Parents' Reactions to Teacher Practices of Parent Involvement

The Elementary School Journal Volume 83, Number 2 ? 1982 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved. 001 3-5984183/8302-0009$01o.00 Teachers approach their instructional tasks with a variety of perspectives and strategies that emphasize certain aspects of teaching and deemphasize others. For example, some teachers teach language skills using organized games, while other teachers teach the same skills by direct instruction. Teachers adopt different approaches to the same subject matter partly because their teaching situations differ. Their students may have different learning problems or their classrooms may have varied resources and facilities. Even in the

added by over 1,000 teachers to a survey of teachers' practices. Results of the survey of 3,700 teachers in about 600 schools in Maryland are described in Becker and Epstein (in this issue). The teachers' comments reflect the variation in years of experience and in the number and types of contacts individual teachers have had with parents. Each theme can be viewed from two perspectives-there are potential advantages, but there are also potential problems, with any parent-involvement technique. Teachers' comments reveal their contrasting opinions on the benefits expected from parent assistance at home and on the organizational structures used to conduct parent-involvement activities. Some teachers are very positive about parent involvement; others have been discouraged by their attempts to communicate and work with parents.

Relationship between Socio-Economic Status, Interpersonal Communication, and School Climate with Parental Involvement in Early Childhood Education

Parental involvement in inclusive school is crucial for the development of children with special needs. Thus, the present study observed an inclusive primary school in Denpasar to identify the types of parental involvement in the school, the school's programs to involve parents, and the challenges faced by the teachers in involving parents in their children's education. Following Miles' and Huberman's (1994) model of Interactive Qualitative Data Analysis combined with Epstein's et al. (2002) types of parental involvement at school, the present study revealed that 1) all the six types of parental involvement’s in Epstein’s model were identified with an average of moderate frequency; 2) Seven programs were designed to involve the parents, namely, parenting seminar, class conference, WhatsApp Group discussion, Guest teacher, interactive project, field trip, and collaboration with English-speaking community; 3) there were moderate challenges in involving parents in communicating with the schools, in decision making, and in enrolling the parents in the school activities. This implies that there should be more deliberate effort from the parents in inclusive schools to be more involved in their children’s education, while schools should relentlessly initiate and inspire more intensive parental involvements in the schools’ program.

Parent involvement in elementary school and educational attainment

A link between parental involvement in school and student victimization in school is often assumed, but empirical studies have shown inconsistent results. Research suggests that the quality of student-teacher relationships could potentially serve as a crucial mediating factor in the link between parental school involvement and student victimization in school. However, the proposition in question lacks sufficient empirical evidence to substantiate it. This paper examines how parental school involvement indirectly influences student victimization by peers and teachers in school mediated via the quality of student-teacher relationships. Additionally, it further investigates sex differences in the patterns of relationships among parental school involvement, quality of student-teacher relationships, and student victimization by peers and teachers in school. Data were derived from a nationally representative sample of 934 junior high school students and their parents/caregivers in Taiwan. The results revealed that parental school involvement had a nonsignificant direct association with school victimization by peers and teachers, but a significant indirect association with both types of school victimization mediated via the quality of student-teacher relationships. These findings are applicable to both boys and girls. To reduce school victimization, policies and intervention programs could consider promoting parental school involvement and the quality of student-teacher relationships.

Background Educational reform is a major challenge facing schools in Taiwan. The new educational reform requires that every primary school must have parental involvement programmes in their school schedules, and to support these new programmes, there is a need for research to examine the extent and nature of parental involvement in primary schools in Taiwan, and to investigate the impact of parental involvement on pupil outcomes. Purpose The purpose of the study was to examine the extent to which parents' involvement in schooling is related to primary pupil outcomes, after taking into account differences in family social status and family structure, and the children's perceptions of their school learning environments. Sample For the analyses data were collected in 2001 from 261 6th-grade Taiwanese students, 128 boys and 133 girls, from four primary schools in the Taichung City school district. The average age of the children was approximately 11 years. Design and methods In the analysis of the research model, a quantitative approach was adopted, in which each student completed two questionnaires and two academic achievement tests. The first questionnaire included questions to assess family social status, family structure and parents' involvement in their children's education. In the second questionnaire there were questions to measure pupils' self-concept and perceptions of their schools' learning environments. The data were analysed using multiple-regression techniques to examine relationships among family social status, family structure, parental involvement, the school learning environment and pupils' school-related outcomes. Results The findings suggested that: (a) children's academic achievement is related to their family social status and perceptions of immediate family learning environments, and (b) children's self-concept is associated with their perceptions of classroom learning environments, parents' aspirations and parents' involvement at home. These propositions indicate the differential nature of the relationships among family and school environments and measures of children's school outcomes. Conclusions In the Taiwanese context, by showing the particularly important association between Taiwanese family environments and children's school outcomes, the present investigation supports the educational reform movement that encourages schools to involve parents more intimately in shared responsibilities.

Teachers' Sense of Efficacy: An Important Factor in School Improvement

Adolescence is a critical period of development. Previous research suggests parent involvement in school directly impacts student success. However, different types of parental involvement and the efforts of middle school personnel to educate parents about these effective practices have received scant attention in the literature. The level and type of parental involvement, as perceived by adolescents, is correlated with adolescent psychological wellbeing. Perceived parental involvement positively or negatively affects adolescents’ sense of psychological well-being, especially self-esteem, self-evaluation, and peer relationships. Parenting style greatly influences children’s development as well. The authoritative/democratic parenting style influences middle school children, leading to positive developmental outcomes, positive adolescent selfevaluations, higher levels of adolescent self-esteem and adjustment, while also positively influencing levels of intrinsic motivation for learning. This article reviews research related to (a) adolescents’ perceptions of parental involvement, (b) the parenting style related to higher levels of psychological wellbeing, and (c) the impact of assorted parenting styles on adolescent psychological well-being. It concludes with implications for middle school systems, middle school counselors, families, parents, and community members.

Parents' involvement in their children's education has been shown to have positive results in various aspects of child development such as behaviour, social-emotional development and academic performance. This article focuses on teachers' views of the major problems affecting home-school partnership and possible solutions to improve communication between school and family. It examines teachers' accounts of the components of parental participation in the process of pupil learning and evaluates teachers' suggestions for improving teacher-parent collaboration in Greek schools. The results show that Greek secondary school teachers have a positive attitude towards parental involvement in school but find that in fact parental involvement in Greek schooling is poor and infrequent. Most teachers ascribe poor parent-school relationship to factors such as parental unwillingness to respond to school initiated partnership schemes and to the parents' educational and social background. Generally speaking, Greek teachers appear to be in favour of an active collaboration with parents which will benefit schools, families and pupils.

BackgroundParental school involvement is critical for students’ academic and educational success. This study addresses a research gap by conducting latent class and correspondence analyses to uncover and visually depict the intricate relationships between parental school involvement and its barriers.MethodsData were obtained from 1,307 parents of students in grades 4 to 9 in China. Students in grades 4 to 9 experience preadolescence (grades 4 to 6) and early adolescence (grades 7 to 9), which are critical periods of transition in individual development. The latent class analysis revealed sub-populations of parental school involvement and its barriers. The correspondence analysis demonstrated the relationship between the groups of both parental school involvement and its barriers.ResultsThe results showed: (1) six distinct groups of parental school involvement, namely the High Involvement in Child’s Things, All High Involvement, High Initiative Involvement, High Passive Involvement, Medium Involvement, and Low Involvement groups; (2) five groups of barriers to parental school involvement, namely the High Work-Transportation, High Work, Medium Personal, High Transportation, and None Barriers groups; (3) a visual pattern of the relationship between six groups of parental school involvement and five groups of barriers to parental school involvement. Specifically, the All High Involvement and High Initiative Involvement groups were closer to the None Barriers class; Medium Involvement was related to High Work Barriers; Low Involvement to Medium Personal Barriers; and High Passive Involvement to High Transportation Barriers.ConclusionsThis study clarifies relationships between the latent groups of parental involvement in school and the latent groups of barriers to involvement, which support the reformulated explanatory model of barriers to parental involvement in education.

The transition to school may be particularly difficult for children with developmental disabilities and behavioral difficulties. Such children are likely to experience problems with self-regulation skills, which are critical to school adjustment. Additionally, inconsistent discipline practices and low parental involvement in children's schooling may contribute to a poor transition to school. This study employed a randomized clinical trial to examine the effects of a school readiness intervention that focused on children's self-regulation skills as well as parenting and parental involvement in school. Results showed that the intervention had positive effects on children's self-regulation in kindergarten as measured by teacher and observer reports. Additionally, the intervention significantly reduced ineffective parenting prior to school entry, which in turn affected parental involvement. This finding is significant because it demonstrates that parental involvement in school may be increased by efforts to improve parenting skills in general. Overall, the study demonstrated that school adjustment across kindergarten among children with developmental disabilities and behavioral difficulties can be enhanced through an intervention aimed specifically at improving school readiness skills.

The benefits of parent involvement in children's schooling are widely recognized by educators. Policy makers agree, encouraging practices to involve parents in schools by codifying them in federal law: parent involvement was the eighth goal of the 1994 Educate America Act (U.S. Department of Education, 1996), has been periodically required of school programs funded under Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (now called the No Child Left Behind Act; Arroyo & Zigler, 1993), and has been part of Head Start's national performance standards since they became law in 1975. As more states fund universally accessible preschool programs, planners would be wise to consider policies for involving parents in their children's preschool education. In this chapter we describe the most effective parent participation model to date, Head Start, and discuss how state programs can build on Head Start's success, using it as a template for practices that invite parents into schools. We begin by summarizing the research on parent involvement in school and discuss the ramifications of the findings for universal preschool programs. We explain the mechanisms through which parent involvement is thought to be associated with children's academic achievement. We identify common barriers to parent involvement and ways of overcoming them. In addition to addressing the policy implications for state-funded preschool that can be gleaned from the research, we highlight opportunities that state preschool initiatives afford for a partnership between policy and research.

Research indicates the importance of parental and community agency involvement for the reduction of adolescent delinquent behavior. However, few studies specifically examine the role of parental involvement within the physical school context, and many neglect to examine this issue based on school administrator perceptions. This study, a cross-sectional secondary data analysis of the 2008 School Survey on Crime and Safety, examines the impact of parental and community agency involvement in schools on student delinquency among a representative sample of 2,331 schools. Findings show that parental involvement in schools is predictive of decreased delinquency, while formal community agency involvement in schools by agencies such as law enforcement and social services is predictive of increased delinquency. Results suggest that based on school administrator perceptions, stimulating parent involvement in schools may reduce delinquency and serve as a preventative measure, allowing schools to rely less on reactive punishment. Furthermore, additional work should be done to determine how the involvement of both formal and informal community agencies impact student behavior.

The aim of this study was to investigate the management of parental involvement in three multicultural schools in the Umlazi District in Durban, South Africa. A literature survey resulting in a theoretical framework on parental involvement in schools, multicultural schools, and themanaging of parental involvement in schools has been done. The contextual background of schools in contemporary South Africa is depicted. A qualitative research design has been used. Focus group discussions have been conducted, with a total of thirty-three principals, teachersand parents. It has found that there is a low level of meaningful contact between school and parents. Apathy exists on the side of parents, low expectations on the side of principals and teachers, and an organisational structure facilitating parent-school interaction is lacking. In managing parental involvement in multicultural schools, school managers displaya lack of intercultural sensitivity.