“Mama, sign this note”: Young Refugee Children’s Brokering of Literacy Practices

In this article, Perry provides a case study of a Sudanese refugee family and the language and literacy brokering provided by their kindergarten daughter. In addition to helping with letter-sound correspondence and vocabulary in English, she provided valuable knowledge about genres, the purposes they serve in the world, and how they are used. The parents valued their young daughter’s brokering and viewed her as an important teacher, particularly with respect to the many texts that came home from school each week. The girl’s experience of brokering in school was different, however. This case study offers important implications for supporting young children’s literacy development, family literacy, and parent participation in education.