The PCAP-13 2007: Report on Differences in Reading Performance of 13-Year-Olds Based on Language and Minority Majority Language Status supplements the PCAP-13 2007: Report on the Assessment of 13-Year-Olds in Reading, Mathematics, and Science, which describes the performance of 13-year-old students on the Pan-Canadian Assessment Program, developed and administered in 2007 by the Council of Ministers of Education, Canada (CMEC). The assessment focused on reading as the major domain, with mathematics and science as the two minor domains. A complementary report (PCAP-13 2007: Contextual Report) was published in October 2009. The report analyzed the context variables from the student, teacher, and school/principal questionnaires that were administered as part of the assessment and identified the variables that are strongly linked to reading performance. This report is based on the same context variables, but it focuses on those that best explain the differences in performance between six language groups.

The assessment population was divided into six groups: Majority English (students attending anglophone schools in all provinces and territories except Quebec); Quebec English (students attending anglophone schools in Quebec); Quebec or Majority French (students attending francophone schools in Quebec); and three groups of francophone students attending francophone schools in minority-language settings outside of Quebec — that is, New Brunswick French, Ontario French, and Small French Minorities, which encompasses francophone students from all other jurisdictions because the numbers of participants did not warrant individual groups. When possible, the Small French Minorities were further divided into two groups: West French Minorities and East French Minorities.

This first of the eight chapters in this report provides the broad context for the study, including the objectives, design, components, and implementation process of the 2007 PCAP assessment.

Chapter 2 describes the reading performance of all six language groups. It then provides comparisons with the average performance of all Canadian 13-year-old participants, as well as the relative performance between language groups.

Chapters 3, 4, 5, and 6 compare the six language groups, based on the context variables derived from the responses on the questionnaires administered at the same time as the assessment. Chapter 3 deals with student- and school-level demographic variables (e.g., socioeconomic status, language spoken at home, public vs. private school, community size). Chapter 4 addresses variables related to attitude and motivation in relation to school, learning, and reading. Chapter 5 analyzes various student reading behaviours and strategies. Chapter 6 sets out a number of the variables related to teaching, particularly reading instruction in the participating schools. Each of these four chapters contains charts showing each group's score for each context variable measured, linking the variables with students' reading performance.

Chapter 7 is crucial to understanding the links between the large number of context variables that were analyzed and the reading performance of the students in each of the six groups. Multivariate regression models were used to compare the links between the context variables for each individual language group. These models can analyze the effect of one variable (e.g., reading strategies) while taking into account the effect of all other context variables included. This report attempts to identify the variables that play a determining role in each group's reading performance. Some variables may have similar effects in all groups.

Chapter 8 provides a summary review of the key context variables that play a determining role in each group's reading performance, and briefly discusses some of the educational and classroom consequences.

Significant results include the following:

  • The Quebec or Majority French group has the highest mean score (532) and the New Brunswick French group has the lowest mean score (458).
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  • More than half of students in the West French Minorities, East French Minorities, and Ontario French groups do not usually speak at home the language of instruction of the schools they attend.
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  • For all language groups except the East French Minorities group, the tendency is for student subgroups who usually speak at home the language of instruction they receive at school to have higher mean scores.
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  • Three language groups (Majority English, West French Minorities, and Quebec English) tend to have the highest proportion of students reporting to have 100 or more books at home.
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  • The Quebec or Majority French group has the highest percentage of teachers who consider themselves to be language-arts specialists. This contrasts with the Small French Minorities groups, which have the smallest proportion of teachers who consider themselves to be specialists of language arts.
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  • The minority-language groups have mean scores that are slightly lower than those of the two majority groups for parent/guardian encouragement of reading.
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  • The New Brunswick French group has the largest percentage of students dedicating little time to language-arts homework and the smallest percentage of students doing one hour or more of language-arts homework.