRA] “The main point of the school was for the kids to learn conversation in Farsi

not to read and write. So my son was already fluent in speaking Farsi”.

Also, the heritage language program used materials published in their home country, and students often did not respond positively and enthusiastically to them, “Some of them they were not happy” since the content often had little direct relevance to their lives. For Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes example, EMMA mentioned the lack of appropriate teaching materials “they wrote their book themselves” which is at the children’s instructional level and also engages their interests as another challenge that they faced in community Persian schools.

[EMMA] “But the problem was that the school instruction was way above the level of the

children. They were more emphasizing more on history than learning the language. For

example they were talking about Shahanshah” (exiled king of Iran in 1977)…. They

wrote their book themselves and they did not realize how complicate the book is for the

kids…… after a year she said: mom I do not want to go anymore”.

Schedule conflict was another challenge. Juggling her busy work schedules while also trying to accommodate one or more children’s after-school or weekend classes; left

AZI very little time to facilitate her son’s participation in heritage language classes.

[AZI] “I wanted to take him to a Farsi class. But since didn’t have time to take him to

school since we are always working on the weekend, also he does not like rule and

regulation of the school, so he told us “how about you teach me Farsi?”

SHERRY on the other hand, felt that since there are not many uses for Persian literacy, it would be useless to take away her children’s weekends to attend Persian classes.

[SHERRY] I also did not feel good to take away their Saturday or Sunday weekend and

take them to school for Farsi… There is no usage for it. I mean once they learned it the

case is closed, one word!!!! (yek kalom). Here the phrase “one word” expresses

“assurance” which is a metaphor in Iranian language.

In addition to facing schedule challenges, AZI felt the pressure to promote her son’s assimilation into U.S. society as she reasoned that since her son speaks the heritage Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes language at home, there is no need to spend time learning it at school where he could be learning another language.

[AZI] ‘Since I think that he has learned Farsi somewhat, so I rather him learn French so

he can speak three languages’.

Home Literacy Environment and Efforts:

The majority of mothers had made an effort to maintain their children’s heritage language by either sending them to community schools, or by teaching their children the basic literacy skills at home. The continued use of oral and written language in different environment, not only aided the growth of the language, but also it provided motivation for the children to see the usefulness of their heritage language.

[SHERRY] “I started teaching them these about four years ago. I teach them their own

names. However, learning Iranian alphabet was hard for them and they could not learn

it. They know common words such as (obb, water) (baba, father). Learning their first

,”بابا Dad “ baba ,“ آب name and last name was very interesting to them. (water “obb

it was funny for them to write it and they liked it. And they liked ”مادر mother “momon

the funny way that the letters looked to them.

[MITRA] I taught him myself. He can write names, last names… I wrote the alphabet for

him and told him how to practice it. After a while he practiced and knew how to do it. I

wrote like “alef, beh, peh, teh, seh” I wrote five letters at a time for him and showed him

how to read and write it.

Others, who were less successful, and also less involved with their children’s heritage language maintenance; although not by choice, felt guilty about their lack of efforts. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

[SHERRY]”However, not reading and writing, and I think that it was my fault since

when they went to school I also went to work and at that time I did not have enough time

to teach Farsi”.

Others made some efforts but were not consistent in their efforts. For example

EMMA sent her children to Persian school for a while, however, the program did not meet the learning needs of her children and they lost their interest in attending the school. She now thinks that homeschooling could have been her next option, however, the day-to-day demands of life and the “busy lifestyle” did not leave enough time for that.

[EMMA] “Maybe I should have just stopped this school and teach her at home. But our

lifestyle does not allow us to do something extra”.

Another problem parents faced in teaching basic literacy skills at home was the difficulty of teaching Persian alphabet to the children.

[SHERRY]“Like teaching alphabet in Farsi is very hard for them since we have letter

that are similar and have the same sound but they have different names and figures., like

T and T they both sound the same but loom different and different words might use either

of them and the child gets confused which one to use”.

[MITRA] I had problem teaching him the alphabet he since like I told you we have

letters that have the same sounds but their shape looks different, it would confuse him

and a long time hard work is needed to work with the kids so they would not forget it”.

Overall, the participant’s responses in this study regarding the heritage language maintenance issues revealed that those who maintained a high level of proficiency (SHERRY, and MITRA) used their heritage language more frequently and in various ways of listening, speaking, reading, and writing. It seems that in the case of this study, the success is rare. Some of Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes the parents encouraged their children to develop literacy in Persian by having them read and write in Farsi at home.

[MITRA] “I have brought many Farsi books with me and started to teach him his name

as a drawing so he would copy his name since he did not know the letters and their

sound”.

However, home literacy efforts of these mothers was not an easy task and sometimes many challenges arrows that caused the family stop their efforts which many regretted it later.

Parent’s Role:

Parents are an important part of the success of a heritage language learning and maintenance. Parental involvement in heritage language maintenance was another issue that came up in mother’s responses. SHERRY mentioned that as a parent, she impacted her children’s heritage language learning by spending more time with them and being involve in their lives and by modeling their family values constantly.

[SHERRY] “When the kids were supposed to be at home by 3:30 from school I was home

at 3:00. So I would go and pick them up from school, I never let them go by bus, I take

them and bring them back myself. So they would completely speak Farsi….. A kid that

has grown up with family value, they earn from the family; kids learn everything from

their mother”.

In addition to sending their children to heritage language programs, parents believed that they can promote their children’s language development by ensuring that they speak the heritage language at home and engage in other activities to make up for time not spent in classes. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

[MITRA] “I think that kids need to be encouraged to do this any way possible. . So if the

kids are encouraged maybe with game play, I brought some CD from Iran that is all

game lay on the computer so they tech alphabet with computer game”.

Although parental involvement was definitely viewed as a vital part of success, some parents felt that they faced various challenges when trying to support their children’s language growth.

[EMMA] “I think parents can do a lot. We get busy and we forget what we are losing.

Then sometimes we cannot do something about it”….. I just think we should not give up

on our kids. Even if we teach them a letter or a word a day.

Extended Family, Visiting Iran:

There may be nothing better for family retention of the heritage language than making return trips to the homeland. For most immigrants, this is probably impossible, due to economic considerations or political problems in the homeland. However, some families are wealthy enough to make occasional or even regular visits to the old country. Families able to retain these close ties are those in which bilingualism is most likely to thrive. A visit to the homeland may give many Iranian-American children who might otherwise abandon their heritage language new motivation to learn. In the case of language maintenance, most mothers believed that in order for their heritage language development and retention to be successful, the language needed to be used in multiple contexts and emphasized many language benefits of visiting the home country when possible.

[MITRA] “When they went back to visit my family and visit their grandparents, they

were very happy that they could communicate with them…. I would always tell then when Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

you call Iran and speak to your grandparents you should speak Farsi fluently and not

broken and with English words in them so they can understand you”.

AZI noticed that her son’s Persian language skills had progressed while visiting their home country.

[AZI]” When went to Iran and stayed for two months, then we saw that since he was with

his cousins his age there for two weeks and had to speak Farsi; we all of the sudden

noticed that he responds in complicated Farsi words; like the words stayed with him

from there and now he was using them…… My son also we knew he would understand

but did not have the courage to speak it at first, and when he came back from Iran he

found the courage to speak it also”.

EMMMA was “hopeful” that she could accelerate her son’s heritage language skills by sending him to visit their home country.

[EMMA] “But if somebody came from Iran they try so hard to negotiate and speak Farsi

to them…… Hopefully when my son gets older if I take him back to Iran to visit the

relatives hopefully he would be more interested then he would be able to speak then

talking to relatives would help”.

Even when it was not possible to visit home country often, parents felt that children should have other people beside their parents to talk in the heritage language, and that close proximity to extended family members could be very beneficial as they can serve as the

“role model” for their children”.

[SHERRY]”My extended family live close by and my sister is living here, my sister’s

kids live here and they all know Farsi and they are a role model for my

kids.”……“However, something is very important, besides parents speaking with the Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

kids outside of the house, other grownups like your sister, your friend, your brother, if

they also speak Farsi in public places it is also very important and can support the kids”.

Question 3: What are some factors that parents think influence their children’s Persian language learning and literacy maintenance?

Mothers as Main Care Giver:

Majority of mothers noted the important roles that mothers play in children’s language skills especially when their kids were younger. EMMA expressed her regret that she could not interact with her children much since she had work obligations and had to leave her children with “baby sitter” or at a daycare, where they had to speak English, resulting in language shift and losing what they had learned at home.

[EMMA] “But with my son, I just left him with babysitter when he was four and I started

working, I had no choice”.

AZI also had to work in her jewelry store while her husband took care of their son and did not allow their son learn Farsi at first fearing it may interfere with his English learning.

[AZI] “since my husband took care of my son at home when I was working for two and a

half years and said “no” I don’t want him to learn Farsi, I want him to learn English

since I don’t want him to have any problems when he goes to school”.

While for SHERRY and MITRA this was not a problem since one MITRA never worked outside of the house and SHERRY only started to work when her children were older and attended school. As expected earlier as a result of my own experience and observation, their children Farsi skills were much higher than the other two mothers who had to work and did not have many interactions with their kids. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

[SHERRY]“When the kids were little I was not working until they reached school years

and when they went to school I started working

Time/Public Resources:

Most mothers described the daily management of their children’s language use as a balancing act. On one hand, they wanted to “teach them Farsi” and on the other hand life challenges would make it hard for them to do so. For example, work obligations and scheduling conflicts which prevented parents from sending their children to weekend Persian classes. Some parents even felt guilty about not having devoted enough time to their children’s heritage language learning.

[EMMA] “Our life style won’t allow it”

[MITRA] “Also classes were on Saturday and Sundays and it would make it harder for

the parents that were busy during the week to take the kids to class… I think where we

live the resources are very limited and for example for a Farsi class parents have to

drive long distances and that school is not even the way it should be”.

[SHERRY] “I think that it was my fault since when they went to school, I also went to

work and at that time I did not have enough time to teach Farsi”.

School Work:

The children entry to school was also a significant turning point. As children began attending school, they started to bring English home with them, impacting their parent’s heritage language literacy efforts. Mothers often noted that children needed to complete their homework assignments and abandon their heritage language literacy teaching efforts.

[SHERRY] “But later I saw that the one hour that I was teaching them Farsi, they could

be learning their own school work, since they not be advanced in it, and also they would Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

stay behind from their studies in school. …..I did not have enough time to teach Farsi. It

was very important for me that the kids have good learning foundations and wanted to

make sure that they learned their school work completely.

Home vs. Public:

Language minority children are subjected to tough assimilative pressures at community, mainly from their peers. They may be made to feel different, and their language or accent may be ridiculed. These children begin to develop a sense of shame about their language and culture and accordingly make every attempt to suppress it. Parents in this study mentioned that their children spoke English in public places most of the time since it would make them feel more confident about themselves.

[MITRA] “Outside they speak English to their Friends even if they are Farsi speaking

people…….So in formal situations like Dr. offices or school they prefer if we spoke

English to them, However, if we go to places like the mall of places to have fun like the

pool they do not care if we speak Farsi to them and are not embarrassed….if we go to

places that the majority are white and has less immigrant population, they rather speak

English. This way their self esteem is also higher than when we speak Farsi to them in

these situations

[AZI] “He likes to speak Farsi in the public. But if he feels that there are people who do

not understand Farsi and they might think that he is talking about them, and then he talks

English”

Language Shift: Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

In reflecting on the language loss, SHERY mentioned that although Persian was the main language in their home, she did not think that her children’s heritage language would be lost by the third generation.

[SHERRY] “But my children that have learned here, I doubt that if one day the Farsi is

offered at school they would tell their kids to take Farsi classes since, I don’t think they

are going to do this since they are grow up here”.

Socialization/Parties:

Mothers also believed that socializations and family gathering had a great impact on their children’s heritage language skills. Majority of the mothers reported that their children use Persian with other adults and relatives in parties and other social gatherings.

[SHERRY] “When the kids or young people get together they all speak English together.

As soon as the situation changes like we go and join them they switch right away and

speak Farsi. When a grown up comes in they, maybe they want to be respectful, they

speak Farsi, but when they are together by themselves they speak English”.

In such gatherings, children not only got to use and practice their heritage language, but also were exposed to many advanced words that other grownups used that they had not heard from their own parents

[MITRA] “if we had parties and he would hear a word that adults had used and he did

not know the meaning of it, he would come to me and ask me mom what does this word

that grownups use mean……… he had learned vocabularies that we did not use much

with him and he learned it by paying attention to the conversation of adults in our family

gatherings”. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

According to MITRA Community Persian schools were also a great place for socialization and networking.

[MITRA] “Eventually mothers would also get to know each other’s and they would start

going to each other houses and invite each other for birthdays and so on. This would

eventually lead to a big group friendship so when the kids had to go to Farsi school on

Saturday they did would not feel that they lost their Saturday since they knew that they

would have fun after the class”.

Individual Differences/ Birth Order/ Age:

One mother thought that individual differences in her children’s personalities such as their varied language skills and interests as well as their wide-range of their learning styles had a great impact on their language learning and retention.

[MITRA]”my younger son has tried to speak more often and he is a talkative child by

nature…….. My other son does not play emotional and just communicate the things that

he needs not his emotions and feelings. His talk has just practical points”.

Other mothers noted the impact of birth order and age differences on Farsi language learning.

[EMMA] “I think that with my daughter I could not speak any English because I had just

came so I did not have any choice but to talk Farsi. So she learned it. “He is different.

But my daughter answers me back in Farsi”…. he can’t because he has a very limited

vocabulary. But my daughter does, she loves Farsi….. He gets frustrated when he sees

somebody that does not speak English”.

[SHERRY] “But I think the kids that are older like 18 or so they can progress faster.

Like they might be able to pass the first grade in one month and the second grade the

next month if they already know how to speak it. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

[AZI] “They are so young now and don’t understand much. As he gets older, you , Iran’s

situation does not stay like this all time, they can go and come back more frequently as

the traveling there get easier and they become a different person then”.

Motivation:

AZI thought that peer pressure was a positive force and a motivation in her son’s desire to speak his heritage language.

[AZI] “Another thing that “clicked” for him was that he has friends who also speak

other languages and when he is with them and he sees that they speak their own

language with each other so he is also encouraged to speak his parent’s language”.

Conclusions

Many Iranian-American parents undergo an intense effort to maintain their heritage language. Language maintenance is hard. In some scene it is like a battle and sometimes families lose their will to fight this battle resulting in diminishing their heritage language at home. Ultimately this challenge forces some parents to “give up” as they mentioned “We pay for that you know. Some of the things we have here that we do not have it back home so we pay for it”. While there is a great deal of variation in heritage language fluency among the children’s of these mothers interviewed here and many held different views about heritage language use, almost all of the students agree that they want their children to know their heritage language if at all possible.

As I had expected at the beginning of my study, Iranian parents from this study share similar positive attitudes toward maintaining heritage language, but feel hopeless in some ways.

They think although, it is important for their children to maintain Persian to be able to communicate with parents and expended family and to learn about their family values and ethnic Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes culture, however, they feel that it is more urgent that they learn English well for academic purposes. They all agree that because of pressure from the mainstream society, it is hard for children to maintain Farsi proficiency. They regarded the Persian weekend classes somehow beneficial but lacking sufficient materials, teaching methods, and convenient time and location.

Another finding that I also expected was the prevalent of English use among Iranian-

American children. When children grew older and went to school, they tended to shift to English more. English eventually replaced Farsi because it is used in school and at public places and social settings outside of the family.

Finally, it was found that despite parents’ ideologies in maintaining their heritage language, the day -to-day demands of family life, limited resources, and the lack of immediate need for heritage literacy made it increasingly difficult for parents to continue to teach and maintain these skills, such that some of them eventually “gave up”.

Limitations

One of the limitations of my study in my own opinion is my lack of experience in conducting qualitative research. As a first time researcher, I question almost every aspect of my research. Did I choose appropriate interview questions to get the most dada for my research? Did

I use the appropriate method of coding? Were my analysis and findings credible? My answer to these questions seemed to vary. One day it seemed that I was confident with most of my approaches and another day I doubted most of them.

Another threat to the validity of this research is lack of “member checking” since the participants were not given their interview transcripts and the research reports so they can agree/disagree with the researcher’s findings. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

Also credibility of participants in this study could be questioned. I have know all of the participants on a personal level therefore, they might have wanted to impress me and given me the answers that I wanted to hear.

Also my status as insider might have affected my ability in collecting and interpreting the data without bias. Another factor was the translation. Although I was cautious and tried to ensure an accurate translation, it was difficult to be certain that the phrasing and word choices would be interpreted the same way in both English and Farsi.

Future Research

Given the limited amount of extant on Iranian-Americans heritage language learning and maintenance, future research is needed to confirm my results. This study only begins to develop an understanding of this population. Further investigation is needed to deepen our understanding of Iranian-American language views and practices. A larger sample, perhaps with more open- ended questions, may deepen our knowledge regarding this matter.

Reflections

The fact that I am a native Persian language speaker, made me believe that I understood this topic well. Doing this qualitative research made me realize the depth of knowledge one can acquire even on the previously known subjects to them. The most important thing that I learned by doing this qualitative research was that I realized that I DO NOT listen well at all. By listening to the recordings, I was amazed by how much I did not hear. I now realize that I needed to slow down, relax and just listen. I think since this topic had such a personal significant to me, I had a hard time to just listen. Often I was so busy thinking about formulating my own responses to the participants comment (specially my first interview) and felt the eager to verify their stories with my own stories, that I missed important pieces of information. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

References

Maxwell, J.A. (2005). Qualitative Research Design. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Passel, J, & Capps, R. (2003). Immigration and state response. Paper presented at the Governing

in the Global Age Conference. George Washington University. Washington, D. C.

19-21.

Sampat, P. (2001). Last Word. World Watch, 14 (3), 34-37.

Valdes, G. (2001). Heritage language students: Profiles and possibilities. In J.K. Peyton, D.

Ranard, & S. McGinnis (Eds.), Heritage languages in America: Preserving a national

resource (pp. 37-77). McHenry, IL and Washington, DC: Delta Systems and Center for

Applied Linguistics. Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

Appendix A

EMMA MITRA SHERRY AZI Categories Substantive Initial Initial Coding Initial Coding Initial Coding Categories Coding

If asked in English/if Farsi with Farsi only rule at Spoke English asked in Farsi/when us/communicate home/siblings first/made a Talking at home mad/not offensive/ with parents/ English/parent mistake/afraid of Family more vocabulary mix languages/ spoke Farsi at future school Life /take me more witness parental home/ problems/now we seriously/ interactions/broth speak Farsi/he insists ers speak English Raised daughter to Both raised by Homemaker until Husband took care of school age at mother at kids school age/did him until the age of 3 Mother as main caregiver home/Left son with home/did not not ride school while mom working or not the baby sitter when work/ bus/followed them in the store/he young/ for most activities/ imposed English only Negotiate with people Grandparents Farsi with aunts, No family here/roots from Iran/need for speak uncles in Iran/should learn more relatives here Farsi/calling English with Farsi to speak with Extended family Iran/stress cousins/ switch them fluency/frustration conversation mode when grown up Visiting Iran Parental attitudes and desired outcome Literacy learning environment at home Time / resources Parent’s Efforts Family values/culture Future need School work Social Life Iranian school Home vs. public Canadian experience Public resources Immigration Future need Socialization/parties Media/Technology Personality differences Children’s Birth order Characteristics Motivation Age Language proficiency level Iranian-American Parents’ Attitudes

Appendix B

Heritag e Langua ge

Personal Characters Personality, Birth Order, Motivation, Age, Language level

Social Life School work, Iranian school, Home vs. Public, Canadian Experience, Public Resources, Immigration, Future Needs, Socialization/parties

Family Life Talking at home, Main care giver, Extended family, Visiting Iran, Parent’s Attitudes/ Desired outcomes, Literacy Environment, Time/Resources, Parent’s Efforts, Famil values/ Iranian culture