A home-to-school approach for promoting culturally inclusive family–school partnership research and practice

Abstract

In this article, parental role construction is framed from a sociocultural perspective. Applying this perspective foregrounds the need for researchers and practitioners to gain an insider’s understanding of how families themselves construct their roles in supporting children’s education. By doing so, the field can reimagine family–school partnerships that are inclusive of normative family practices across ethnoculturally diverse families and develop interventions that build on cultural heritage, community strengths, and families’ funds of knowledge. In this article, a home-to-school, strengths-based conceptualization of family engagement that challenges deficit-based and school-centric orientations toward families is described. Evidence from three innovative research projects will be discussed that shows by being curious about how parents construct their roles and support their children at home (both directly and indirectly), researchers and practitioners can gain useful information to co-create more culturally inclusive and welcoming school environments, as well as more meaningful home–school connections.