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

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Is "getting parents in" to school enough?

The issue of "getting parents in" to school was "an overriding concern" for most schools. The study reports that book loan schemes were a popular feature of primary schooling. For instance, in 1995 in 35 schools 1420 children borrowed materials for home use. The schemes were deemed a success simply because they "got parents in" to school. Success was measured on the basis of the number of parents who collected book bags and the number of loans made. No evidence about improvement of reading performance was available. Most schools did not gather assessment data that measured the impact of these schemes on their pupils' reading performance.

The figures for parental attendance at school were confusing because they were presented in such a way that researchers could not estimate how many parents had been involved. The authors suggest that "getting the parents in" was an over-riding concern for most of the schools. They recognise that this not easily achieved - hence, they suggest "most schools understandably camouflaged their lack of success."

Book loans and workshops represented a considerable investment of teacher and parent time. The study findings suggest that these initiatives were more geared towards exporting school materials, aims and values, rather than trying to understand, build on and work with parents' interest in and knowledge of their children's education.

The authors suggest that the questionnaire responses indicated an incomplete understanding of the role of self esteem in children's identity construction. They cite research evidence which indicated that the ways in which parents help their children to construct their identities were more powerful than the messages sent home by schools. Schools need to understand the parents' and children's views of where they stand in the world of education because this feeds into the children's self-concept. For this reason, the authors suggest, the schools with good uptake of parental provision were those who understood that some parents had bad, or no, experiences of schooling and adapted their provision accordingly - although they do not state how this was done. In some cases poor parental participation in workshops may have been related to unease about being taught "teacherly" ways of working with their children.

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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 Is "getting parents in" to school enough? The issue of "getting parents in" to school was "an overriding concern" for most schools. The study reports that book loan schemes were a popular feature of primary schooling. For instance, in 1995 in 35 schools 1420 children borrowed materials for home use. The schemes were deemed a success simply because they "got parents in" to school. Success was measured on the basis of the number of parents who collected book bags and the number of loans made. No evidence about improvement of reading performance was available. Most schools did not gather assessment data that measured the impact of these schemes on their pupils' reading performance. The figures for parental attendance at school were confusing because they were presented in such a way that researchers could not estimate how many parents had been involved. The authors suggest that "getting the parents in" was an over-riding concern for most of the schools. They recognise that this not easily achieved - hence, they suggest "most schools understandably camouflaged their lack of success." Book loans and workshops represented a considerable investment of teacher and parent time. The study findings suggest that these initiatives were more geared towards exporting school materials, aims and values, rather than trying to understand, build on and work with parents' interest in and knowledge of their children's education. The authors suggest that the questionnaire responses indicated an incomplete understanding of the role of self esteem in children's identity construction. They cite research evidence which indicated that the ways in which parents help their children to construct their identities were more powerful than the messages sent home by schools. Schools need to understand the parents' and children's views of where they stand in the world of education because this feeds into the children's self-concept. For this reason, the authors suggest, the schools with good uptake of parental provision were those who understood that some parents had bad, or no, experiences of schooling and adapted their provision accordingly - although they do not state how this was done. In some cases poor parental participation in workshops may have been related to unease about being taught "teacherly" ways of working with their children.