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PARENTS: PRIMARY EDUCATORS, CAREGIVERS, GATEKEEPERS, SCAFFOLDERS

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Abstract

Abtract Parents as primary educators need empowerment support in order to become gate openers and scaffolders for better learning of their children. In this paper the results of relevant desk research is presented in order to establish a common understanding of widely used notions such as parental involvement and parental engagement, discuss the benefits and successful methods of engaging with all parents and its impact on children's learning and well-being. The paper also discusses successful practices and bursts some myths around parental impact, with special focus on identifying the role of parents in the learning of their children as opposed to their schooling. Parents are the primary educators of their children. This doesn't only mean they are the first educators, but on the one hand they are responsible for educating them according to the UNCRC, and on the other hand they have the largest impact on children's learning outcomes regardless their own education and ability to directly support school work or lack of it. For these reasons, parents should be a primary target group in educational discourse. They need to understand why new educational paradigms are more beneficial for their children than old pathways they experienced in their own childhood. More and more parents have well-being concerns for their children (while others put extra workload on their shoulders), and it is a global trend that needs to be stopped that those who can afford it, opt out of public education or formal education as such. In a world where schools are exploring new ways of working and parents are concerned, the only way forward is to engage parents, all of them, into transforming formal education for 21 st century needs, and define new pathways together. Parents and teachers need to engage the children themselves, too, and explore unknown territory together. We live in times when the type of education we need to offer children is not like anything experienced by the majority of adults of today. In this presentation we will explore ways and methods to implement the necessary engagement practices, showing inspiring practice and research evidence, focusing on learning outcomes in traditional competence areas (the 3Rs) as well as soft skills, STEM, arts and digital literacy. Parental involvement and parental engagement Parents are the primary educators of their children. This statement is a twofold one: on the one hand there is no need for research to prove that parents are the first to educate their children from birth, there is also a solid body of evidence showing that up to about 11 years or age parents have the largest impact of the learning outcomes of their children (Desforges 2003.) This role is then taken over by the peer group, but parents still remain the second most impacting group. Thus, for the educational and learning success of the individual child, parental attitudes are crucial. In the next section we quote research around parental involvement and parental engagement, the first being an invitation taking part in something that is already in place and the latter one being a co-creation procedure between partners-namely school and home-mutually recognising each other's role and impact and working in partnership around learning. Although it is beyond the scope of this review, it is important to mention that in modern pedagogy that considers the child rights this can only be designed in a participatory way with regards to children as competent partners (see the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child).
PARENTS: PRIMARY EDUCATORS, CAREGIVERS, GATEKEEPERS, SCAFFOLDERS
Eszter Salamon
Parents International
director@parentsinternational.org
Abtract
Parents as primary educators need empowerment support in order to become gate openers and
scaffolders for better learning of their children. In this paper the results of relevant desk
research is presented in order to establish a common understanding of widely used notions such
as parental involvement and parental engagement, discuss the benefits and successful methods
of engaging with all parents and its impact on children’s learning and well-being. The paper
also discusses successful practices and bursts some myths around parental impact, with special
focus on identifying the role of parents in the learning of their children as opposed to their
schooling.
Parents are the primary educators of their children. This doesn’t only mean they are the first educators,
but on the one hand they are responsible for educating them according to the UNCRC, and on the
other hand they have the largest impact on children’s learning outcomes regardless their own
education and ability to directly support school work or lack of it. For these reasons, parents should
be a primary target group in educational discourse. They need to understand why new educational
paradigms are more beneficial for their children than old pathways they experienced in their own
childhood. More and more parents have well-being concerns for their children (while others put extra
workload on their shoulders), and it is a global trend that needs to be stopped that those who can
afford it, opt out of public education or formal education as such. In a world where schools are
exploring new ways of working and parents are concerned, the only way forward is to engage parents,
all of them, into transforming formal education for 21st century needs, and define new pathways
together. Parents and teachers need to engage the children themselves, too, and explore unknown
territory together. We live in times when the type of education we need to offer children is not like
anything experienced by the majority of adults of today. In this presentation we will explore ways
and methods to implement the necessary engagement practices, showing inspiring practice and
research evidence, focusing on learning outcomes in traditional competence areas (the 3Rs) as well
as soft skills, STEM, arts and digital literacy.
Parental involvement and parental engagement
Parents are the primary educators of their children. This statement is a twofold one: on the one hand
there is no need for research to prove that parents are the first to educate their children from birth,
there is also a solid body of evidence showing that up to about 11 years or age parents have the largest
impact of the learning outcomes of their children (Desforges 2003.) This role is then taken over by
the peer group, but parents still remain the second most impacting group. Thus, for the educational
and learning success of the individual child, parental attitudes are crucial.
In the next section we quote research around parental involvement and parental engagement, the first
being an invitation taking part in something that is already in place and the latter one being a co-
creation procedure between partners namely school and home mutually recognising each other’s
role and impact and working in partnership around learning. Although it is beyond the scope of this
review, it is important to mention that in modern pedagogy that considers the child rights this can
only be designed in a participatory way with regards to children as competent partners (see the UN
Convention on the Rights of the Child).
The benefits and types of parental engagement with schooling
Parents in developed countries are expected to play in their children’s schooling has changed
significantly over the past 20-30 years expecting parents to be engaged acting as “…quasi-consumer
and chooser in educational ‘marketplaces’” and “monitor and guarantor of their children’s
engagement with schooling” (Selwyn 2011). Research evidence (Harris and Goodall, 2008, Deforges
& Abouchaar, 2003) also shows it clearly that parental involvement results in better outcomes for
young people. This makes it imperative to involve parents in schooling and this approach has gained
widespread political traction in many European countries.
However, defining what is meant by parental involvement/engagement in schooling, the kind of
interactions and methods most likely to benefit children, the role and responsibility of players,
especially that of parents, teachers and school heads, remain somewhat controversial. Politicians,
researchers, schools, teachers and parents’ groups and children have failed to settle on shared
definitions or priorities that sometimes lead to confusion. Although often presented as a “unified
concept” parental involvement/engagement “has a range of interpretations, which are variously
acceptable or unacceptable by different constituents” (Crozier, 1999: 219). Different stakeholders
often use this fact in a way that leads to power struggles and tensions between different stakeholders
(ibid 220), and sometimes also lead to some kind of a ‘blame game’. As Harris and Goodall’s 2008
study of parental interaction in schools illustrates, whilst parents were more likely to understand their
involvement as support for their children and children, in turn, saw their parents as ‘moral support’,
teachers viewed it as a “means to ‘improved behaviour and support for the school’” (2008: 282). This
leads to a split between expectations of schools towards parents and vice versa.
Epstein’s (2002) classification of practice has been widely used in establishing a typography for
parental involvement with school. It is important to take note of the fact that Epstein goes beyond the
notion of involvement or engagement in learning of the individual child, but rather introduces the
notion of partnership schools that are governed based on a mutual, balanced appreciation of home
and school that has a major impact on establishing participatory leadership structures. Epstein’s
Framework (2002:6) defines six types of involvement, parenting, communicating, volunteering,
learning at home, decision making, collaborating with the community. It is important to state that
these types have no hierarchy whatsoever, although they are often seen by some schools and teachers
as levels of different value and formulating unfounded expectations towards parents whose need for
engagement is different (Hamilton 2011.)
Goodall and Montgomery (2013) have argued for a more refined approach that moves interest away
from parents’ interactions with school generally towards a more specific focus on children’s learning.
They make a key distinction between involvement and engagement suggesting that the latter invokes
a “feeling of ownership of that activity which is greater than is present with simple involvement”
(2013: 399) and propose a continuum that moves from parental involvement with schooling to
parental engagement with children’s learning. This approach includes the recognition that learning is
not confined to school and the importance of supporting the learning of children inside and outside
school. This approach can be particularly important in the case of parents (and of course children)
from ethnic minorities, with low levels of education (and bad experiences with their own schooling)
or those facing economic difficulty who, research has shown (ibid 400) are more likely to find
involvement in school difficult but who nevertheless have strong commitments to their children’s
learning. This is a key issue to consider when designing mentoring models for parents in the
Parent’r’us project.
Goodall (2017) urges for a paradigm shift towards a partnership that is based on the following
principles formulated on the basis of reimagining Freire’s banking model of education for the 21st
century’s reality:
1. School staff and parents participate in supporting the learning of the child
2. School staff and parents value the knowledge that each brings to the partnership.
3. School staff and parents engage in dialogue around and with the learning of the child
4. School staff and parents act in partnership to support the learning of the child and each
other
5. School staff and parents respect the legitimate authority of each other’s roles and
contributions to supporting learning
According to Kendall (2018) these frameworks acknowledge the complex, dynamic nature of
relationships between parents, school and children’s learning and open meaningful opportunities for
dialogue and re-negotiation of roles and responsibilities they may not go beyond questioning
traditional paradigm of home-school relations. Re-imagining home-school relations need to be based
on reflection on the purpose of learning and going beyond the immediate and often narrow priorities
of schools based on testing and other policy accountabilities (Grant, 2009:14). Grant reminds us that
“reframing children’s lives outside school and family life purely in terms of an educational project”
could lead to the “worst case scenario” of children being “continuously worked on by ambitious
parents and teachers” (Grant, 2009:14). Grant goes on to suggest, many parents may choose, quite
reasonably, to invest in insulating the boundaries between school and home life seeing “part of their
role as protecting children from school’s incursions into the home and ensuring that children socialise,
play and relax as well as learn” (ibid).
This leads to the necessity to explore reasons of non-involvement or low levels of involvement with
schooling when designing any intervention on parental empowerment.
Working with ‘hard-to-reach’ parents
The term ‘hard-to-reach’ has often been used to ‘label’ and pathologise “parents who are deemed to
inhabit the fringes of school, or society as a wholewho are socially excluded and who, seemingly,
need to be ‘brought in’ and re-engaged as stakeholders (Crozier and Davis, 2007). Although the label
has been discussed and tackled in recent literature and practice, it remains an enduring concept in
policy and practice discourses in Europe (Hamilton 2017:301) and may have particular implications
for the target group of the Parent’r’us project. Campbell (2011) defines ‘hard to reach’ parents as
those who: “have very low levels of engagement with school; do not attend school meetings nor
respond to communications; exhibit high levels of inertia in overcoming perceived barriers to
participation” (2011:10). The term is often used to refer to parents who fail to reproduce the attitudes,
values and behaviours of a ‘white middle class’ norm described in Deforges above, which, argue
Crozier and Davies (2007), underpins consciously or unconsciously, school expectations. Here we
see the definition used pejoratively to describe the deficit characteristic of ‘non-responsive’ which is
explicitly linked to economic status, class and ethnicity, serving to stigmatise and ‘other’ particular
groups of parents.
Goodall and Montgomery (2013) discuss the situation of parents who are often ‘labelled’ as ‘hard-
to-reach’ because school may not yet have facilitated an appropriate or effective way of building
relationships with them. Findings from the Engaging Parents in Raising Achievement Project (EPRA)
indicated that for some parents, often those characterized as ‘hard-to-reach’, schools, especially
secondary school, can be experienced as a “closed system”, as hostile or disorientating, due perhaps
to the parent’s own experiences of school or wider structural relations that they may feel position
them negatively in relation to the ‘authority of school’ (Harris and Goodall, 2008).
Goodall and Montgomery also demand that attention is paid to the way social and cultural issues
positions different groups of parents in relation to schooling. Citing Reay’s (2000) work Harris and
Goodall (2008) draw attention to the way that middle class parents tend to increase their positional
ambition to ensure they maintain a relative advantage as the educational aspirations of the lower
classes rise. This they argue ensures that barriers continue to be manufactured as others, for example
access to education, are broken down.
Bursting myths around impactful engagement
Deforges’ (2002) systematic review of the realised benefits of parental involvement on children’s
school attainment establishes the degree of significance of this. He found that whilst parents engaged
in a broad range of activities to promote their children’s educational progress (including sharing
information, participating in events and school governance) degree of parental involvement was
strongly influenced by social class and the level of mothers’ education: the higher the class and level
of maternal educational qualification the greater the extent and degree of involvement. In addition,
the review also noted that low levels of parental self-confidence, lack of understanding of ‘role’ in
relation to education, psycho-socio and material deprivation also impacted negatively on levels of
participation in school life with some parents simply being “put off involvement by memories of their
own school experience or by their interactions with their children’s teachers or by a combination of
both.” (2003:87). The review concluded that whilst quality interactions with school (for example
information sharing and participation in events and governance) are characteristic of positive parental
involvement in education, a child’s school attainment was more significantly bound up with a
complex interplay of a much broader range of social and cultural factors, including “good parenting
in the home…the provision of a secure and stable environment, intellectual stimulation, parent-child
discussion, good models of constructive social and educational values and high aspirations relating
to personal fulfilment and good citizenship; (2002:5). Identifying ‘at-home good parenting’ as the
key factor in determining children’s attainment the review found that this form of involvement “works
indirectly on school outcomes by helping the child build a pro-social, pro-learning self-concept and
high educational aspirations” (2003:87) and had a much greater impact on achievement than the
effects of school in the early years of schooling in particular. Grouping these factors together as
‘spontaneous parental involvement’ the report contrasted the positive correlation with children’s
attainment they combined to secure, with the effects of “interventions that aim to enhance
“spontaneous levels of engagement” (ibid 5). Although the extent and variety of intervention activity,
which included parenting programmes, home-school links and family and community education, was
noted to be substantial the review was not able to find a positive correlation between these activities
and attainment data and suggested they were “yet to deliver the achievement bonus that might be
expected.”
Price-Mitchell highlights an over-emphasis on school learning as the only, or priority, objective of
home/school interactions. As such schools offer a ‘mechanistic view’ which separates educators and
parents rather than connecting them with “educators see[ing] themselves as experts” in children’s
learning “rather than equals” (2009:5). According to her this creates hierarchical relationships and
limits capacity to understand and develop partnerships that create new knowledge. (2009:8)
Mitchell-Price pays attention to the way that social capital circulates within the context of school and
its potential to include or exclude parents from different social and cultural groups. Citing Santana &
Schneider (2007) Mitchell-Price suggests that “lower income and ethnically diverse parents who
traditionally have less access to resources for their children benefit greatly from social networks as a
way of accruing benefits otherwise unavailable to them” (2009:19). Hamilton argues that this requires
teachers to develop an ‘outreach mentality’ (2017:313) going beyond “promoting awareness among
parents of rules and expectations” towards deep, reflexive exploration of their own socio-cultural
positionality as a ‘teacher’ and representative of authority, and taking responsibility for the agency
they have in the processes and practices of home school interaction.
Family learning provisions
The educational provision of Family learning has been alluded to in some of the literature so far. At
its roots is a social and humanistic approach to learning, with the underpinning principles of ‘parents
as educators, the acknowledgement that language is power and the central position of dialogue in
education’ (Mackenzie, 2009: 5-6). Traditionally aimed at both disadvantaged families and
communities who may be experiencing poverty and social exclusion for a variety of reasons, family
learning provision incorporates both hard and soft outcomes. The former based on improvements in
the parent and child’s attainment levels in literacy and numeracy and developing employment skills
for the parent, whilst the latter in the form of improved confidence, interpersonal skills, and improved
mental and physical wellbeing.
While they may not have a direct impact on the learning outcomes of children (see above), these
provisions are useful tools to support the lifelong learning of parents.
European policies on parental involvement
Several reports and studies (EC, 2012; OECD, 2006, 2009 and 2012a and Eurostat, 2014, MEMA
2017) confirm that significant obstacles still exist in the educational pathways of children with a
migrant or Roma background in the educational systems of the EU Member States. Most EU Member
States have developed, to some degree, educational policies for migrant and Roma children, however
differences in the depths, extent and support of these measures show major differences (MEMA
2017). Eurydice has reported that high percentages of disadvantaged (especially migrant and Roma)
children experience discrimination in school systems, and in most countries a clear achievement gap
is also clearly present. This is accompanied by an increase of intolerance and xenophobia in most EU
Member States.
At the same time successful, mostly local or municipality-level initiatives show that there are effective
solutions for these issues that are best tackled together. Some countries have implemented effective
national policies for inclusion in education (Austria, Germany, Ireland), but none have introduced a
systemic approach to vulnerable parents’ inclusion.
Inspiring European practices in the field of parental inclusion
All successful projects and initiatives in the field of parental involvement include an element that
helps to overcome language/vocabulary barriers and also support inclusion of the parents themselves
in society. However, successful, long-term engagement programs often build on the acceptance of
differences in languages and culture made visible in school settings.
Another type of program that is in place in many local contexts is aiming at raising cultural awareness
and create mutual understanding by that. Inviting parents into school settings to introduce their home
cultures create more trust in school. This is especially important in the case of parents who have low
levels of education themselves. It is often necessary for school staff to leave their comfort zone and
the school premises for successful outreach to parents with migrant background.
The most successful and sustainable programmes (e.g. SEAs or Schools as Community Learning
Centres) tackle the whole community as one, consider language and cultural differences, but offer a
holistic solution.
There are two main aims of parental involvement/engagement that were explored in inspiring
practices and related literature. One is the engagement of parents in the learning of their own children
for better learning outcomes, the other is engagement in school life as a form of active citizenship.
The second, broader approach necessarily includes the first one, parents engaged is school life also
understand the importance of learning and support their own children more. At the same time, it must
be mentioned that deeper engagement in your own children’s learning can be successful without more
engagement in school, especially if the intervention is aiming at parents’ understanding of learning
processes, their role as primary educators and the fact that school plays only a minor role in the
learning of children.
Inspiring practices in some cases focus on a certain narrow target group, for example parents of a
certain nationality or level of education, while others have a more holistic approach, targeting all
migrants or all parents that are generally difficult to reach and engage. Inspiring practices collected
during the needs analysis period show that successful models are transferable from one target group
to the other, e.g. Roma programmes and migrant-centred ones often use very similar methodologies.
Recommendations and methods developed in Includ-ED as well as FamilyEduNet, building on
methodology developed in the Include-ED project and partnership school’s methodology offer a
useful universal source that OSD can build on. It supports an approach, where all interested parties
participate in designing and implementing inclusion activities. It tackles both sides of parental
engagement in learning and in school life.
Parent Involvement 3.0 is a useful general handbook to help teachers and school heads understand
the importance and possible tools of parental involvement. The methods suggested can be
implemented by school leadership even in systems, where school autonomy is on a low level.
Schools as Community Learning Centres is an initiative that is very much in line with current polity
trends, but implementing it needs full school autonomy and a school leader committed to it. However,
even individual teachers may be able to implement certain aspects building on local community.
A simple assessment tool on parental involvement developed by NPC-p, Ireland can be used for
awareness-raising as well as monitoring development in practice.
ParentHelp trainings show that its activities are equally useful for parent leaders, teachers and school
heads to understand parental involvement/engagement, embrace diversity and be able to manage
challenges.
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Book
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Narrowing the Achievement Gap proposes a radical change to our conception of learning, education and schooling, arguing that parental engagement is the best lever we have for school improvement and closing the achievement gap. Unique in its focus on original research linking underachievement and parental engagement, this book uses a range of international case studies to demonstrate that achievement isn’t only reliant on what happens in school and that what happens out of school is equally important. Each chapter explores how schools can actively engage with parents and communities to reinstate education in the home, and to generate support to combat issues out of their control, including poverty, deprivation, and a lack of social capital. Although schools have an integral part to play in this process, it argues that parents and society must reconsider their own educational responsibility, regardless of background, and offers a solid research base and practical suggestions to help do so. Consisting of an in-depth and contemporary study of this significant issue in educational achievement and written by an expert in the field, this text will appeal to researchers, academics and postgraduate students in the fields of education, schooling, sociology of education, school effectiveness and improvement, school policy and school leadership.
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In the authors' research with Pakistani and Bangladeshi heritage parents, some teachers, head teachers and other educational professionals referred to the South Asian parents as ‘hard to reach’. Whilst it was clear from the parents that they were not very, and in some cases not at all, involved in their children's schools and knew little about the education system or what their children were doing in school, it was also very apparent that the parents were not ‘difficult’, ‘obstructive’, or ‘indifferent’—the kind of behaviour ‘hard to reach’ implies. The article therefore considers that rather than parents being ‘hard to reach’, it is frequently the schools themselves that inhibit accessibility for certain parents. The authors challenge the cultural interference model, arguing that it is incorrect and pathologises parents. The article arises out of a two‐year, Economic and Social Research Council funded, qualitative study of Bangladeshi and Pakistani heritage families and schools, in the north‐east of England.
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A meta-analysis is undertaken, including 52 studies, to determine the influence of parental involvement on the educational outcomes of urban secondary school children. Statistical analyses are done to determine the overall impact of parental involvement as well as specific components of parental involvement. Four different measures of educational outcomes are used. These measures include an overall measure of all components of academic achievement combined, grades, standardized tests, and other measures that generally included teacher rating scales and indices of academic attitudes and behaviors. The possible differing effects of parental involvement by race and socioeconomic status are also examined. The results indicate that the influence of parental involvement overall is significant for secondary school children. Parental involvement as a whole affects all the academic variables under study by about .5 to .55 of a standard deviation unit. The positive effects of parental involvement hold for both White and minority children.
Article
This meta-analysis of 41 studies examines the relationship between parental involvement and the academic achievement of urban elementary school children. Analyses determined the effect sizes for parental involvement overall and subcategories of involvement. Results indicate a significant relationship between parental involvement overall and academic achievement. Parental involvement, as a whole, was associated with all the academic variables by about 0.7 to 0.75 of a standard deviation unit. This relationship held for White and minority children and also for boys and girls. The significance of these results is discussed.