Parental Involvement in Schools

Parental Involvement in Schools

[pic]
Table of Contents

Introduction………………………………………………………………………………………3
Grade Level Studies…...…………………………………………………………………………3
Reasons for Lack of Involvement……...…..……………………………………………………4
Solutions to the Problem………..……...…..……………………………………………………7
Conclusion………………………..……...…..……………………………………………………7
Summary Chart………..……...…..……………………………...………………………………8
Personal Position ………..……...…..……………………………………………………………8
References ………………….…...…..…………………………………………………………….9

Introduction The topic of this research paper is parental involvement in schools and the effects that it has on students. The more parents are involved in a child’s education the better off the student will be. There has been a tremendous amount of research on this topic and it shows that children whose parents are involved in their schools perform better than students whose parents are not involved. The studies that were looked at in this paper centered on an early head start program, a middle school program, and a high school program. Each of these studies looked at the effect that parental involvement had on student achievement in the classroom. The paper will focus on the reasons why parental involvement is so important to student achievement and the barriers that parents, teachers, and administrators face in developing parental involvement programs. The paper also will look at different ways that teachers can increase parental involvement that can be useful in helping schools develop parental involvement programs or strengthen those that are already in place in schools.
Grade Level Studies In the early head start program, the study looks at how the different dimensions of family involvement in a student’s education affect the end of the year outcomes of approaches to learning, student behavior problems, and receptive vocabulary. The study showed that home based family involvement is the strongest predictor of student outcomes. The study also shows a strong association between family involvement with children’s motivation to learn, attention span, task persistence, receptive vocabulary skills, and low student behavior problems (Hawes, 2005). In the middle school program, the study focused on forty eight sixth grade students who completed parental involvement surveys, along with the parents of each student who also completed a parental involvement survey. The results of the surveys were then compared to each students reading level determined by the McLeod Reading Comprehension Test and this data was compared statistically to determine if in fact there is any correlation between the two. The results of the study found there to be a slight positive correlation between parental involvement and higher reading comprehension and achievement of the sixth grade students. The implications of these findings are discussed in more detail (Fantuzzo, 2004). In the high school program, the study looked at how parental involvement influenced the achievement of students during their high school years. What the study found was that parental involvement is multidimensional, ethnic group samples reported comparable degrees of parental involvement, parents’ aspiration for their children’s education attainment had a positive effect on student’s academic growth, and the effect, or lack thereof, of parental involvement was consistent across ethnic group samples and across data sources (Fan, 2001).
Reasons for Lack of Involvement Based on these results, it should be very important for schools to have well-developed parental involvement programs. Parental involvement programs are also required by section 1118 of the No Child Left Behind Act to hold schools accountable for starting and maintaining parental involvement programs. This law aims to make sure that parents are involved in their child’s education in ways that will increase the individual student’s academic achievement and school performance as a whole. Why then are educators reluctant to include parents? Many educators tend to remember how things were as they were growing up in which schools and homes were two separate entities. Today’s schools need to look upon parents as partners who can be of much more help than originally thought. These parents can be involved in many different operations in the school today such as decisions on curriculum or policies within the school, daily instruction of their child, and expectations of the school in the future. One reason why some schools shy away from extensive parental involvement programs is the cost associated with these programs. The cost to run a parental involvement program in a district of about 30 schools is around $83,000 per year (Jones, 2001). This will include the hiring of a family involvement coordinator who can help with programs at up to 30 schools. Because of the tight budgets in many school districts today, this may lead administrators to cut their budgets in this area. There are however federal and state funds that are available to schools to help with this cost. The cost will be well worth it if the programs are well designed and increase the performance of students. This could also be costly to schools that do not have a program and face punishments for violating federal and state laws, or for schools who perform below expected achievement levels and face losing funding because of this. There are also barriers that keep parents from becoming involved or wanting to be involved in the school. Many parents have had a negative experience in the past associated with their own educational experience when they were in school (Jones, 2001). When parents have had a negative experience in school, they are less likely to become involved. Teachers are also a barrier to parental involvement. Many teachers do not see the need that exists for involving parents. Many teachers in the classroom today, especially older teachers, have had very little training in dealing with parents. Many have very negative feelings toward dealing with parents and do not enjoy interacting with parents. One main reason for this is that teachers are not trained properly in teacher education programs about how to successfully deal with and incorporate parents. What needs to be understood is that teachers, trained or not, are the primary link between families and schools (Jones, 2001). Another factor that causes parents to stay away is how well adapted to American culture and language the parents are. Parents who do not speak the language or who struggle with speaking English are less prone to be involved with schools. These parents feel that they are not educated enough in order to be of any service to the school. It is also important to look at the cultural background of the families. While families of all backgrounds maintain rules about grades and homework throughout high school, there are some variations by ethnicity (Henderson & Mapp, 2002). One of the main trends seen in a child’s education is the decline of parental involvement levels as students increase in age or grade level. Parental involvement levels are very high for students in elementary schools, decline as they enter into middle school, and fall even farther as the students enter high school. The sad fact about this is that when the students need their parents the most is when the parents seem to become less involved in their child’s education. One reason for this is that teachers, schools, and districts communicate better with parents at the elementary level than they do at the middle or high school levels. Elementary schools often have newsletters, e-mail reports, parent workshops, active PTA’s, and homework hotlines, while parents of older students in the same district do not know what is going on in their student’s school life (Jones, 2001). Some of this can be attributed to the fact that teachers working in middle and high schools have many more students to deal with than a teacher who works in an elementary school. A teacher at an elementary school typically will have no more than 30 students and parents to stay in contact with, while teachers in middle and high schools may have in the area of 150 students and families to keep in touch with. It should be evident that time constraints for these teachers definitely play a role in the amount of communication that goes on.
Solutions to the Problem One way to solve this problem is to have schools develop advisory committees or systems at the middle and high school levels to train teachers and staff on how to keep in touch with parents. This can be achieved by breaking students into groups of 15 or 20 students and assigning them to one individual staff member for the entire time that they attend the school (Jones, 2001). In this way the workload is broken down to a manageable level that does not overwhelm the teacher. It is up to schools and administrators to develop programs to hold teachers accountable, but also to make this task somewhat manageable for them. By doing this it is much more likely that teachers will stay in touch with parents and that parents will remain involved in the education process. Teachers must be willing to sacrifice some personal time in order to make this happen. If teachers are not willing to sacrifice, then no matter how well developed a program is it will ultimately fail.
Conclusion
It is proven that productive parental involvement will lead to increased student achievement. This increase will be seen on an individual level and for schools and districts as a whole. These programs must be well designed and supported by administrators, teachers, parents and the community in order to truly make a difference. This will take some sacrificing on the part of teachers to make it a point to make sure that they stay in touch in some way, shape, or form with all families. This will also take some sacrificing on the part of schools, districts, and administrators in the form of providing funding, workshops, and training for teachers and parents alike. Without this training many of the programs will not be successful and will ultimately fail. This then is a waste of time and money and will further the gap that exists between schools and parents.
| |Henderson & Mapp |Jones |Banks |
|Facts |Authors reviewed more than 50 |Article was a passionate plea for |A current member of ECTE 516; currently teaching |
| |research studies to compile |parents to become involved; |CTE courses; feels students would be more |
| |and publish facts in 2002. |referenced often in educational |responsible academically if parents were more |
| | |journals |invested. |
|Values |Family, effective education |Perspective, educated |Fairness, quality of instruction, quality of |
| | |decision-making |educational experience |
|Beliefs |Parents need to be aware of |While he appreciates the |Feels the need to seek parental involvement while|
| |student experiences; schooling|difficulties of parent’s |not taking away from the time necessary to create|
| |is more effective with the |time-scheduling, feels it is |and implement an effective curriculum and |
| |entire family involved. |imperative for a child to have the|educational experience. |
| | |support of their parents when | |
| | |schooling | |
|Attitudes |Full-involvement needs to |Wants teachers to be able to |Parents seem to truly want to be involved, but |
| |happen to allow students to |conduct and manage classrooms |also seem to wait to let the teacher make the |
| |learn properly. |while also having time to |first step. |
| | |relate/interact with parents. | |

Personal Position Schools need to understand the needs of parents and take these into consideration when developing these programs. The schools also need to inform parents in a manner that they can help their students to make good, fundamentally sound decisions about their education. This is one of the most important factors and resources in a student’s education and is many times one that goes untapped by many schools. It is so important for administrators, teachers, and schools as a whole to realize how important and beneficial parents are and how effective these programs can be.

References
Fan, X. (2001). Parental involvement and student’s academic achievement: A growth modeling analysis. The Journal of Experimental Education, 70(1), 27-61.

Fantuzzo, J. (2004). Multiple dimensions of family involvement and their relations to behavioral and learning competencies for urban, low-income children. The School Psychology Review, 33(4), 467-80.

Hawes, C.A. (2005). Parental involvement and its influence on the reading achievement of 6th grade students. Reading Improvement, 42(1), 47-57.

Henderson, A. & Mapp, K. (2002). A new wave of evidence: The impact of school, family, and community connections on student achievement. Austin, TX: Southwest Educational Development Laboratory.

Jones, R. (2001). Involving parents is a whole new game: Be sure you win! The Education Digest, 67(3), 36-43.

[pic]

References: Fan, X. (2001). Parental involvement and student’s academic achievement: A growth modeling analysis. The Journal of Experimental Education, 70(1), 27-61. Fantuzzo, J. (2004). Multiple dimensions of family involvement and their relations to behavioral and learning competencies for urban, low-income children. The School Psychology Review, 33(4), 467-80. Hawes, C.A. (2005). Parental involvement and its influence on the reading achievement of 6th grade students. Reading Improvement, 42(1), 47-57. Henderson, A. & Mapp, K. (2002). A new wave of evidence: The impact of school, family, and community connections on student achievement. Austin, TX: Southwest Educational Development Laboratory. Jones, R. (2001). Involving parents is a whole new game: Be sure you win! The Education Digest, 67(3), 36-43. [pic]