Parental Involvement in raising the Achievement of Primary School Pupils: why bother? (Updated)

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What did the research find out?

From their analysis of the evidence, the authors reported that:

the schools' reasons for parental involvement were not well elaborated;
the uptake of parental involvement was not clear and schools did not measure uptake carefully. The authors suggest that this might have been due to poor uptake in some schools;
teachers expressed a number of reasons for involving parents but the most dominant of these was for parents to act as agents of the school in teaching their children elements of the school curriculum;
primary schools were overwhelmingly concerned to "get parents in" but did not measure the effectiveness of participation in terms of pupil achievement;
the self-esteem mentioned by teachers in responses to questionnaires tended not to take account of the crucial role of parents and home in developing their children's self concept - particularly in relation to their cultural and community context; and
in planning tasks for parents schools concentrated too much on very skilled tasks which really needed specialist teaching knowledge.

The answers to the questionnaire were sorted into a number of categories based on the meaning of the responses. These responses were grouped into four main classes of rationale:

parent as agent of the school (45%)
to raise the self-esteem of parents as educators and of children (21%)
parents have a special role with their children (11%)
the school will become more embedded in the community (9%)

This suggested to the authors that teachers' rationales for the investment of time and energy in parental involvement were principally to enlist them as agents of the school and to educate them. In their words, "....these hard pressed primary school teachers, working with an over-loaded curriculum....were trying to turn parents into teachers who could provide additional pedagogic assistance." Interview data cited in the report supported this analysis.

“Because we have such large classes you can't do all the things you want to do with the children. I want them to hear their children read every night. I want the children to do more than I have time for......"

“The main aim is that children will be able to have more individual help. We hope that the children will be pushed further along."

The authors suggest that this does not seem to recognise and build upon the unique relationship of parent and child or to use the parent's knowledge of their child. They call this "a form of colonisation, rather than collaboration".

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Research Home Themes \| Find digests \| About the digests resources glossary researchers contact TRIPS Introduction The aims of this study How was the study designed? What did the research find out? Is "getting parents in" to school enough? What were parents asked to do with their children? Conclusions Implications Where can I find out more? Send us your feedback Collated digests To view/remove/add notes and save your collated digests click here Get Word Reader Parental Involvement in raising the Achievement of Primary School Pupils: why bother? (Updated) This digest found in Parents Send to a friend Word doc 60KB Printer friendly Collate for later What did the research find out? From their analysis of the evidence, the authors reported that: the schools' reasons for parental involvement were not well elaborated; the uptake of parental involvement was not clear and schools did not measure uptake carefully. The authors suggest that this might have been due to poor uptake in some schools; teachers expressed a number of reasons for involving parents but the most dominant of these was for parents to act as agents of the school in teaching their children elements of the school curriculum; primary schools were overwhelmingly concerned to "get parents in" but did not measure the effectiveness of participation in terms of pupil achievement; the self-esteem mentioned by teachers in responses to questionnaires tended not to take account of the crucial role of parents and home in developing their children's self concept - particularly in relation to their cultural and community context; and in planning tasks for parents schools concentrated too much on very skilled tasks which really needed specialist teaching knowledge. The answers to the questionnaire were sorted into a number of categories based on the meaning of the responses. These responses were grouped into four main classes of rationale: parent as agent of the school (45%) to raise the self-esteem of parents as educators and of children (21%) parents have a special role with their children (11%) the school will become more embedded in the community (9%) This suggested to the authors that teachers' rationales for the investment of time and energy in parental involvement were principally to enlist them as agents of the school and to educate them. In their words, "....these hard pressed primary school teachers, working with an over-loaded curriculum....were trying to turn parents into teachers who could provide additional pedagogic assistance." Interview data cited in the report supported this analysis. “Because we have such large classes you can't do all the things you want to do with the children. I want them to hear their children read every night. I want the children to do more than I have time for......" “The main aim is that children will be able to have more individual help. We hope that the children will be pushed further along." The authors suggest that this does not seem to recognise and build upon the unique relationship of parent and child or to use the parent's knowledge of their child. They call this "a form of colonisation, rather than collaboration".