parents role in education essay

Role of Parents and Families of Students in Education Essay (Critical Writing)

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Introduction

Parents and families of students play an important role in the educational process. Therefore, the teacher must establish a trusting relationship with them to get to know their students better. Moreover, Ms. Cowhey did not try to find out information about children and parents that they would not want to share. This approach is the best way to build trusting relationships with students’ families since teachers are not perceived as wary.

In my work, I would apply the strategy of a weekly newsletter to parents about what children are learning in school. Ms. Cowhey says that when parents ask more specific questions about what they learn in school, kids are more willing to share information. Therefore, this approach helps to improve understanding and interaction in the family, while parents can track the real learning progress of students. Furthermore, Cowhey (2006) describes how she involved parents in the educating process:

I asked if they knew of any good resources or had any advice for me. One of the mums said that she’d help the district develop a family diversity curriculum the year before and would help me with that. She offered to share books for home and talk with the class about foster care and adoption. She invited me to a workshop about issues of adoptive children in schools which was very helpful. (p. 197)

I would also use this strategy as it allows the learning process to be shaped most comfortably for the child and promotes parent-child interaction.

One of the biggest fears about “going against the grain” is that my approach to educating students will cause a lot of misunderstandings and complaints. These criticisms can come from colleagues and parents as people are accustomed to traditional approaches to education. However, after completing this course, I am sure each student needs to be approached individually to achieve the best learning outcomes. Therefore, a departure from standard educational strategies must be used. At the same time, it is important to critically evaluate the concept of teaching differently. It should be based on standard teacher practices for the child’s comprehensive development.

Teaching differently is important not only to change all educational standards but to adapt them in such a way as to guarantee growth and progress for each student. I will be able to meet the challenges that arise because I understand that the educator’s work should be directed to the child and act in their best interests.

Cowhey, M. (2006). Black Ants and Buddhists: Thinking critically and teaching differently in the primary grades. Stenhouse Publishers.

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Bibliography

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The Parents Role in Their Child’s Education

By: Author Dr. Patrick Capriola

Posted on Published: February 23, 2019

The parent’s role in their child’s education is more complex than ever. Standardization has placed increasing pressure on students and the advent of social media and online learning platforms have created a vastly different educational experience for today’s kids than prior generations. It is important for parents to be involved in their child’s education so they can help them navigate this increasingly complex landscape.

What is the role of the parent in their child’s education? The parent’s role is to ensure the child’s basic needs are met every day and to help them develop the academic, social, and emotional skills necessary to succeed. Parents should nurture their ability to take on responsibility, engage with peers, work towards goals and pursue their interests.

The parent is the most influential person in the child’s life and has an unmatched power to direct and motivate. Parents who seek to support their child’s academic success should focus on whole child strategies that are considerate of where the child is in every area of their development. You and your child will benefit greatly if you have a vision for fulfilling your role in your child’s education that examines the supports that need to be in place to ensure they get the most out of their formal and informal educational experiences.

Make Sure the Basics are Covered

From the beginning, the parent’s primary role is to make sure the child’s basic needs are met. As they grow older these things are still your job, but how you go about making sure they get done should change. For example, until a child is 7 or 8 you may need to be in the bathroom with them when they brush their teeth. If they won’t do it, you will have to get in there and do it for them. It may be a hassle (I know my 3-year-old gives me a battle every night), but the benefits far outweigh the costs. You don’t want to look at your teenager suffering 10 years from now with their mouth full of cavities. You also don’t want to pay the bills to get them fixed.

21st-century life has presented parents with this decision more than ever before – pay the price now or pay a higher price later. Each time you are presented with this choice you have the power to teach your child good habits. The lessons they learn from you about responsibility, attentiveness, and care will carry over into other areas of their lives – including education.

Each day parents must have age appropriate expectations for what the child needs to do for themselves. Parents should also have a plan in place for how they will monitor whether those responsibilities are met and to the degree of quality with which it is carried out. Each morning the parent needs to ensure the child has:

• Done their Homework the Night Before
• Had a full night’s sleep
• Had a healthy breakfast
• Cared for Themselves and Maintained their Environment
• Arrived at School on Time

It’s a lot to get done every day, but the payoff is worth it in the end. The skills your child will learn as they practice doing their homework, taking a shower, getting to bed on time, making their bed in the morning, brushing their teeth, and grooming themselves in a neat and presentable manner will stay with them for life.

As a young adult, they will undoubtedly have a few days where they don’t make their bed, eat well, or care for themselves. They will intuitively know that it’s wrong because it won’t feel like the right thing to do. Something will be out of place. They will sense this because you made sure they knew how to care for themselves properly.

Remember, what you teac them today will stay with them forever. There is no place where this is more apparent than self-care, which is the first step on the path to personal responsibility.

Make the Home a Great Place to Learn

The child’s home shapes their perception of what a safe and relaxing environment should be and it is where they learn habits that they carry with them for the rest of their lives. As the parent, you decide how they will experience their home. When I think about how my kids experience our home, I break it down into two parts; physically and psychologically.

The home should be neat and clean. If your child experiences organization as they grow up it will help them appreciate its importance later in life. Everything should have a place, and that includes opportunities for learning.

Do they have a space they can call their own? If you can, make sure they do. Are their toys in the playroom educational or purely for entertainment? Make sure there is a balance of both. Do they have access to a lot of screens? Screen time should be limited and the child should not view them as a part of their daily lives.

Do they have a desk anywhere? Is it in a place where they feel comfortable learning and is free of distractions? Can they go there to just chill out and play? Make sure they have some kind of work station that they can go to do homework or play constructively.

Psychologically

The way the child feels about the home will be a big factor in determining how comfortable they are learning while there. The home should be a place where the child is expected to learn, and they should intuitively understand the importance of this expectation.

You won’t be able to instill a belief in education in them through words alone. It must come through action. Establish a routine where they sit down in a quiet area and study, read or work on an intellectual hobby at least 3 times a week. Make it a priority.

As you are getting your child established in their new routine make sure you are considerate of how they feel about the experience. Although you don’t want to place all of your emphasis on whether they like working and studying all the time (they won’t), you do want to try to make sure they are comfortable enough to get into their zone so they can work productively. That is the feeling that you will work to build on.

When your child is able to consistently tune in to what they are working on they will experience more success over time. Give them the opportunity to experience that success by making sure they understand what their goals are for the day. If they are working on a huge Lego set they should not be attempting to finish it each day. Help them set a smaller goal that they can work toward, so they can see how success builds upon itself. With that, confidence will follow.

Understand Your Child’s Learning Style

If you are able to understand your child strengths you will be much more likely to help them as they work through the struggles that come along with discovering themselves. There is currently no way to put everything about their learning style into a category that will help you know exactly what to do and when, but there are some helpful frameworks and ideas based on research that should assist you in developing a better understanding of how your child learns.

The most discussed framework is known as learning modalities, and there are four:

• Kinesthetic

Visual Learners

• Benefit from demonstrations
• Have well-developed imaginations
• Easily distracted by movement or action
• Use lists to stay organized
• Easily learn through descriptions
• Remember faces but forget names

Auditory Learners

• Enjoy discussion and plays
• Solve problems by talking them out
• Can be distracted by noise
• Prefer verbal instructions from the teacher
• Remember names but forget faces

Kinesthetic Learners

• Thrive when they are active
• Learn while moving and doing (manipulatives help)
• Prefer action over watching or listening
• Struggle sitting down and concentrating
• High energy

Tactile Learners

• Enjoy hands-on activities like projects or labs
• Learn while taking notes
• Likes to draw to remember

You will probably find that your child does not fit firmly into any one of these categories, but instead favors one over the other. Almost all kids learn through each of the learning modalities, and this framework is used to determine which they favor more. Take some time to observe how your child learns now that you’ve read these over. Think about how you can modify learning at home so your child can engage in activities that are more responsive to their preferences and needs.

There is more to understanding a child’s learning style than just their modality. Learning d ispositions provide another helpful framework that can be an important indicator of what they will respond to. These are the habits of mind that are built up over time. If you understand where your child is in the learning disposition framework, you can better understand how they respond to the learning process. There are five learning dispositions to consider:

Persistence

Agility and Flexibility

• Motivation and drive to learn

Metacognition

Problem-Solving and Questioning

Persistent learners are willing to stick with a task and see it through completion. They won’t easily give up and will work to analyze a problem and develop a strategy to solve it. Children who learn persistence develop resilience over time through their frequent contact with intellectual adversity.

Learners who are agile and flexible are able to change their minds when they receive new information. They don’t get stuck in the trap of assuming things need to be the way they were originally presented. They understand how new variables being introduced to a situation can completely reshape that scenario.

Motivation and Drive to Learn

Learners who are motivated and driven are enthusiastic about and engaged in the learning process. They seek out learning experiences and are driven by both extrinsic and intrinsic factors.

Children who think about their own thinking are able to plan a strategy for producing the information that they need, are aware of their own learning process and can reflect on and evaluate the productiveness of their thinking. Metacognition is important for the motivated learner to guide themselves as they plot new courses for their own learning.

Problem solvers are adept at asking questions so they can fill in the gaps between what they know and what they need to know. They are also able to analyze scenarios from different points of view to see other perspectives that may have an impact on the outcome of the situation.

Model Active Learning

You are your child’s most significant role model. Growing up, they will look to you first to learn the skills and traits that will make them successful in life. In few areas will this be more important than learning. Through hard work, dedication, and daily modeling you have the opportunity to instill in them a passion for learning and a willingness to put the work in necessary to be successful.

Over the years your kids will hear you tell them about the importance of learning. The degree to which they take those words seriously will be determined in large part by the action they see you taking as a learner yourself. Make reading a priority, and ensure they see it is a priority.

If your children are younger read with them every single day for at least 15 minutes (if they are really little) to a ½ hour. If they are older, try starting your own family book club so you can read stories together and share the meaning of those stories with each other.

Another great way to demonstrate to your kids that you are a lifelong learner is through the work that you do around the house. Running a household comes with a lot of responsibility, and nobody knows it all. You undoubtedly have had to look things up to figure them out at some point. Involve your kids in this process.

Perhaps the drain under your sink was clogged and you realized that it’s not that difficult to release the plug and remove the debris manually. Or, maybe have a draft coming in from the windows and want to use some silicone to seal it up. Both are great opportunities to engage them in learning and application of knowledge.

Make sure they participate in the entire process with you. If you learn and apply the information together they will understand the process behind learning information then acting on it, which is something they don’t always get in school. It’s a great way to make learning real and relevant while creating a bonding experience for the family.

This will require more patience from you and your project may not get completed the right way the first time, but if you prioritize the opportunity to connect with your child you will see the lasting benefits of reusing this strategy for years to come.

Support the Child in their Learning

Children who have parents who support their learning are more likely to succeed in school. You can help your child by modeling the interest and excitement about learning necessary to create a passion in them for learning that will stay with them for life.

Help Them Learn to be Responsible for their Own Learning

Children need to be responsible for their own learning at an early age (in an age-appropriate manner). In a lot of ways, it’s easier when they are little because they are more eager to learn and to please their parents. Use that energy wisely. Make sure they are exposed to engaging learning experiences that make them want to come back for more.

There are many places on the web that already do a great job listing out ideas and activities that you can use with your child to keep them engaged in the learning process. Here’s the one I like best.

Engage with the School You Chose

Parents who view their school of choice as partners in their child’s learning are typically more engaged in the educational process. They know that it’s the parent who is most responsible for the child’s education, not the school.

As such, they choose their child’s school carefully and closely monitor what is going on at the school to ensure the school is living up to their expectations of what should be provided to their child. If the school messes things up, they are not afraid to make a move to a new school.

Of course, that’s not the first option anyone wants to take. Once you have chosen a school that you think is a great fit for your child you want to engage them intentionally and frequently to ensure that lines of communication are open and high expectations are being met for your child.

Make sure that you receive information from your child’s teacher about their behavior and academic performance as frequently as you think will keep you well informed. Get involved with the parent-teacher association so you can be more aware of what is going on at the school.

Get to know and be friendly with the principal’s secretary (they typically know what’s going on at the school). Build relationships in the school community that get you beyond the messaging of the district and administration and to the core of what is really happening at the school.

Understand Your Child’s Intellectual Interests (Beyond School)

Schooling itself is not a goal. It is a vehicle to develop students into stronger critical thinkers so they can contribute to society meaningfully later in life. You can help them each step of the way by paying attention to what they are really interested in and give them the time to pursue those interests.

The liberal education that is provided to students in western countries is great for creating well-rounded thinkers that are versed in the arts and sciences. However, the general curriculum does not typically allow for too much deviation from prescribed standards.

So, if a child has other interests they want to pursue they don’t always have the options to do so. That’s a great opportunity for you to shape your child’s free time with hobbies instead of downtime (or screen time).

Give your child the chance to develop their interests by ensuring they have the time and resources needed to learn about their topic. Let’ say they are interested in engineering. Help them learn more by joining a local rocket club.

When they join the club they will be introduced to the concept of rocketry in a thoughtful way. Engage with them as much as you can and become part of the learning process if it is something you want to share together.

Make connections with other parents so it will be easier for your child to meet up with other kids who share their interest in rocketry. Watch them as they practice. Make sure quality learning is taking place. When it comes time to buy them their own rocket, you will be more comfortable knowing they have been taught the proper way to use it because they were taught by trained adults and practiced with proficient peers.

No matter what their interest turns out to be, it will be important for you to support with the time, resources, and encouragement they need to progress through the learning process. Your involvement can be a great addition to ensuring they succeed.

They don’t have to be the next great engineer, they just have to stick with it long enough to figure out if it really is something they want to pursue. Once they have given it the time it deserves, they can choose to stick with it or move on to something else.

Turn Off Devices

I write frequently about this topic . Avoid devices as much as possible. In my home, they are not permitted (including T.V.) during the week and we try to avoid them as much as possible on the weekends. When we do allow the T.V. to be on, we try to ensure the kids are watching something that has a legitimate storyline and plot.

Tablets and phones are avoided as much as possible as well. Devices create a distraction for kids with little to show for their time. They are one of those things that you probably want to put off for as long as possible and then minimize time exposed when you finally have to give in and purchase your child one of their own.

Final Thoughts

It’s important to remember that the parent is the primary driver behind the child’s education, not the school. If a child has a strong parent who is engaged throughout the learning process they will rely less on other role models for learning.

That’s important in a day and age where U.S. schools are still performing below international standards. It’s up to you to ensure they get what they can from the education system and they get the rest of what they need from somewhere else. Where that is will be up to you.

It will probably be a combination of strategies that will help you find success. Remember that this is a marathon. Make your connection with your child the priority above everything thing else that goes into parenting and you will have a solid foundation for success.

Related Questions

Why is it important for parents to be involved in their child’s education.

Parents who are involved in their child’s education are more likely to have kids who develop socially, academically, and behaviorally in a healthy way. Children with involved parents benefit from lower drop-out rates, higher grades, better social skills and greater engagement in all that schools have to offer. As a result, they are more likely to enroll in and complete college, setting them up for their career of choice.

How Do I Help My Child Find Their Passion?

Make sure you are frequently introducing them to new things. When something sticks, write it down. Continue this process, noting their interests along the way. As you compile a list of their interests you can work with your child to decide which ones they will pursue. Give them the freedom and support they need to explore each one. For the most part it should be driven by the child’s desire, but remember every kid needs a nudge once in a while.

Parent Role in Education is Critical for Academic Success

Research confirms how critical their role in student success

Betsie Van Der Meer / Getty Images

• Issues In Education
• An Introduction to Teaching
• Tips & Strategies
• Policies & Discipline
• Community Involvement
• School Administration
• Technology in the Classroom
• Teaching Adult Learners
• Teaching Resources
• Becoming A Teacher
• Assessments & Tests
• Elementary Education
• Secondary Education
• Special Education
• Homeschooling
• M.Ed., Curriculum and Instruction, University of Florida
• B.A., History, University of Florida

While parents have always had a role in their children’s education, there is a growing body of research that confirms their critical role in helping both teachers and students succeed academically.

Parental Engagement Starts Early

The parent-school relationship is one that should begin early, a fact recognized by both the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Education. In May 2016, these departments issued a joint  Policy Statement called "Family Engagement from the Early Years to the Early Grades" to recognize the critical role of parents in promoting children’s success starting in early childhood systems and programs:

"Strong family engagement in early childhood systems and programs is central—not supplemental—to promoting children’s healthy intellectual, physical, and social-emotional development; preparing children for school; and supporting academic achievement in elementary school and beyond."

The policy statement reiterated the findings in an earlier report, " A New Wave of Evidence ," from the Southwest Educational Development Laboratory (2002). This report remains the most comprehensive meta-analysis using 51 studies on parent engagement and student academic success. The report released the statement:

“When schools, families, and community groups work together to support learning, children tend to do better in school, stay in school longer, and like school more.”

The reviewers considered backgrounds and income and included studies covering all grades, all regions of the country, diverse populations along with a variety of methods, both quantitative and qualitative. The conclusion reached was that that parent engagement led to:

• Higher grades and test scores, and enrollment in higher-level programs
• An increase in earned credits and promotions.
• Improved attendance
• Improved behavior and social skills
• An increase in enrollment in postsecondary education

Increasing parent engagement to achieve these outcomes means schools are seeking ways to connect parents to school communities.

What Parents Think

A report commissioned by Learning Heroes and supported by the Carnegie Corporation called " Unleashing Their Power & Potential " details why communication can help.

The data for the report came from a survey that focused on the “perceptions of schools and the state and national assessment data.” More than 1,400 K–8 public school parents across the nation took part. The survey co-collaborators included Univision Communications, National PTA, National Urban League, and the United Negro College Fund.

The findings from  " Unleashing Their Power & Potential" may hold one big surprise for educators; elementary school parents place more emphasis on their child’s happiness than academics. Putting happiness first, however, shifts in the middle school years as parents develop doubts about their children’s preparedness for postsecondary schools.

One primary area for concern in the survey found parents are confused about how to understand the different ways students are accessed:

“(M)ost of the communications parents receive—report cards, annual state test score reports, and curriculum summaries to name a few—are indecipherable and incomprehensible for most parents. About a quarter of parents are not aware of their child's annual state test scores.”

The authors of the report suggest there is a need for improved communications “that are responsive to parents' needs, interests, and concerns.” They note:

“Most parents rely on report card grades, quizzes, and communications with teachers to determine whether their child is achieving their grade level.”

They promote helping parents to understand the connection between these forms of assessment.

That sentiment was echoed by Claudia Barwell, director of learning, Suklaa, with her essay, " How Parents Can Change the Global Landscape of Education " in which she discusses the challenges in finding the right balance in communicating with parents. Her essay, written from a parent’s point of view, suggests that there are three fundamental areas for balance: the teacher’s relationship with parents, parents’ relationship with formal assessment, and the latent power of parents in co-designing schooling.

She suggests that schools survey parents and ask these key questions:

• What values do you believe are essential for a developing child?
• What part of the current curriculum is essential?
• What should we be teaching that we are not?
• What skills will they need for the future?
• What role would you like to play in the education of your children?

Such questions can begin a dialogue and improve the conversations between parents and teachers and administrators. Barwell would also see value in seeing “links to brief teaching methods and a glossary of terms so that parents can support learning at home without being told we are ‘doing it wrong’ by our children.”

Barwell’s request for links illustrates an audience willing to use a growing number of technology tools designed for parents to understand how a school operates. There are also technology tools designed to help parents interact with the teachers and administrators.

How Parents Interact With Schools

If parents are looking for an explanation with details of what their child is expected to learn over the course of a week, month or year, there are multiple options schools may be using, from software platforms to mobile apps. 

For example, SeeSaw or  ClassDojo , used in preschool and elementary grades, are software programs that can document and share information about student learning in real-time. For the upper elementary grades, middle and high school, the platform  Edmodo  allows parents to see assignments and class resources, while Google Classroom provides teachers a means to send assignments to students and send out parent/guardian updates. All of this software offers mobile apps as well. Video-conferencing programs such as Zoom and Google Meet allow for real-time interaction between students and teachers, or even students, teachers, and parents, in a virtual setting.

Because evaluation programs for teachers, support staff, and administrators include  a parent communication/engagement goal , a need exists to measure communication and engagement, and these technology tools collect that data. For this reason, many schools districts encourage parents to sign up for the mobile app  Remind . This app can be used by a teacher to send homework updates or by a school district to send general school updates through text messages.

Finally, most public schools now post student grades online through student-management software such as  PowerSchool, Blackboard ,  Engrade,   LearnBoost , or  ThinkWave . Teachers can post student performance ratings (grades) which let parents keep a watchful on student academic progress. Of course, the amount of information available through these kinds of technology can be a little overwhelming.

Technology tools designed to increase parent engagement are only effective if they are used by the parents. School districts need to consider how they will educate parents to use different technology tools to guide their decisions. But it is not only in the area of technology that parents need training. 

Research findings report that most parents do not understand educational policy at the local, state or federal level. To correct these gaps, the  Every Students Succeed Act (ESSA) , an educational reform plan that replaced the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) in 2015, places an  emphasis on the importance of stakeholder engagement . There are mandates for community input; states  must  solicit and evaluate input from parents when developing strategic plans for schools.

Finally, while teachers need to keep parents “in the loop” they also need to respect the limited time today’s parents find themselves, stretched for time, energy, and resources.

Home and School Connection

Technology and legislation aside, there are other ways parents can be supportive of education in general, and they have been around almost as long as the institution of public education.

As early as 1910, a book on education by Chauncey P. Colegrove titled "The Teacher and the School" placed an emphasis on engaging parents. He advised teachers to “enlist the interest of parents and secure their co-operation by making them acquainted with what the schools are striving to accomplish.”

In his book, Colegrove asked, “Where there is no knowledge of each other, how can there be close sympathy and cooperation between parents and teacher?” He responded to this question by stating, “The surest way to win a parent's heart is to show an intelligent and sympathetic interest in the welfare of his children.”

Over 100 years after Colegrove published "The Teacher and the School," Secretary of Education (2009-2015)  Arne Duncan  added:

“We often talk about parents being partners in education. When we say that, we're usually talking about the healthy and productive relationships that can develop between the adults in a child's life at home and the adults who work with that child at school. I can't overstate how important this partnership is.”

Whether it is a handwritten note or a text message, the communication between teachers and parents is what develops the relationships described by Duncan. While a student’s education may take place within the walls of a building, the school’s connection to parents can extend those walls into the student’s home.  

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2018 Theses Doctoral

Essays on the Role of Parents in Educational Outcomes and Inequality

Chan, Eric Wai Kin

Parents have been shown to be a crucial driver in a child's educational outcomes in both the economics and education literature. However, researchers have yet to understand the roles that educational interventions, information, and policies might have on parental behavior and engagement toward their child's education and, in turn, how to effectively promote parental engagement for the benefits of children. In my dissertation, I examine how educational interventions and policies can impact the behavior and decision-making of parents and in turn affect student achievement. Specifically, I add to the scholarly literature evidence on (a) how being identified as gifted student affect parental levels of engagement and time investments, (b) how timely information about academic progress might change parental behaviors and improve educational outcomes, and (c) how immigrant mothers react to an expansion of pre-K specifically targeted at their children. Chapter one examines the short-term and long-term effects of an elementary school gifted education program in California that clusters 6-8 gifted students in classrooms. While I examine the academic effects of the program, I emphasize the analysis on the role of parent engagement and time investments in the lives of gifted children. While the gifted education literature has studied the causal effects of programs, there is limited evidence on how parent engagement might change as a result of these programs and its potential as a mechanism for achievement effects. Therefore, this study contributes to the economic debate of whether parent engagement is a complement or substitute to education quality. Using a fuzzy regression discontinuity approach, I primarily find small to no evidence on short-term academic effects, but stronger effects on longer-term course-taking and college outcomes. On the parent side, I find that while most parents are not more engaged overall, parents of minority gifted children and low-socioeconomic students are. The implication is that there is heterogeneity in the manner by which parents react behaviorally to students that are identified as gifted. In Chapter two, a joint paper with Peter Bergman, we run a randomized controlled trial in West Virginia examining the effects of a high-frequency academic information intervention on middle and high school student' academic outcomes. In this field experiment, we send out three types of alerts to parents - weekly missing assignments, weekly class absences, and monthly low grade average - during the 2015-16 school year. We find that the intervention reduces course failures by 38%, increases class attendance by 17%, and increases retention. We find no evidence that test scores improve, but find that there are significant improvements on in-class exam scores. The evidence of improvement in test scores show that there are information frictions between parent and child, and thus parents may have inaccurate beliefs about their child's abilities due to a lack of complete information. Chapter three examines the maternal labor supply and pre-K enrollment effects of a bilingual pre-K policy implemented in Illinois during the 2010-11 school year, which came after the implementation of a statewide universal pre-K program in 2007. Research has shown the importance of quality preschool in the development of a child, with minorities particularly sensitive to the prevalence of quality early childhood education. In this study, I exploit variation in a policy mandating that any school with at least twenty identified English Language Learner student of a particular language is required to open up a bilingual classroom for those students. Using multiple control groups and various difference-in-differences specifications, I find that there is little to no change in maternal labor supply among Hispanics and recent immigrants, including the probability of being in the labor force, hours worked per week, and wage and salary income. However, I also find a significant and robust increase of 18-20 percentage points in the enrollment of 3- and 4-year old children into pre-K programs in Illinois. This result shows that, even in a state where there is universal access to pre-K, the design of such policies might not have sufficient reach to high-need parents. Taken together, this dissertation helps deepen our understanding of the various roles parents might affect educational outcomes and inequality. As my results demonstrate, there are various ways which help and incentivize parents to react in a manner that will improve childhood and long-term outcomes. Whether by programs, information, or public policy, the tools are many, yet it is crucial that scholarly work continues to dive deeper into how parents, children, and other stakeholders react.

• Education and state
• School management and organization
• Educational equalization
• Education--Parent participation

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Home — Essay Samples — Life — Parenting Styles — Parent Involvement in Education

Parent Involvement in Education

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Published: Apr 11, 2019

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Works Cited

• Child Trends. (n.d.). Parental involvement in education. https://www.childtrends.org/indicators/parental-involvement-in-education
• Sivertsen, J. (2018, March 26). The importance of parental involvement in education. EdTech Magazine.
• The Star Online. (2018, January 7). The importance of parental involvement in children's education. https://www.thestar.com.my/news/education/2018/01/07/the-importance-of-parental-involvement-in-childrens-education/
• Topor, D. R., Keane, S. P., Shelton, T. L., & Calkins, S. D. (2010). Parent involvement and student academic performance: A multiple mediational analysis. Journal of Prevention & Intervention in the Community, 38(3), 183-197.
• Wang, M. T., Hill, N. E., & Hofkens, T. (2014). Parental involvement and African American and European American adolescents' academic, behavioral, and emotional development in secondary school. Child Development, 85(6), 2151-2168.
• Wang, M. T., & Sheikh-Khalil, S. (2014). Does parental involvement matter for student achievement and mental health in high school? Child Development, 85(2), 610-625.
• Wilder, S. (2014). Effects of parental involvement on academic achievement: A meta-synthesis. Educational Review, 66(3), 377-397.
• Xu, J. (2011). Parental involvement in homework: A review of current research and its implications for teachers, after school program staff, and parent leaders. Harvard Family Research Project. https://www.hfrp.org/publications-resources/browse-our-publications/parental-involvement-in-homework-a-review-of-current-research-and-its-implicatio

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THE CRUCIAL ROLE OF PARENT INVOLVEMENT IN THE LEARNING PROCESS OF STUDENTS

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Does Parent Involvement Really Help Students? Here’s What the Research Says

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Parental involvement has been a top priority for school leaders for decades, and research shows that it can make a major difference in student outcomes.

But a parents’ rights movement that has captured headlines over the past few years and become a major political force has painted a particular picture of what parents’ involvement in their children’s education looks like.

Policies that have passed in a number of individual school districts, states, and the U.S. House have spelled out parents’ rights to inspect curriculum materials and withdraw their children from lessons they deem objectionable; restricted teaching about race, gender identity, and sexuality; and resulted in the removal of books from school libraries, including many with LGBTQ+ characters and protagonists of color.

The parents’ rights movement has been divisive and attracted the ire of some teachers who feel censored. But it has also opened up the conversation around parent involvement in school, said Vito Borrello, executive director of the National Association for Family, School, and Community Engagement.

And that’s a good thing, he said.

“The parents’ rights bills in and of themselves, I wouldn’t suggest are entirely focused on best practice family engagement,” said Borrello, whose group works to advance effective family, school, and community engagement policies and practices. “However, what the parents’ rights bills have done is elevated the important role that parents have in their child’s education.”

For decades, research from around the world has shown that parents’ involvement in and engagement with their child’s education—including through parent-teacher conferences, parent-teacher organizations, school events, and at-home discussions about school—can lead to higher student achievement and better social-emotional outcomes.

Here are five takeaways from the research.

1. Studies show more parental involvement leads to improved academic outcomes

When parents are involved in their children’s schooling, students show higher academic achievement, school engagement, and motivation, according to a 2019 American Psychological Association review of 448 independent studies on parent involvement.

A 2005 study from researchers at the Johns Hopkins University Center on School, Family and Community Partnerships , for example, showed that school practices encouraging families to support their child’s math learning at home led to higher percentages of students scoring at or above proficiency on standardized math tests.

And research shows that parent involvement with reading activities has a positive impact on reading achievement, language comprehension, and expressive language skills, as well as students’ interest in reading, attitudes toward reading, and level of attention in the classroom, according to a research summary by the National Literacy Trust.

“When parents become involved at school by, for example, attending events such as open houses or volunteering in the classroom, they build social networks that can provide useful information, connections to school personnel (e.g., teachers), or strategies for enhancing children’s achievement,” the APA research review said. “In turn, parents with heightened social capital are better equipped to support their children in succeeding in school as they are able to call on resources (e.g., asking a teacher to spend extra time helping their children) and utilize information they have gathered (e.g., knowing when and how their children should complete their homework).”

2. Parent involvement changes social-emotional outcomes, too

The APA study showed that not only does parental involvement lead to improved academic outcomes, but it also has a positive impact on students’ social and emotional skills and decreases instances of delinquency.

That finding also applies internationally.

A 2014 International Education Studies report on parental involvement among 9th and 10th graders in Jordan showed that parental involvement had a positive impact on students’ emotional engagement in school. That means students with more involved parents are more likely to have fun, enjoy school, have high self-esteem, and perceive school as a satisfying experience.

And when parents visit their children’s school, that contributes to a sense of safety among the students, ultimately improving school engagement, the study said. Although conducted in Jordan, the study provides insight into how parental involvement affects students’ social-emotional development in other countries, including the United States.

Parent involvement also gives teachers the tools to better support their students, Borrello said.

“When teachers understand what their students are going through personally and at home and any challenges they may have, then that improves their teaching,” he said. “They’re able to support their student in ways they wouldn’t be able to otherwise.”

3. Not all parental involvement is created equal

Different levels and types of parent involvement led to varying outcomes for students, according to the American Psychological Association study.

For example, school-based involvement, such as participation in parent-teacher conferences, open houses, and other school events, had a positive impact on academics in preschool, middle school, and high school, but the size of the impact was much lower in high school than in preschool. That may be because parents have fewer opportunities to be involved in the high school environment than in younger students’ classrooms where parents might volunteer.

At-home discussions and encouragement surrounding school also have a positive impact on students’ academic achievement at all developmental stages, with that type of parent involvement being most effective for high schoolers, according to the study. Reading with children and taking them to the library have a positive impact as well.

But one common form of parental involvement, helping kids with their homework, was shown to have little impact on students’ academic achievement.

In fact, homework help had a small negative impact on student achievement, but positive impacts on student motivation and engagement in school, according to the APA study.

The research shows the value of encouraging parents to be involved in their student’s learning at home, and not just attending school events, Borrello said.

“In the past, schools either had an event that wasn’t connected to learning or only measured the engagement of a family based on how often they came to the school,” he said. “What families are doing to create an environment of learning and supporting learning at home, is probably even more important than how many times they’re coming to school.”

4. Results of parent involvement don’t discriminate based on race or socioeconomics

Research has shown a consensus that family and parent involvement in schools leads to better outcomes regardless of a family’s ethnic background or socioeconomic status.

Parent involvement has led to higher academic outcomes both for children from low and higher socioeconomic status families.

When comparing the impact of parent involvement on students of different races and ethnicities, the APA found that school-based involvement had a positive impact on academics among Black, Asian, white, and Hispanic children, with a stronger impact on Black and white families than families from other demographics. The finding also extended internationally, with similar effects on children outside of the United States.

5. Schools can encourage parent involvement in person and at home

Parent involvement doesn’t have to end with parent-teacher conferences. There are many ways for schools to encourage parents to be more involved both in school and at home, Borrello said.

The best way to start, he said, is by creating a school culture that is welcoming to families.

“That starts with the principal, and that starts with school leadership that is welcoming to families, from how they’re engaging parents in the classroom to what policies they have in schools to welcome families,” Borrello said.

Parent gathering spaces or rooms in school buildings, scheduled parent engagement meetings and office hours, and at-school events held outside of the school day are all good places to start, Borrello said. From there, schools can work to include parents in more decision-making, give parents resources to support learning at home, and equip teachers with the tools to engage and connect with parents.

“If the school is not welcoming and families don’t feel welcome at the school, then you’re not going to get them to come to school no matter what you do,” Borrello said. “Then it’s really thinking about who you’re creating those relationships with families so that they can be heard.”

Coverage of strategies for advancing the opportunities for students most in need, including those from low-income families and communities, is supported by a grant from the Walton Family Foundation, at www.waltonk12.org . Education Week retains sole editorial control over the content of this coverage. A version of this article appeared in the August 16, 2023 edition of Education Week as Does Parent Involvement Really Help Students? 5 Key Takeaways Based on The Research

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Parental Involvement in Your Child’s Education

The key to student success, research shows.

If you could wave a mag­ic wand that would improve the chances of school suc­cess for your chil­dren as well as their class­mates, would you take up that challenge?

For decades, researchers have point­ed to one key suc­cess fac­tor that tran­scends near­ly all oth­ers, such as socioe­co­nom­ic sta­tus, stu­dent back­ground or the kind of school a stu­dent attends: parental involve­ment.

The extent to which schools nur­ture pos­i­tive rela­tion­ships with fam­i­lies — and vice ver­sa — makes all the dif­fer­ence, research shows. Stu­dents whose par­ents stay involved in school have bet­ter atten­dance and behav­ior, get bet­ter grades, demon­strate bet­ter social skills and adapt bet­ter to school.

Parental involve­ment also more secure­ly sets these stu­dents up to devel­op a  life­long love of learn­ing , which researchers say is key to long-term success.

A gen­er­a­tion ago, the Nation­al PTA found that three key par­ent behav­iors are the most accu­rate pre­dic­tors of stu­dent achieve­ment, tran­scend­ing both fam­i­ly income and social status:

• cre­at­ing a home envi­ron­ment that encour­ages learning;
• com­mu­ni­cat­ing high, yet rea­son­able, expec­ta­tions for achieve­ment; and 
• stay­ing involved in a child’s edu­ca­tion at school.

What’s more, researchers say when this hap­pens, the moti­va­tion, behav­ior and aca­d­e­m­ic per­for­mance of all chil­dren at a par­tic­u­lar school improve. Sim­ply put, the bet­ter the part­ner­ship between school and home, the bet­ter the school and the high­er the stu­dent achieve­ment across the board.

Down­load Our Parental Involve­ment in Edu­ca­tion Report

What Is Parental Involve­ment, and How Is It Dif­fer­ent From Parental Engagement?

Parental involve­ment is the active, ongo­ing par­tic­i­pa­tion of a par­ent or pri­ma­ry care­giv­er in the edu­ca­tion of a child. Par­ents can demon­strate involve­ment at home by:

• read­ing with children;
• help­ing with homework;
• dis­cussing school events;
• attend­ing school func­tions, includ­ing par­ent-teacher meet­ings; and
• vol­un­teer­ing in classrooms.

While both parental involve­ment and parental engage­ment in school sup­port stu­dent suc­cess, they have impor­tant differences.

Involve­ment is the first step towards engage­ment. It includes par­tic­i­pa­tion in school events or activ­i­ties, with teach­ers pro­vid­ing learn­ing resources and infor­ma­tion about their student’s grades. With involve­ment, teach­ers hold the pri­ma­ry respon­si­bil­i­ty to set edu­ca­tion­al goals. 

But while teach­ers can offer advice, fam­i­lies and care­givers have impor­tant infor­ma­tion about their chil­dren that teach­ers may not know. So a student’s learn­ing expe­ri­ence is enriched when both bring their per­spec­tives to the table. 

With engage­ment , home and school come togeth­er as a team. Schools empow­er par­ents and care­givers by pro­vid­ing them with ways to active­ly par­tic­i­pate, pro­mot­ing them as impor­tant voic­es in the school and remov­ing bar­ri­ers to engage­ment. Exam­ples include encour­ag­ing fam­i­lies to join the fam­i­ly-teacher asso­ci­a­tion or arrang­ing vir­tu­al fam­i­ly-teacher meet­ings for fam­i­lies with trans­porta­tion issues. 

Research has found that the ear­li­er edu­ca­tors estab­lish fam­i­ly engage­ment, the more effec­tive they are in rais­ing stu­dent performance.

Why Is It Impor­tant to Involve Par­ents in School?

It ben­e­fits students.

Chil­dren whose fam­i­lies are engaged in their edu­ca­tion are more like­ly to: 

• earn high­er grades and score high­er on tests;
• grad­u­ate from high school and college;
• devel­op self-con­fi­dence and moti­va­tion in the class­room; and
• have bet­ter social skills and class­room behavior.

In one study, researchers looked at lon­gi­tu­di­nal data on math achieve­ment and found that effec­tive­ly encour­ag­ing fam­i­lies to sup­port stu­dents’ math learn­ing at home was asso­ci­at­ed with high­er per­cent­ages of stu­dents who scored at or above pro­fi­cien­cy on stan­dard­ized math achieve­ment tests.

Stu­dents whose par­ents are involved in school are also less like­ly to suf­fer from low self-esteem or devel­op behav­ioral issues, researchers say. 

And class­rooms with engaged fam­i­lies per­form bet­ter as a whole, mean­ing that the ben­e­fits affect vir­tu­al­ly all stu­dents in a classroom.

It Pos­i­tive­ly Influ­ences Children’s Behavior

Decades of research have made one thing clear: parental involve­ment in edu­ca­tion improves stu­dent atten­dance, social skills and behav­ior. It also helps chil­dren adapt bet­ter to school.

In one instance, researchers look­ing at children’s aca­d­e­m­ic and social devel­op­ment across first, third and fifth grade found that improve­ments in parental involve­ment are asso­ci­at­ed with few­er ​ “ prob­lem behav­iors” in stu­dents and improve­ments in social skills. Researchers also found that chil­dren with high­ly involved par­ents had ​ “ enhanced social func­tion­ing” and few­er behav­ior problems.

It Ben­e­fits Teachers

Because it improves class­room cul­ture and con­di­tions, par­ent involve­ment also ben­e­fits teach­ers. Know­ing more about a stu­dent helps teach­ers pre­pare bet­ter and know­ing that they have par­ents’ sup­port ensures that teach­ers feel equipped to take aca­d­e­m­ic risks and push for stu­dents to learn more. 

How Can Par­ents Get Involved in Their Child’s Education?

• Make learn­ing a pri­or­i­ty in your home, estab­lish­ing rou­tines and sched­ules that enable chil­dren to com­plete home­work, read inde­pen­dent­ly, get enough sleep and have oppor­tu­ni­ties to get help from you. Talk about what’s going on in school. 
• Read to and with your chil­dren: Even 10 – 20  min­utes dai­ly makes a dif­fer­ence. And par­ents can go fur­ther by ensur­ing that they read more each day as well, either as a fam­i­ly or pri­vate read­ing time that sets a good example.
• Ask teach­ers how they would like to com­mu­ni­cate. Many are com­fort­able with text mes­sages or phone calls, and all teach­ers want par­ents to stay up to date, espe­cial­ly if prob­lems arise.
• Attend school events, includ­ing par­ent-teacher con­fer­ences, back-to-school nights and oth­ers — even if your child is not involved in extracur­ric­u­lar activities. 
• Use your com­mute to con­nect with your kids; ask them to read to you while you dri­ve and encour­age con­ver­sa­tions about school. 
• Eat meals togeth­er: It’s the per­fect oppor­tu­ni­ty to find out more about what’s going on in school.
• Pri­or­i­tize com­mu­ni­ca­tion with teach­ers, espe­cial­ly if demand­ing work sched­ules, cul­tur­al or lan­guage bar­ri­ers are an issue. Find out what resources are avail­able to help get par­ents involved. 

Parental Involve­ment Out­side the Classroom

Out­side of the class­room, engaged par­ents more often see them­selves as advo­cates for their child’s school — and are more like­ly to vol­un­teer or take an active role in governance. 

Researchers have not­ed that par­ent involve­ment in school gov­er­nance, for instance, helps par­ents under­stand edu­ca­tors’ and oth­er par­ents’ moti­va­tions, atti­tudes and abil­i­ties. It gives them a greater oppor­tu­ni­ty to serve as resources for their chil­dren, often increas­ing their own skills and con­fi­dence. In a few cas­es, these par­ents actu­al­ly fur­ther their own edu­ca­tion and upgrade their job.

While pro­vid­ing improved role mod­els for their chil­dren, these par­ents also ensure that the larg­er com­mu­ni­ty views the school pos­i­tive­ly and sup­ports it. They also pro­vide role mod­els for future par­ent leaders.

Read­ing and Homework

Very ear­ly in their school career — by fourth grade — chil­dren are expect­ed to be able to read to learn oth­er sub­jects. But recent research shows that about two-thirds of the nation’s pub­lic school fourth graders aren’t pro­fi­cient read­ers .

To make chil­dren suc­cess­ful in read­ing , and in school more gen­er­al­ly, the sin­gle most impor­tant thing you can do is to read aloud with them.

Youth Sports and Oth­er Extracur­ric­u­lar Activities

Par­ents can make or break their child’s rela­tion­ship with sports and oth­er extracur­ric­u­lar activ­i­ties, so they should think deeply about how to show chil­dren the fun of mas­ter­ing a new skill, work­ing toward a group or indi­vid­ual goal, weath­er­ing adver­si­ty, being a good sport and win­ning or los­ing gracefully.

Beyond this, par­ents with coach­ing skills should con­sid­er vol­un­teer­ing to get involved. The Nation­al Alliance for Youth Sports notes that only about 5 % to 10 % of youth sports coach­es have received any rel­e­vant train­ing before coach­ing, with most coach­es step­ping up because their child is on the team and no one else volunteered.

Parental Involve­ment in Juve­nile Justice

Par­ents find­ing them­selves involved in the juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem on behalf of their kids face a sys­tem that offers many chal­lenges and few resources. 

The Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Juve­nile Deten­tion Alter­na­tives Ini­tia­tive has long sought to sharply reduce reliance on deten­tion, with the aim of decreas­ing reliance on juve­nile incar­cer­a­tion nationwide.

But par­ents whose chil­dren face the judi­cial sys­tem can make a dif­fer­ence. Sur­veys of cor­rec­tions offi­cials note that fam­i­ly involve­ment is one of the most impor­tant issues fac­ing the juve­nile sys­tem, and it is also the most oper­a­tional­ly challenging. 

One well-respect­ed frame­work out­lines the impor­tance of five ​ “ dimen­sions” that mea­sure parental involve­ment, includ­ing recep­tiv­i­ty to receiv­ing help, a belief in pos­i­tive change, invest­ment in plan­ning and obtain­ing ser­vices and a good work­ing rela­tion­ship between the par­ent and the jus­tice system.

What Suc­cess­ful Parental Involve­ment Looks Like

Experts urge par­ents to be present at school as much as pos­si­ble and to show inter­est in children’s schoolwork.

As not­ed in the Annie E. Casey Foun­da­tion ​ “ Parental Involve­ment in Edu­ca­tion Pol­i­cy” brief, the Nation­al PTA lists six key stan­dards for good parent/​family involve­ment programs:

• Schools engage in reg­u­lar, two-way, mean­ing­ful com­mu­ni­ca­tion with parents.
• Par­ent­ing skills are pro­mot­ed and supported. 
• Par­ents play an inte­gral role in assist­ing stu­dent learning.
• Par­ents are wel­come in the school as vol­un­teers, and their sup­port and assis­tance are sought. 
• Par­ents are full part­ners in the deci­sions that affect chil­dren and families. 
• Com­mu­ni­ty resources are used to strength­en schools, fam­i­lies and stu­dent learning.

How To Avoid Neg­a­tive Parental Involvement

Teach­ers may, on occa­sion, com­plain of ​ “ heli­copter par­ents” whose involve­ment — some­times called ​ “ hov­er­ing” — does more harm than good. One vet­er­an edu­ca­tor recent­ly told the sto­ry of an award-win­ning col­league who quit the pro­fes­sion because of the grow­ing influ­ence of ​ “ a group of usu­al­ly well-inten­tioned, but over-involved, over­pro­tec­tive and con­trol­ling par­ents who bub­ble-wrap their children.” 

What these par­ents fail to under­stand, he said, is that their good inten­tions ​ “ often back­fire,” imped­ing their children’s cop­ing skills and capac­i­ty to prob­lem-solve. Such over-involve­ment can actu­al­ly increase children’s anx­i­ety and reduce self-esteem. 

The colleague’s plea: ​ “ Please part­ner with us rather than per­se­cute us. That will always be in your children’s best interests.”

Resources for Par­ents, Teach­ers, School Admin­is­tra­tors and Advocates

• Child Trends Fam­i­lies and Par­ent­ing Research
• Har­vard Grad­u­ate School of Edu­ca­tion’s Usable Knowl­edge series
• Par­ent Insti­tute for Qual­i­ty Education
• The Nation­al Par­ent Teacher Association
• Johns Hop­kins Uni­ver­si­ty Nation­al Net­work of Part­ner­ship Schools
• The Casey Foun­da­tion Parental Involve­ment in Edu­ca­tion pol­i­cy brief
• The Casey Foun­da­tion’s Fam­i­lies as Pri­ma­ry Part­ners in Their Child’s Devel­op­ment and School Readiness

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• School Education /

Essay on Parents: Free Samples for School Students

• Updated on  
• Nov 6, 2023

Robert Brault once said, ‘A parent’s love is whole no matter how many times divided.’ Our parents mean everything to us. From birth to the day we become financially independent, our parents have always been there for us, formulate our thoughts and make or change the decisions in our lives. Parents play a crucial role in a child’s emotional, social, intellectual, and physical development. We celebrate important days like Mother’s Day and Father’s Day to honour and respect our parents. No words can describe the efforts and the hardships they go through. Therefore, today we will be providing you with an essay on parents to help you understand their importance in our lives and their role in shaping our future.

Table of Contents

• 1 Essay on Parents in 100 Words
• 2 Essay on Parents in 200 Words
• 3 Essay on Parents in 300 Words

Also Read: Parental Pressure: Care But Not Too Much

Essay on Parents in 100 Words

Also Read: Importance of Education in Our Life

Essay on Parents in 200 Words

Also Read: National Parent’s Day 2023

Essay on Parents in 300 Words

Also Read: How to Prepare for UPSC in 6 Months?

Ans: It’s very easy to write an essay on parents, all you need to do is highlight every aspect of your life where your parents have supported you. You can start by mentioning your early school days when you were having difficulties with your classmates or teacher, and how beautifully your parents helped you. Real-life examples will give value to your essay as it will portray the emotional bond between you and your parents.

Ans: Mere words cannot describe the importance of parents in our lives, as they always try to do their best. Our parents offer us the life which they ever dreamed of so that we can have a flourishing future. They are the primary source of moral guidance for us. They impart values, ethics, and principles that shape our understanding of right and wrong, contributing to the development of a strong moral compass.

Ans: Here are 5 lines on parents: Parents are the guiding lights that illuminate the path of a child’s life; They provide unconditional love, which forms the bedrock of our emotional well-being; Through their nurturing presence, parents provide a sense of security and stability; They serve as role models, imparting values and morals that shape our character; Parents are the first teachers, introducing us the wonders of the world.

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Shiva Tyagi

With an experience of over a year, I've developed a passion for writing blogs on wide range of topics. I am mostly inspired from topics related to social and environmental fields, where you come up with a positive outcome.

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The Home-School Team: An Emphasis on Parent Involvement

Students thrive when their parents become part of the classroom.

Children learn best when the significant adults in their lives -- parents, teachers, and other family and community members -- work together to encourage and support them. This basic fact should be a guiding principle as we think about how schools should be organized and how children should be taught. Schools alone cannot address all of a child's developmental needs: The meaningful involvement of parents and support from the community are essential.

The need for a strong partnership between schools and families to educate children may seem like common sense. In simpler times, this relationship was natural and easy to maintain. Teachers and parents were often neighbors and found many occasions to discuss a child's progress. Children heard the same messages from teachers and parents and understood that they were expected to uphold the same standards at home and at school.

As society has become more complex and demanding, though, these relationships have all too often fallen by the wayside. Neither educators nor parents have enough time to get to know one another and establish working relationships on behalf of children. In many communities, parents are discouraged from spending time in classrooms and educators are expected to consult with family members only when a child is in trouble. The result, in too many cases, is misunderstanding, mistrust, and a lack of respect, so that when a child falls behind, teachers blame the parents and parents blame the teachers.

At the same time, our society has created artificial distinctions about the roles that parents and teachers should play in a young person's development. We tend to think that schools should stick to teaching academics and that home is the place where children's moral and emotional development should take place.

Yet children don't stop learning about values and relationships when they enter a classroom, nor do they cease learning academics -- and attitudes about learning -- when they are at home or elsewhere in their community. They constantly observe how the significant adults in their lives treat one another, how decisions are made and executed, and how problems are solved.

All the experiences children have, both in and out of school, help shape their sense that someone cares about them, their feelings of self-worth and competency, their understanding of the world around them, and their beliefs about where they fit into the scheme of things.

These days, it can take extraordinary efforts to build strong relationships between families and educators. Schools have to reach out to families, making them feel welcome as full partners in the educational process. Families, in turn, have to make a commitment of time and energy to support their children both at home and at school.

The effort involved in reestablishing these connections is well worth it, as many communities across the country -- including those we work with -- are discovering. Our experience is that significant and meaningful parent involvement is possible, desirable, and valuable in improving student growth and performance.

A Starting Point

The communities in which we are involved -- mostly inner city neighborhoods -- tend to start with relatively poor relationships between schools and families. Many of the parents experienced failure during their own school days and are reluctant to set foot inside their children's schools. Teachers commute to work and often know very little about the neighborhood outside the school. Before they can develop effective partnerships, educators and families in these communities first have to learn to trust and respect one another.

Although it is less obvious, the same is true in more affluent communities. The lack of trust and respect can be seen in the growing numbers of parents choosing to enroll their children in private schools or educate them at home, and in the growing reluctance of voters to approve school-bond issues. At the same time, relatively few schools have open-door policies allowing parents to visit at any time, and parents who insist on playing an active role in their children's education are often branded as troublemakers.

The starting point in any community is to create opportunities where parents and teachers can learn that they both have children's best interests at heart. We applaud the growing trend to decentralize decision making from central offices to individual schools because it creates opportunities for parents and educators to work together, making decisions about school policies and procedures. Some may see this arrangement as shifting power from school staff to parents, but it's not power shifting; it's power sharing. It is empowering all the adults who have a stake in children's development.

Participation on school-based planning and management teams gives parents a chance to learn about the professional side of schooling -- to understand the inner workings of curriculum and instruction. It also allows them to educate school staff about the community and demonstrate that parents have much to offer if provided the opportunities to do so.

Working together as full partners, parents, teachers, administrators, businesspeople, and other community members can create an educational program that meets unique local needs and reflects the diversity within a school without compromising high performance expectations and standards. They can foster a caring and sensitive school climate that respects and responds to students' differences as well as their similarities.

A Wide Variety of Roles

Besides participating in governance, parents can be involved in schools in many roles. There are the traditional ways: encouraging children to complete homework, attending parent-teacher conferences, and being active members of their school's parent-teacher organization. Other roles, however, require more commitment: serving as mentors, teacher aides, or lunchroom monitors, or providing assistance to schools and students in myriad other ways.

At a time when schools are adopting curricula based on real-world problems and information, families can make a valuable contribution by sharing first-hand information about work, hobbies, history, and other personal experiences, either in person or via a computer network. Perhaps most important, parents can simply take the time to go to their schools and observe, learning about what their children and their children's teachers are doing.

The hectic pace of modern life can make this kind of involvement seem out of reach for many parents. But there are positive signs that it is becoming more feasible. Employers, concerned about the quality of the future workforce, are starting to adopt policies that allow parents time off to participate on a school's planning and management team or volunteer time at regular intervals. And more schools are offering either day care or preschool, which makes it easier for parents with young children to spend time at an older child's school.

This level of parent involvement in schools allows parents and staff to work together in respectful and mutually supportive ways, creating an environment in which understanding, trust, and respect can flourish. At the same time, students get consistent messages from the important adults in their lives. When children observe that home and school are engaged in a respectful partnership for their benefit, they are likely to develop more positive attitudes about school and achieve more, compared to situations in which school and home are seen as being worlds apart.

Better Lines of Communication

Regardless of a parent's direct involvement in school activities, it is vital for parents and teachers to communicate effectively with one another. Each has a piece of the picture of a child's development, and each can be more effective when information is shared. Constant communication helps ensure that both schools and homes are responsive to students' unique needs and therefore support children's overall development.

Some of this interaction should be face to face, either at the school, at home, at a parent's worksite, or at another convenient location. It must be considered an integral part of schooling, and adequate time must be provided during regular working hours for school staff to carry it out. At the same time, this communication must be recognized as a critical part of parenting, and parents must make the commitment to meet periodically with their children's teachers.

Technology can allow educators and parents to be linked into a sturdier web of mutual support than ever before. Schools and homes can be connected through computer networks that allow them to freely share information, via email and bulletin boards, twenty-four hours a day and year-round.

It's not hard to imagine a time in the near future when all parents will be able to quickly call up information such as a student's schedule for the week, current assignments, and suggestions from teachers about what they can do to support learning goals at home. They'll be able to review what the child has been doing by looking at actual samples of schoolwork that have been collected in an electronic portfolio.

To ensure that everyone, regardless of income or other circumstances, has equal access to such electronic tools, some schools work with businesses and other partners to create computer-lending programs for families. All schools should consider creating similar programs. The needed computers should also be available to parents at a variety of public settings such as schools, libraries, and government buildings, and there should be free or low-cost classes to teach educators and parents how to use them to foster learning.

The establishment of computer networks linking schools and homes fits neatly with another positive trend we've noticed: More and more schools are broadening their mission to provide educational services for their entire community.

Lifelong learning is rapidly becoming a requirement for success in the modern world. Parents and other community members can either attend classes at a school or study at home using distance learning technologies, with content supplied by their local school or by one far away. Through these networks, parents can not only advance their own education but also demonstrate for their children that adults need to keep working at learning, too.

But the biggest winners are the children. When we walk into a school and see parents and teachers working together, in all sorts of roles, it's a sure sign that the school challenges the very best in students and helps all, regardless of race, class, or culture, realize their fullest potential.

James P. Comer is Maurice Falk Professor at the Yale Child Study Center, associate dean of the Yale Medical School, and director of the university’s School Development Program.

Norris m. haynes is an associate professor at the yale child study center and yale university’s department of psychology and director of research for the university’s school development program..

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Parents’ Responsibility in Children’s Education

As a parent, you have a responsibility to ensure that your child is getting the best education possible. This means being involved in their schooling and making sure that they are on track to graduate and succeed in life. It is important to be supportive of your child’s educational endeavors and help them when they need it. You should also hold them accountable for their schoolwork and grades. Ultimately, it is up to you as a parent to make sure that your child’s education is a priority.

Responsibility of Parents to Their Children’s Education Pdf

It is the responsibility of parents to ensure that their children receive a quality education. This means that parents must be involved in their child’s education from early childhood through high school and beyond. Parents must advocate for their children at school, help with homework, and monitor their child’s progress. In addition, parents must instill a love of learning in their children so that they will continue to grow and develop academically throughout their lives.

Parents are More Important Than Teachers in a Child’s Education Essay

Parents role in child development.

It is widely accepted that parents play a vital role in their child’s development. The amount of time, energy and love that parents invest in their children has a direct impact on their physical, cognitive, social and emotional growth. As the first and most influential people in a child’s life, parents provide the foundation upon which children build all future relationships. By setting limits and providing support, guidance and encouragement, parents help children develop a sense of self-control, empathy and responsibility – essential skills for successful adulthood. While every parent wants what’s best for their child, sometimes it can be difficult to know exactly how to nurture them during these crucial years. Here are some tips on how you can support your child’s development: Be warm and responsive: Show interest in what your child is doing and offer praise when they achieve something or behave in a way you approve of. This will help them feel loved and valued, boosting their self-esteem. At the same time, don’t be afraid to set boundaries – this will teach them about self-control and appropriate behaviour. Encourage exploration: Give your child opportunities to try new things – whether it’s trying different foods or exploring different textures through sensory play . This will help them develop curiosity , creativity and problem-solving skills . Play together : Playing with your child is not only fun – it’s also an important way to bond with them and support their development . It provides a chance for you to model appropriate behaviour , teach new skills ( such as turn-taking or sharing ) ,and encourage imaginative thinking . Make sure they get enough sleep: A good night’s sleep is essential for all aspects of health – including brain development . Help your child establish healthy sleep habits by sticking to a regular bedtime routine including winding down activities before bedtime . Avoid letting them use screens ( such as TVs , laptops or phones ) in the hour leading up to sleep as the blue light emitted can interfere with melatonin production , making it harder to fall asleep . The early years are an incredibly important time in your child’s life – make sure you make the most of it!

The Role of Parents in Their Child’s Education in the New Normal

The new normal of remote learning has brought additional challenges and responsibilities for parents. Although schools and teachers are doing their best to provide quality education, there is no doubt that parents play a vital role in their child’s education. Here are some ways parents can support their child’s learning in the new normal: 1. Stay involved – One of the most important things you can do as a parent is to stay involved in your child’s education. This means being aware of what they are learning, providing moral support, and helping them with any difficulties they may have.

2. Create a positive learning environment at home – Just as it is important for schools to create a positive learning environment, it is also important for homes to be conducive to learning. This means having a designated space for your child to learn, ensuring there are minimal distractions, and providing whatever materials they need to be successful.

3. Be supportive but not overbearing – It is essential that you offer support to your child during this time, but it is also important that you give them the space to learn and grow on their own. Try not to hover or be too overbearing; instead, offer help when needed and trust that they will do great things!

Parents Should Have an Active Role in Their Child’s Education.

It is no secret that education is important. In fact, it is often said that education is the key to success. So, it should come as no surprise that parents should have an active role in their child’s education. There are a number of ways in which parents can be actively involved in their child’s education. One way is by simply being involved in their child’s school life. This means attending school functions, such as open houses and parent-teacher conferences, and being involved in your child’s homework and extracurricular activities. Another way to be actively involved in your child’s education is by communicating with their teachers on a regular basis. This will ensure that you are up-to-date on your child’s progress and can help them if they are struggling in any areas. Finally, one of the most important ways to be actively involved in your child’s education is by making sure that they have access to quality resources at home. This includes things like books, educational toys and games, and a computer with internet access. With these resources at home, your child will be able to continue learning even when they are not at school. By taking an active role in your child’s education, you can ensure that they get the best possible start in life.

Role of Parents And Teachers in Child’s Education

There is no denying that parents play a pivotal role in their child’s education. They are the first and most important educators in a child’s life and they have the ability to instill values and beliefs that will stay with their child for a lifetime. However, it is also important to acknowledge the role that teachers play in a child’s education. Teachers are uniquely positioned to provide children with the skills and knowledge they need to succeed in school and beyond. When parents and teachers work together, they can create a powerful team that will help children reach their full potential. Here are some ways that parents and teachers can work together to support children’s education: 1. Communicate regularly with each other about your child’s progress. Parents should let teachers know about any concerns or issues they are having at home so that teachers can be aware of what may be affecting their child’s performance in school. Similarly, teachers should keep parents updated on what is happening in the classroom so that everyone is on the same page. 2. Work together to create a positive learning environment at home and at school. When both parents and teachers are supportive of learning, children will be more likely to thrive academically. Creating an encouraging atmosphere where mistakes are seen as opportunities for growth is essential for helping kids feel confident in themselves as learners.

Parents Role in Child Education

Why should parents be responsible for their children’s education.

As a parent, you are your child’s first and best teacher. You are the one who knows your child best and can help them succeed in school and in life. Here are five reasons why you should be responsible for your child’s education: 1. You know your child best. As a parent, you know your child’s strengths, weaknesses, likes, and dislikes better than anyone else. This knowledge can help you choose the right educational opportunities for your child and ensure that they are successful in school. 2. You can provide individualized attention. In a classroom of 20 or more students, it can be difficult for teachers to give each student the individual attention they need to thrive. As a parent, you can provide this one-on-one attention to help your child learn and grow. 3. You can instill important values in your child. In addition to academics, parents have the unique opportunity to teach their children important values like responsibility, respect, and hard work through their everyday actions and interactions.

4. You can advocate for your child’s needs. If yourchild is struggling in school or has special needs , you will be their best advocate .You know them better than anyone else and can fight for the resources they needto be successful .

What are the Parents Role in Their Children’s Education?

It is often said that parents are a child’s first teacher. This may be true, but the role of parents in their children’s education goes far beyond just teaching them the basics. Parents play a vital role in supporting and encouraging their children to learn and do well at school. Here are some ways that parents can support their children’s education:

2. Encourage them to ask questions. Another way that parents can support their children’s education is by encouraging them to ask questions. It is important for children to feel confident about asking questions in class, as this shows that they are engaged with the lesson and are keen to learn more. If your child seems hesitant to ask questions, you could try asking them yourself after class – this will show them that it is okay to ask questions and will encourage them to do so next time they are in class. 3. Help with homework Homework can be a difficult task for many children (and adults!), so it is important for parents to offer help and support when needed. However, it is also important not to do your child’s homework for them – this will not help them learn and understand the material covered in class. Instead, try offering guidance or advice if they seem stuck, or simply lending a listening ear if they need someone to talk through their work with.

4. Provide resources Many schools provide resource lists at the start of each year which detail the materials required for each subject throughout the year ahead – these usually include items such as textbooks, exercise books etc..

What are 5 Responsibilities of a Parent?

2. Nurturing Your Child’s Emotional Development It is important to create a warm and loving environment for your child where they feel valued and supported. This includes showing them affection, spending quality time together and providing encouragement when they face challenges. It is also important to teach them how to express their emotions in healthy ways.

3. Fostering Your Child’s Mental Development. You can help your child develop mentally by reading together, talking about new things you’ve learned and Encouraging them to ask questions about the world around them . It is also important to provide structure and limits so that they can learn self-discipline . And finally , don’t forget to have fun together! 4. Encourage creativity, critical thinking , problem solving skills through playtime activities

What Should Be the Role of Parents in the Child’s Education Essay?

There is no single answer to this question as it depends on the individual child and family circumstances. However, there are some general guidelines that can be followed in order to ensure that parents play a positive and supportive role in their child’s education. Firstly, it is important that parents take an active interest in their child’s schooling and educational progress. This means staying up-to-date with what is happening at school, attending parent-teacher meetings and communicating regularly with the teacher. It also means being involved in decisions about which classes or activities your child takes part in outside of school hours. Secondly, parents should provide a stable and supportive home environment for their children, where learning is valued and encouraged. This includes ensuring that there is a quiet space available for homework, providing access to books and other resources, and helping out with projects or assignments when needed. Thirdly, parents need to set clear expectations around behaviour and effort levels when it comes to schoolwork. Children should know that they are expected to do their best and put forth consistent effort in order to succeed academically. At the same time, however, parents should avoid putting too much pressure on their kids – instead offering encouragement and praise when appropriate. Ultimately, the role of parents in their child’s education will vary depending on the individual situation. However, by taking an active interest in their schooling, providing a supportive home environment and setting clear expectations around behaviour and effort levels, parents can help ensure that their children have everything they need to succeed academically.

Why Parents Role is Essential to Student Success?

As a parent, you play an important role in your child’s education and success in school. You can help your child succeed by being involved in their schooling and providing support at home. When you are involved in your child’s education, they are more likely to do well in school. You can help by talking with their teachers, attending school events, and helping with homework. It is also important to encourage your child to read at home and discuss what they are learning in school. Your support at home is also essential for your child’s success in school. Help them establish good study habits, such as setting aside time each day for homework and studying. Be available to answer questions and help them when needed. Encourage them to keep trying when they face challenges and celebrate their successes along the way. By taking an active role in your child’s education and providing support at home, you can help them succeed in school and reach their full potential.

Parents’ Responsibility in Child Education

As parents, we are responsible for our children’s education. We need to be involved in their schooling and help them to succeed. This means being active in their learning, providing support at home, and communicating with their teachers. We also need to advocate for our children’s education, ensure that they have access to quality resources, and provide opportunities for them to learn and grow. By working together, we can give our children the best possible education and help them reach their full potential.

Sherry Lane

Meet Sherry Lane, a proud holder of a PhD in Educational Psychology with a concentration in Montessori Methods. At EduEdify.com, I dive deep into Montessori Education, Teaching-Learning, and Child-Kid paradigms. My advanced studies, combined with years of research, position me to provide authoritative insights. Let's explore the many facets of education, ensuring every child receives the best instruction tailored to their needs.

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Role Played by Parents in Education

Introduction, home advantage, the education stakeholder have discovered the importance of.

Parenting and education are two aspects of a student’s school life that cannot be separated. Going by the fact that school children come from family backyards, the role of the parent in the entire child’s school life is clearly cut out. Moreover, research findings point out that the role of the parents in the children’s academic lives is so crucial that if not played fully and effectively, the results and children’s success (academically) are likely to be negative. Parents look for schools for their children, prepares and take them to schools, meets all the children education costs, provides other parental care to the children, makes follow-ups to ensure that the children are comfortable in the learning institutions, ensures the children safety (both in school and at home), follows up the progress of their children in learning among others.

Ideally, it can be concluded that the role of the parents in the children’s education is unmatched. While some parents believe that the academic life of the child should be solely entrusted to the teachers, others believe they have a central role to play in the success of their children. This paper, therefore, looks at the way parents are involved in education and gives a lengthy argument on the contribution of the latter to the overall educational success.

The respondent (parent) identified as a 33-year-old female in Taiwan who lived with her husband and who had a straight sexual orientation. In addition, the respondent’s race was typically Chinese. She also spoke Chinese, which she claimed was her native language. Asked about the number of children she had, the parent hinted that she had two male children, both of whom were of school-going age and attended an elementary school in the neighborhood. On her value of her children’s education, the parent indicated that there was nothing that mattered in her life than to see through her two boys to the highest level of education possible, revealing that she and her husband (both of whom had post-graduate qualifications), had presented a good role model, a thing that continued to inspire the boys to achieve even higher levels of education. In addition, the respondent hinted at their commitment to the course through close parental mentoring and support to the boys throughout their school life. The respondent believed that the success of the boys in education greatly depended on this support, a factor that she admitted that they were willing to provide.

Apart from payment of school fees, the respondent hinted that they had organized for private transport for the boys to and from school irrespective of the latter being within the vicinity of their dwelling unit. She also pointed out that it was the role of parents to ensure that their children got the best schooling environment if at all they were to attain the best results. Commenting on the importance of parental involvement in education matters, the respondent said that children’s education responsibility could not only be bestowed on the teachers and the students. Instead, she felt that the parents had a more central and crucial role to play in an effort to see through their children’s education success dream. She also indicated that the results of education could be more favorable in a circumstance where the school’s management, teachers, and the parents could unite through healthy partnership encouraged by a quest to achieve a common objective (children’s educational success).

She however suggested the need for more parental involvement in the school’s decision making and planning, which she noted was in the initial stages of development not only in the school the boys schooled but also in many other schools in the region. This, she said was an achievement in enhancing children’s education excellence in the region a move that she expressed optimism of holding more potential. As a chairperson of the Parent Teachers Association (PTA) in the school which the boys attended, the respondent said that it was irresponsible for the parents to entrust their children fully to the school administration and teachers. Instead, she suggested that there was a dire need for increased parental involvement in the children’s schooling life. Going by the take of the respondent, parents have a role in ensuring that all was well for their children both socially and academically. She suggested that the parents could also enhance children’s academic excellence through post-school hour’s tuition, assistance in homework completion as well as close monitoring of the child’s performance both in the academic and social circles. These views of the respondent concur to a large extent with the views of the author (Annette) in her book, Home Advantage.

Ideally, she felt that the parents were central to the success of the children’s education saying that they were closer to and spent more time with the children than the teachers. As a result, she pointed out that parents ought to be in a better position to aid children in the achievement of their goals. Asked about the challenges that children’s education posed to the parents, the respondent hinted that seeing children through academic success and giving them the attention that they deserved was one of the most challenging bits of parenting. However, she said that children’s education was one of the most important parental obligations, so important to warrant relentless effort from the parent just to make sure that the children succeeded academically. In fact, she admitted that the success of education at whatever level largely depended on the parents’ realization that they have a central role to play thus actively involving themselves in all aspects that support children’s success in school.

According to Annette (2000: 8), the involvement and role of parents in their children’s education is much more than their participation in the parent’s teacher’s organizations. Parents are fully in charge of the child’s school life and success. In fact, the author argues that in a normal school day, a child spends only a third of the day in school and a whole two-third with the parents. However, a responsible parent will still be concerned and ensure that his child is fine whether in his vicinity or not (in school or at home). If parents are ineffective in their role and participation in the education system, failure in children’s education becomes imminent (Annette, 2000:11).

For example, from the results of the interview, it is evident that the respondent, as a parent of two, clearly understands the importance of active involvement of parents in their children’s education matters. According to her, parents must understand that they have an important role to play in their children’s academic success. Both the interviewee and her husband believe that the responsibility of ensuring children succeeds in school belonged to the parents: a fact that supports the argument of Annette (2000: 16).

The role of the parent (according to the respondent) ranges from basic children care to assist them in actual classwork. The respondent is the head of an association that enhances the close relationship between the tutors and the parents (PTA). Consequently, she recognizes the key role played by the parent in children’s education hence takes a front row in popularizing the association to enhance increased parental involvement in children’s education. Although the respondent admits that it is sometimes challenging on the part of the parent to actively involve herself in the education matter (perhaps due to the life commitment such as work), she points out that children’s educational success should always be accorded first priority. Indeed, she concurs with Annette (2000: 23) that child academic success is so important that it is worth sacrificing for. In fact, the respondent hailed the famous three hours in nine months approach. However, she said that this was so little time that parents should involve themselves more in children’s academic matters.

While admitting that parental involvement in children’s education was limited especially among the working class (who believed that there was a clear demarcation between the schools and homes about the education of their children), she pointed out that the trend was rapidly changing as parents continued to realize the importance of their active involvement in education. However, she credited this achievement to the important role of PTA, especially via aggressive sensitization campaigns to educate parents as to why they should concern themselves so much with their children’s education life. However, the critics of increased parental involvement in education argue that this could lead to role conflicts among the parties involved, especially if the parents were to be actively involved in actual school management and planning.

According to the evidence presented by Annette (2000: 24), parents are depicted as individuals who closely follow their children’s performance in class, closely monitor the work of their teachers and act fast to counter any threat that may compromise the children’s schooling. All these are thus indicated as characteristics of a good parent. It indicates that it is the responsibility of good parenting to take appropriate and haste action in a situation where the child’s school life and performance are at stake. According to Annette (2000: 12) majority of the working class, however, feel that the responsibility of the child’s academic well-being solely falls on the hands of the teachers; the latter of whom submits to the teachers’ professional authority.

According to Annette (2000:13), among this category of parents, the homes and schools are two distinct places with the individual in each sector having well cut out roles and responsibilities to play. As a result, such parents would have limited involvement in school affairs. Recent researches on families and schools as presented in Annette (2000) showed that parental involvement in school matters was on the increase mainly among middle-class parents. Although parental involvement in academics has been directed to social work (with the middle class being hailed for fostering learning opportunities for their children and the working class parents being hailed for resisting rules of oppressive schools management), involvement of parents in schools has been greatly advocated for.

Through PTA however, the parents get directly involved in children’s education during the child’s schooling hours and offer a channel through which parents are directly involved in making decisions in the schools which have a direct impact on the well-being of the children. In addition programs such as the three hours in nine months (under which the parents are only required to avail themselves in school for just three hours within a period of nine months) is easy and irresistible getting parents to voluntarily participate in schools’ decision making and programs designing.

partnerships among the various parties that are involved in the education process in making the dream of the students and the system, to produce successful students, a reality. These partnerships have more so been encouraged, particularly between the teachers and the parents since the two are the parties with the greatest students’ contacts. Fostering relationships among these individuals has been proven a strategy whose results in enhancing greater parental participation in school activities have been vehemently positive. In this case, the parents are greatly credited for effectively playing the role of tutors’ advisers’ that can only thrive in circumstances where healthy and close relationships exist between the teachers and the parents (Annette, 2000:7).

Good parenting calls for concern from the parents about the education well being of the children, diagnose problems that the children might have, and devise appropriate solutions to solve the problem. For example, consider a family of Emily a fifth-grader student with a chronic reading problem that caused the parents sleepless nights since they had to discuss it all night for one year while trying to come up with a strategy that could help Emily come out of the problem. The moral support provided by such a move, coupled with encouragement accorded to her might initiate a turnaround for the poor student (Annette, 2000:7).

In conclusion, all facts indicate that the parents play a very central role in the success of children’s academics. The nature of education today requires that all the stakeholders in the education system work together for the children’s academic success. As a result, active involvement and commitment of parents, teachers, school management, the government, and the students at large are necessitated. Although parents’ involvement and role in education have been previously downplayed, all indication points out that it is imperative for children academics. Parents are the closest to the children, spend most of the time with them, and play a major role in mentoring and bringing them up in a socially acceptable manner. The manner in which these roles are played could mean the success or failure of the child in education. In the wake of the realization of this fact, evidence shows increased involvement of parents in educational matters. For instance, parents are increasingly getting involved in schools planning and decision making, providing financial support through fundraising & paying school fees for their children.

Annette, L., (2000). Home Advantage: Social Class and Parental Intervention in Elementary Education . Lowman and Littlefield Publisher, United States Of America.

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Essay on Role of Parents in Children’s Life

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100 Words Essay on Role of Parents in Children’s Life

The importance of parents.

Parents play a crucial role in shaping their children’s lives. They are the first teachers and role models. Their love, care, and guidance greatly influence a child’s development.

Nurturing Values

Parents instill values and ethics in their children. They teach respect, kindness, honesty, and responsibility, shaping the child’s character and worldview.

Providing Support

Parents provide emotional, financial, and educational support. They help children navigate challenges, fostering resilience and independence.

Encouraging Dreams

Parents encourage their children’s dreams and ambitions. They provide motivation and inspiration, helping children achieve their goals.

250 Words Essay on Role of Parents in Children’s Life

The pivotal role of parents.

Parents play a crucial role in shaping the lives of their children, serving as the primary influence and guiding light. They are the architects of a child’s early environment, nurturing and molding them into responsible adults.

Emotional and Social Development

Parents are instrumental in a child’s emotional and social development. Through their interactions, they teach children how to express emotions, communicate effectively, and form relationships. They provide the emotional security a child needs for a healthy psychological development.

Educational Guidance

Parents are the first educators. They instill the value of education, encourage curiosity, and foster a love for learning. Their involvement in a child’s academic life significantly impacts the child’s attitude towards education and their academic success.

Moral and Ethical Development

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Setting Life Goals

Parents guide their children in setting and achieving life goals. They provide advice, share experiences, and offer support, helping children navigate life’s challenges.

500 Words Essay on Role of Parents in Children’s Life

The pivotal role of parents in children’s life.

Parents play a crucial role in every stage of a child’s development, shaping their world view and preparing them for the challenges of life. Their influence extends beyond providing basic physical necessities and extends to the psychological and emotional development of the child.

Parents as First Teachers

The first education that children receive is from their parents. They learn basic skills such as talking, walking, and social interaction by observing and imitating their parents. Even before formal education begins, parents lay the foundation for cognitive development and curiosity. They introduce children to books, nature, and the world around them, fostering a love for learning.

Parents as Emotional Anchors

Parents as moral guides, parents as role models.

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Parents as Navigators of Socialization

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Parenting Matters: Supporting Parents of Children Ages 0-8 (2016)

Chapter: 1 introduction, 1 introduction.

Parents are among the most important people in the lives of young children. 1 From birth, children are learning and rely on mothers and fathers, as well as other caregivers acting in the parenting role, to protect and care for them and to chart a trajectory that promotes their overall well-being. While parents generally are filled with anticipation about their children’s unfolding personalities, many also lack knowledge about how best to provide for them. Becoming a parent is usually a welcomed event, but in some cases, parents’ lives are fraught with problems and uncertainty regarding their ability to ensure their child’s physical, emotional, or economic well-being.

At the same time, this study was fundamentally informed by recognition that the task of ensuring children’s healthy development does not rest solely with parents or families. It lies as well with governments and organizations at the local/community, state, and national levels that provide programs and services to support parents and families. Society benefits socially and economically from providing current and future generations of parents with the support they need to raise healthy and thriving children ( Karoly et al., 2005 ; Lee et al., 2015 ). In short, when parents and other caregivers are able to support young children, children’s lives are enriched, and society is advantaged by their contributions.

To ensure positive experiences for their children, parents draw on the resources of which they are aware or that are at their immediate disposal.

___________________

1 In this report, “parents” refers to the primary caregivers of young children in the home. In addition to biological and adoptive parents, main caregivers may include kinship (e.g., grandparents), foster, and other types of caregivers.

However, these resources may vary in number, availability, and quality at best, and at worst may be offered sporadically or not at all. Resources may be close at hand (e.g., family members), or they may be remote (e.g., government programs). They may be too expensive to access, or they may be substantively inadequate. Whether located in early childhood programs, school-based classrooms, well-child clinics, or family networks, support for parents of young children is critical to enhancing healthy early childhood experiences, promoting positive outcomes for children, and helping parents build strong relationships with their children (see Box 1-1 ).

The parent-child relationship that the parent described in Box 1-1 sought and continues to work toward is central to children’s growth and

development—to their social-emotional and cognitive functioning, school success, and mental and physical health. Experiences during early childhood affect children’s well-being over the course of their lives. The impact of parents may never be greater than during the earliest years of life, when children’s brains are developing rapidly and when nearly all of their experiences are created and shaped by their parents and by the positive or difficult circumstances in which the parents find themselves. Parents play a significant role in helping children build and refine their knowledge and skills, as well as their learning expectations, beliefs, goals, and coping strategies. Parents introduce children to the social world where they develop understandings of themselves and their place and value in society, understandings that influence their choices and experiences over the life course.

PURPOSE OF THIS STUDY

Over the past several decades, researchers have identified parenting-related knowledge, attitudes, and practices that are associated with improved developmental outcomes for children and around which parenting-related programs, policies, and messaging initiatives can be designed. However, consensus is lacking on the elements of parenting that are most important to promoting child well-being, and what is known about effective parenting has not always been adequately integrated across different service sectors to give all parents the information and support they need. Moreover, knowledge about effective parenting has not been effectively incorporated into policy, which has resulted in a lack of coordinated and targeted efforts aimed at supporting parents.

Several challenges to the implementation of effective parenting practices exist as well. One concerns the scope and complexity of hardships that influence parents’ use of knowledge, about effective parenting, including their ability to translate that knowledge into effective parenting practices and their access to and participation in evidence-based parenting-related programs and services. Many families in the United States are affected by such hardships, which include poverty, parental mental illness and substance use, and violence in the home. A second challenge is inadequate attention to identifying effective strategies for engaging and utilizing the strengths of fathers, discussed later in this chapter and elsewhere in this report. Even more limited is the understanding of how mothers, fathers, and other caregivers together promote their children’s development and analysis of the effects of fathers’ parenting on child outcomes. A third challenge is limited knowledge of exactly how culture and the direct effects of racial discrimination influence childrearing beliefs and practices or children’s development ( National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2000 ). Despite acknowledgment of and attention to the importance of culture in

the field of developmental science, few studies have explored differences in parenting among demographic communities that vary in race and ethnicity, culture, and immigrant experience, among other factors, and the implications for children’s development.

In addition, the issue of poverty persists, with low-income working families being particularly vulnerable to policy and economic shifts. Although these families have benefited in recent years from the expansion of programs and policies aimed at supporting them (discussed further below), the number of children living in deep poverty has increased ( Sherman and Trisi, 2014 ). 2 Moreover, the portrait of America’s parents and children has changed over the past 50 years as a result of shifts in the numbers and origins of immigrants to the United States and in the nation’s racial, ethnic, and cultural composition ( Child Trends Databank, 2015b ; Migration Policy Institute, 2016 ). Family structure also has grown increasingly diverse across class, race, and ethnicity, with fewer children now being raised in households with two married parents; more living with same-sex parents; and more living with kinship caregivers, such as grandparents, and in other household arrangements ( Child Trends Databank, 2015b ). Lastly, parenting increasingly is being shaped by technology and greater access to information about parenting, some of which is not based in evidence and much of which is only now being studied closely.

The above changes in the nation’s demographic, economic, and technological landscape, discussed in greater detail below, have created new opportunities and challenges with respect to supporting parents of young children. Indeed, funding has increased for some programs designed to support children and families. At the state and federal levels, policy makers recently have funded new initiatives aimed at expanding early childhood education ( Barnett et al., 2015 ). Over the past several years, the number of states offering some form of publicly funded prekindergarten program has risen to 39, and after slight dips during the Great Recession of 2008, within-state funding of these programs has been increasing ( Barnett et al., 2015 ). Furthermore, the 2016 federal budget allocates about $750 million for state-based preschool development grants focused on improved access and better quality of care and an additional $1 billion for Head Start programs ( U.S. Department of Education, 2015 ; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2015 ). The federal budget also includes additional funding for the expansion of early childhood home visiting programs ($15 billion over the next 10 years) and increased access to child care for low-income working families ($28 billion over 10 years) ( U.S. Department

2 Deep poverty is defined as household income that is 50 percent or more below the federal poverty level (FPL). In 2015, the FPL for a four-person household was $24,250 ( Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, 2015 ).

of Health and Human Services, 2015 ). Low-income children and families have been aided as well in recent years by increased economic support from government in the form of both cash benefits (e.g., the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit) and noncash benefits (e.g., Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), and millions of children and their families have moved out of poverty as a result ( Sherman and Trisi, 2014 ).

It is against this backdrop of need and opportunity that the Administration for Children and Families, the Bezos Family Foundation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the Health Resources and Services Administration, the U.S. Department of Education, the Foundation for Child Development, the Heising-Simons Foundation, and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) requested that the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine empanel a committee to conduct a study to examine the state of the science with respect to parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices tied to positive parent-child interactions and child outcomes and strategies for supporting them among parents of young children ages 0-8. The purpose of this study was to provide a roadmap for the future of parenting and family support policies, practices, and research in the United States.

The statement of task for the Committee on Supporting the Parents of Young Children is presented in Box 1-2 . The committee was tasked with describing barriers to and facilitators for strengthening parenting capacity and parents’ participation and retention in salient programs and services. The committee was asked to assess the evidence and then make recommendations whose implementation would promote wide-scale adoption of effective strategies for enabling the identified knowledge, attitudes, and practices. Given the multi- and interdisciplinary nature of the study task, the 18-member committee comprised individuals with an array of expertise, including child development, early childhood education, developmental and educational psychology, child psychiatry, social work, family engagement research, pediatric medicine, public and health policy, health communications, implementation science, law, and economics (see Appendix D for biosketches of the committee members).

WHAT IS PARENTING?

Conceptions of who parents are and what constitute the best conditions for raising children vary widely. From classic anthropological and human development perspectives, parenting often is defined as a primary mechanism of socialization, that is, a primary means of training and preparing children to meet the demands of their environments and take advantage

of opportunities within those environments. As Bornstein (1991, p. 6) explains, the “particular and continuing task of parents and other caregivers is to enculturate children . . . to prepare them for socially accepted physical, economic, and psychological situations that are characteristic of the culture in which they are to survive and thrive.”

Attachment security is a central aspect of development that has been

defined as a child’s sense of confidence that the caregiver is there to meet his or her needs ( Main and Cassidy, 1988 ). All children develop attachments with their parents, but how parents interact with their young children, including the extent to which they respond appropriately and consistently to their children’s needs, particularly in times of distress, influences whether the attachment relationship that develops is secure or insecure. Young chil-

dren who are securely attached to their parents are provided a solid foundation for healthy development, including the establishment of strong peer relationships and the ability to empathize with others ( Bowlby, 1978 ; Chen et al., 2012 ; Holmes, 2006 ; Main and Cassidy, 1988 ; Murphy and Laible, 2013 ). Conversely, young children who do not become securely attached with a primary caregiver (e.g., as a result of maltreatment or separation) may develop insecure behaviors in childhood and potentially suffer other adverse outcomes over the life course, such as mental health disorders and disruption in other social and emotional domains ( Ainsworth and Bell, 1970 ; Bowlby, 2008 ; Schore, 2005 ).

More recently, developmental psychologists and economists have described parents as investing resources in their children in anticipation of promoting the children’s social, economic, and psychological well-being. Kalil and DeLeire (2004) characterize this promotion of children’s healthy development as taking two forms: (1) material, monetary, social, and psychological resources and (2) provision of support, guidance, warmth, and love. Bradley and Corwyn (2004) characterize the goals of these investments as helping children successfully regulate biological, cognitive, and social-emotional functioning.

Parents possess different levels and quality of access to knowledge that can guide the formation of their parenting attitudes and practices. As discussed in greater detail in Chapter 2 , the parenting practices in which parents engage are influenced and informed by their knowledge, including facts and other information relevant to parenting, as well as skills gained through experience or education. Parenting practices also are influenced by attitudes, which in this context refer to parents’ viewpoints, perspectives, reactions, or settled ways of thinking with respect to the roles and importance of parents and parenting in children’s development, as well as parents’ responsibilities. Attitudes may be part of a set of beliefs shared within a cultural group and founded in common experiences, and they often direct the transformation of knowledge into practice.

Parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices are shaped, in part, by parents’ own experiences (including those from their own childhood) and circumstances; expectations and practices learned from others, such as family, friends, and other social networks; and beliefs transferred through cultural and social systems. Parenting also is shaped by the availability of supports within the larger community and provided by institutions, as well as by policies that affect the availability of supportive services.

Along with the multiple sources of parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices and their diversity among parents, it is important to acknowledge the diverse influences on the lives of children. While parents are central to children’ development, other influences, such as relatives, close family friends, teachers, community members, peers, and social institutions, also

contribute to children’s growth and development. Children themselves are perhaps the most essential contributors to their own development. Thus, the science of parenting is framed within the theoretical perspective that parenting unfolds in particular contexts; is embedded in a network of relationships within and outside of the family; and is fluid and continuous, changing over time as children and parents grow and develop.

In addition, it is important to recognize that parenting affects not only children but also parents themselves. For instance, parenting can enrich and give focus to parents’ lives; generate stress or calm; compete for time with work or leisure; and create combinations of any number of emotions, including happiness, sadness, fulfillment, and anger.

STUDY CONTEXT

As attention to early childhood development has increased over the past 20 years, so, too, has attention to those who care for young children. A recent Institute of Medicine and National Research Council report on the early childhood workforce ( Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2015 ) illustrates the heightened focus not only on whether young children have opportunities to be exposed to healthy environments and supports but also on the people who provide those supports. Indeed, an important responsibility of parents is identifying those who will care for their children in their absence. Those individuals may include family members and others in parents’ immediate circle, but they increasingly include non-family members who provide care and education in formal and informal settings outside the home, such as schools and home daycare centers.

Throughout its deliberations, the committee considered several questions relevant to its charge: What knowledge and attitudes do parents of young children bring to the task of parenting? How are parents engaged with their young children, and how do the circumstances and behaviors of both parents and children influence the parent-child relationship? What types of support further enhance the natural resources and skills that parents bring to the parenting role? How do parents function and make use of their familial and community resources? What policies and resources at the local, state, and federal levels assist parents? What practices do they expect those resources to reinforce, and from what knowledge and attitudes are those practices derived? On whom or what do they rely in the absence of those resources? What serves as an incentive for participation in parenting programs? How are the issues of parenting different or the same across culture and race? What factors constrain parents’ positive relationships with their children, and what research is needed to advance agendas that can help parents sustain such relationships?

The committee also considered research in the field of neuroscience,

which further supports the foundational role of early experiences in healthy development, with effects across the life course ( Center on the Developing Child, 2007 ; National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2009 ; World Health Organization, 2015 ). During early childhood, the brain undergoes a rapid development that lays the foundation for a child’s lifelong learning capacity and emotional and behavioral health (see Figure 1-1 ). This research has provided a more nuanced understanding of the importance of investments in early childhood and parenting. Moreover, advances in analyses of epigenetic effects on early brain development demonstrate consequences of parenting for neural development at the level of DNA, and suggest indirect consequences of family conditions such as poverty that operate on early child development, in part, through the epigenetic consequences of parenting ( Lipinia and Segretin, 2015 ).

This report comes at a time of flux in public policies aimed at supporting parents and their young children. The cost to parents of supporting their children’s healthy development (e.g., the cost of housing, health care, child care, and education) has increased at rates that in many cases have offset the improvements and increases provided for by public policies. As noted above, for example, the number of children living in deep poverty has grown since the mid-1990s ( Sherman and Trisi, 2014 ). While children represent approximately one-quarter of the country’s population, they make up 32 percent of all the country’s citizens who live in poverty ( Child Trends Databank, 2015a ). About one in every five children in the United States is now growing up in families with incomes below the poverty line, and 9 percent of children live in deep poverty (families with incomes below 50%

of the poverty line) ( Child Trends Databank, 2015a ). The risk of growing up poor continues to be particularly high for children in female-headed households; in 2013, approximately 55 percent of children under age 6 in such households lived at or below the poverty threshold, compared with 10 percent of children in married couple families ( DeNavas-Walt and Proctor, 2014 ). Black and Hispanic children are more likely to live in deep poverty (18 and 13%, respectively) compared with Asian and white children (5% each) ( Child Trends Databank, 2015a ). Also noteworthy is that child care policy, including the recent increases in funding for low-income families, ties child care subsidies to employment. Unemployed parents out of school are not eligible, and job loss results in subsidy loss and, in turn, instability in child care arrangements for young children ( Ha et al., 2012 ).

As noted earlier, this report also comes at a time of rapid change in the demographic composition of the country. This change necessitates new understandings of the norms and values within and among groups, the ways in which recent immigrants transition to life in the United States, and the approaches used by diverse cultural and ethnic communities to engage their children during early childhood and utilize institutions that offer them support in carrying out that role. The United States now has the largest absolute number of immigrants in its history ( Grieco et al., 2012 ; Passel and Cohn, 2012 ; U.S. Census Bureau, 2011 ), and the proportion of foreign-born residents today (13.1%) is nearly as high as it was at the turn of the 20th century ( National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2015 ). As of 2014, 25 percent of children ages 0-5 in the United States had at least one immigrant parent, compared with 13.5 percent in 1990 ( Migration Policy Institute, 2016 ). 3 In many urban centers, such as Los Angeles, Miami, and New York City, the majority of the student body of public schools is first- or second-generation immigrant children ( Suárez-Orozco et al., 2008 ).

Immigrants to the United States vary in their countries of origin, their reception in different communities, and the resources available to them. Researchers increasingly have called attention to the wide variation not only among but also within immigrant groups, including varying premigration histories, familiarity with U.S. institutions and culture, and childrearing

3 Shifting demographics in the United States have resulted in increased pressure for service providers to meet the needs of all children and families in a culturally sensitive manner. In many cases, community-level changes have overwhelmed the capacity of local child care providers and health service workers to respond to the language barriers and cultural parenting practices of the newly arriving immigrant groups, particularly if they have endured trauma. For example, many U.S. communities have worked to address the needs of the growing Hispanic population, but it has been documented that in some cases, eligible Latinos are “less likely to access available social services than other populations” ( Helms et al., 2015 ; Wildsmith et al., 2016 ).

strategies ( Crosnoe, 2006 ; Fuller and García Coll, 2010 ; Galindo and Fuller, 2010 ; Suárez-Orozco et al., 2010 ; Takanishi, 2004 ). Immigrants often bring valuable social and human capital to the United States, including unique competencies and sociocultural strengths. Indeed, many young immigrant children display health and learning outcomes better than those of children of native-born parents in similar socioeconomic positions ( Crosnoe, 2013 ). At the same time, however, children with immigrant parents are more likely than children in native-born families to grow up poor ( Hernandez et al., 2008 , 2012 ; National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2015 ; Raphael and Smolensky, 2009 ). Immigrant parents’ efforts to raise healthy children also can be thwarted by barriers to integration that include language, documentation, and discrimination ( Hernandez et al., 2012 ; Yoshikawa, 2011 ).

The increase in the nation’s racial and ethnic diversity over the past several decades, related in part to immigration, is a trend that is expected to continue ( Colby and Ortman, 2015 ; Taylor, 2014 ). Between 2000 and 2010, the percentage of Americans identifying as black, Hispanic, Asian, or “other” increased from 15 percent to 36 percent of the population ( U.S. Census Bureau, 2011 ). Over this same time, the percentage of non-Hispanic white children under age 10 declined from 60 percent to 52 percent, while the percentage of Hispanic ethnicity (of any race) grew from about 19 percent to 25 percent ( U.S. Census Bureau, 2011 ); the percentages of black/African American, American Indian/Alaska Native, and Asian children under age 10 remained relatively steady (at about 15%, 1%, and 4-5%, respectively); and the percentages of children in this age group identifying as two or more races increased from 3 percent to 5 percent ( U.S. Census Bureau, 2011 ).

The above-noted shifts in the demographic landscape with regard to family structure, including increases in divorce rates and cohabitation, new types of parental relationships, and the involvement of grandparents and other relatives in the raising of children ( Cancian and Reed, 2008 ; Fremstad and Boteach, 2015 ), have implications for how best to support families. Between 1960 and 2014, the percentage of children under age 18 who lived with two married parents (biological, nonbiological, or adoptive) decreased from approximately 85 percent to 64 percent. In 1960, 8 percent of children lived in households headed by single mothers; by 2014, that figure had tripled to about 24 percent ( Child Trends Databank, 2015b ; U.S. Census Bureau, 2016 ). Meanwhile, the proportions of children living with only their fathers or with neither parent (with either relatives or non-relatives) have remained relatively steady since the mid-1980s, at about 4 percent (see Figure 1-2 ). Black children are significantly more likely to live in households headed by single mothers and also are more likely to live in households where neither parent is present. In 2014, 34 percent of black

children lived with two parents, compared with 58 percent of Hispanic children, 75 percent of white children, and 85 percent of Asian children ( Child Trends Databank, 2015b ).

From 1996 to 2015, the number of cohabiting couples with children rose from 1.2 million to 3.3 million ( Child Trends Databank, 2015b ). Moreover, data from the National Health Interview Survey show that in 2013, 30,000 children under age 18 had married same-sex parents and 170,000 had unmarried same-sex parents, and between 1.1 and 2.0 million were being raised by a parent who identified as lesbian, gay, or bisexual but was not part of a couple ( Gates, 2014 ).

More families than in years past rely on kinship care (full-time care of children by family members other than parents or other adults with whom children have a family-like relationship). When parents are unable to care for their children because of illness, military deployment, incarceration, child abuse, or other reasons, kinship care can help cultivate familial and community bonds, as well as provide children with a sense of stability and belonging ( Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2012 ; Winokur et al., 2014 ). It is estimated that the number of children in kinship care grew six times the rate of the number of children in the general population over the past decade ( Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2012 ). In 2014, 7 percent of children lived in households headed by grandparents, as compared with 3 percent in 1970 ( Child Trends Databank, 2015b ), and as of 2012, about 10 percent of American children lived in a household where a grandparent was present ( Ellis and Simmons, 2014 ). Black children are twice as likely as the overall population of children to live in kinship arrangements, with about 20 percent of black children spending time in kinship care at some point

during their childhood ( Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2012 ). Beyond kinship care, about 400,000 U.S. children under age 18 are in foster care with about one-quarter of these children living with relatives ( Child Trends Databank, 2015c ). Of the total number of children in foster care, 7 percent are under age 1, 33 percent are ages 1-5, and 23 percent are ages 6-10 ( Child Trends Databank, 2015c ). Other information about the structure of American families is more difficult to come by. For example, there is a lack of data with which to assess trends in the number of children who are raised by extended family members through informal arrangements as opposed to through the foster care system.

As noted earlier, fathers, including biological fathers and other male caregivers, have historically been underrepresented in parenting research despite their essential role in the development of young children. Young children with involved and nurturing fathers develop better linguistic and cognitive skills and capacities, including academic readiness, and are more emotionally secure and have better social connections with peers as they get older ( Cabrera and Tamis-LeMonda, 2013 ; Harris and Marmer, 1996 ; Lamb, 2004 ; Pruett, 2000 ; Rosenberg and Wilcox, 2006 ; Yeung et al., 2000 ). Conversely, children with disengaged fathers have been found to be more likely to develop behavioral problems ( Amato and Rivera, 1999 ; Ramchandani et al., 2013 ). With both societal shifts in gender roles and increased attention to fathers’ involvement in childrearing in recent years, fathers have assumed greater roles in the daily activities associated with raising young children, such as preparing and eating meals with them, reading to and playing and talking with them, and helping them with homework ( Bianchi et al., 2007 ; Cabrera et al., 2011 ; Jones and Mosher, 2013 ; Livingston and Parker, 2011 ). In two-parent families, 16 percent of fathers were stay-at-home parents in 2012, compared with 10 percent in 1989; 21 percent of these fathers stayed home specifically to care for their home or family, up from 5 percent in 1989 ( Livingston, 2014 ). At the same time, however, fewer fathers now live with their biological children because of increases in nonmarital childbearing (U.S. Census Bureau, 2015).

In addition, as alluded to earlier, parents of young children face trans-formative changes in technology that can have a strong impact on parenting and family life ( Collier, 2014 ). Research conducted by the Pew Internet and American Life Project shows that, relative to other household configurations, married parents with children under age 18 use the Internet and cell phones, own computers, and adopt broadband at higher rates ( Duggan and Lenhart, 2015 ). Other types of households, however, such as single-parent and unmarried multiadult households, also show high usage of technology, particularly text messaging and social media ( Smith, 2015 ). Research by the Pew Research Center (2014) shows that many parents—25 percent in

one survey ( Duggan et al., 2015 )—view social media as a useful source of parenting information.

At the same time, however, parents also are saturated with information and faced with the difficulty of distinguishing valid information from fallacies and myths about raising children ( Aubrun and Grady, 2003 ; Center on Media and Human Development, 2014 ; Dworkin et al., 2013 ; Future of Children, 2008 ). Given the number and magnitude of innovations in media and communications technologies, parents may struggle with understanding the optimal use of technology in the lives of their children.

Despite engagement with Internet resources, parents still report turning to family, friends, and physicians more often than to online sources such as Websites, blogs, and social network sites for parenting advice ( Center on Media and Human Development, 2014 ). Although many reports allude to the potentially harmful effects of media and technology, parents generally do not report having many concerns or family conflicts regarding their children’s media use. On the other hand, studies have confirmed parents’ fears about an association between children’s exposure to violence in media and increased anxiety ( Funk, 2005 ), desensitization to violence ( Engelhardt et al., 2011 ), and aggression ( Willoughby et al., 2012 ). And although the relationship between media use and childhood obesity is challenging to disentangle, studies have found that children who spend more time with media are more likely to be overweight than children who do not (see Chapter 2 ) ( Bickham et al., 2013 ; Institute of Medicine, 2011 ; Kaiser Family Foundation, 2004 ).

The benefits of the information age have included reduced barriers to knowledge for both socially advantaged and disadvantaged groups. Yet despite rapidly decreasing costs of many technologies (e.g., smartphones, tablets, and computers), parents of lower socioeconomic position and from racial and ethnic minority groups are less likely to have access to and take advantage of these resources ( Center on Media and Human Development, 2014 ; File and Ryan, 2014 ; Institute of Medicine, 2006 ; Perrin and Duggan, 2015 ; Smith, 2015 ; Viswanath et al., 2012 ). A digital divide also exists between single-parent and two-parent households, as the cost of a computer and monthly Internet service can be more of a financial burden for the former families, which on average have lower household incomes ( Allen and Rainie, 2002 ; Dworkin et al., 2013 ).

STUDY APPROACH

The committee’s approach to its charge consisted of a review of the evidence in the scientific literature and several other information-gathering activities.

Evidence Review

The committee conducted an extensive review of the scientific literature pertaining to the questions raised in its statement of task ( Box 1-2 ). It did not undertake a full review of all parenting-related studies because it was tasked with providing a targeted report that would direct stakeholders to best practices and succinctly capture the state of the science. The committee’s literature review entailed English-language searches of databases including, but not limited to, the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Medline, the Education Resources Information Center (ERIC), PsycINFO, Scopus, and Web of Science. Additional literature and other resources were identified by committee members and project staff using traditional academic research methods and online searches. The committee focused its review on research published in peer-reviewed journals and books (including individual studies, review articles, and meta-analyses), as well as reports issued by government agencies and other organizations. The committee’s review was concentrated primarily, although not entirely, on research conducted in the United States, occasionally drawing on research from other Western countries (e.g., Germany and Australia), and rarely on research from other countries.

In reviewing the literature and formulating its conclusions and recommendations, the committee considered several, sometimes competing, dimensions of empirical work: internal validity, external validity, practical significance, and issues of implementation, such as scale-up with fidelity ( Duncan et al., 2007 ; McCartney and Rosenthal, 2000 ; Rosenthal and Rosnow, 2007 ).

With regard to internal validity , the committee viewed random-assignment experiments as the primary model for establishing cause- and-effect relationships between variables with manipulable causes (e.g., Rosenthal and Rosnow, 2007 ; Shadish et al., 2001 ). Given the relatively limited body of evidence from experimental studies in the parenting literature, however, the committee also considered findings from quasi-experimental studies (including those using regression discontinuity, instrumental variables, and difference-in-difference techniques based on natural experiments) ( Duncan et al., 2007 ; Foster, 2010 ; McCartney et al., 2006 ) and from observational studies, a method that can be used to test logical propositions inherent to causal inference, rule out potential sources of bias, and assess the sensitivity of results to assumptions regarding study design and measurement. These include longitudinal studies and limited cross-sectional studies. Although quasi- and nonexperimental studies may fail to meet the “gold standard” of randomized controlled trials for causal inference, studies with a variety of internal validity strengths and weaknesses can collectively provide useful evidence on causal influences ( Duncan et al., 2014 ).

When there are different sources of evidence, often with some differences in estimates of the strength of the evidence, the committee used its collective experience to integrate the information and draw reasoned conclusions.

With regard to external validity , the committee attempted to take into account the extent to which findings can be generalized across population groups and situations. This entailed considering the demographic, socioeconomic, and other characteristics of study participants; whether variables were assessed in the real-world contexts in which parents and children live (e.g., in the home, school, community); whether study findings build the knowledge base with regard to both efficacy (i.e., internal validity in highly controlled settings) and effectiveness (i.e., positive net treatment effects in ecologically valid settings); and issues of cultural competence ( Bracht and Glass, 1968 ; Bronfenbrenner, 2009 ; Cook and Campbell, 1979 ; Harrison and List, 2004 ; Lerner et al., 2000 ; Rosenthal and Rosnow, 2007 ; Whaley and Davis, 2007 ). However, the research literature is limited in the extent to which generalizations across population groups and situations are examined.

With regard to practical significance , the committee considered the magnitude of likely causal impacts within both an empirical context (i.e., measurement, design, and method) and an economic context (i.e., benefits relative to costs), and with attention to the salience of outcomes (e.g., how important an outcome is for promoting child well-being) ( Duncan et al., 2007 ; McCartney and Rosenthal, 2000 ). As discussed elsewhere in this report, however, the committee found limited economic evidence with which to draw conclusions about investing in interventions at scale or to weigh the costs and benefits of interventions. (See the discussion of other information-gathering activities below.) Also with respect to practical significance, the committee considered the manipulability of the variables under consideration in real-world contexts, given that the practical significance of study results depend on whether the variables examined are represented or experienced commonly or uncommonly among particular families ( Fabes et al., 2000 ).

Finally, the committee took into account issues of implementation , such as whether interventions can be brought to and sustained at scale ( Durlak and DuPre, 2008 ; Halle et al., 2013 ). Experts in the field of implementation science emphasize not only the evidence behind programs but also the fundamental roles of scale-up, dissemination planning, and program monitoring and evaluation. Scale-up in turn requires attending to the ability to implement adaptive program practices in response to heterogeneous, real-world contexts, while also ensuring fidelity for the potent levers of change or prevention ( Franks and Schroeder, 2013 ). Thus, the committee relied on both evidence on scale-up, dissemination, and sustainability from empirically based programs and practices that have been implemented and

evaluated, and more general principles of implementation science, including considerations of capacity and readiness for scale-up and sustainability at the macro (e.g., current national politics) and micro (e.g., community resources) levels.

The review of the evidence conducted for this study, especially pertaining to strategies that work at the universal, targeted, and intensive levels to strengthen parenting capacity (questions 2 and 3 from the committee’s statement of task [ Box 1-2 ]), also entailed searches of several databases that, applying principles similar to those described above, assess the strength of the evidence for parenting-related programs and practices: the National Registry of Evidence-Based Programs and Practices (NREPP), supported by SAMHSA; the California Evidence-Based Clearinghouse for Child Welfare (CEBC), which is funded by the state of California; and Blueprints for Healthy Youth Development, which has multiple funding sources. Although each of these databases is unique with respect to its history, sponsors, and objectives (NREPP covers mental health and substance abuse interventions, CEBC is focused on evidence relevant to child welfare, and Blueprints describes programs designed to promote the health and well-being of children), all are recognized nationally and internationally and undergo a rigorous review process.

The basic principles of evaluation and classification and the processes for classification of evidence-based practices are common across NREPP, CEBC, and Blueprints. Each has two top categories—optimal and promising—for programs and practices (see Appendix B ; see also Burkhardt et al., 2015 ; Means et al., 2015 ; Mihalic and Elliot, 2015 ; Soydan et al., 2010 ). Given the relatively modest investment in research on programs for parents and young children, however, the array of programs that are highly rated remains modest. For this reason, the committee considered as programs with the most robust evidence not only those included in the top two categories of Blueprints and CEBC but also those with an average rating of 3 or higher in NREPP. The committee’s literature searches also captured well-supported programs that are excluded from these databases (e.g., because they are recent and/or have not been submitted for review) but have sound theoretical underpinnings and rely on well-recognized intervention and implementation mechanisms.

Other reputable information sources used in producing specific portions of this report were What Works for Health (within the County Health Rankings and Roadmaps Program, a joint effort of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin); the What Works Clearinghouse of the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Services; and HHS’s Home Visiting Evidence of Effectiveness (HomVEE) review.

In addition, the committee chose to consider findings from research using methodological approaches that are emerging as a source of innovation and improvement. These approaches are gaining momentum in parent-

ing research and are being developed and funded by the federal government and private philanthropy. Examples are breakthrough series collaborative approaches, such as the Home Visiting Collaborative Innovation and Improvement Network to Reduce Infant Mortality, and designs such as factorial experiments that have been used to address topics relevant to this study.

Other Information-Gathering Activities

The committee held two open public information-gathering sessions to hear from researchers, practitioners, parents, and other stakeholders on topics germane to this study and to supplement the expertise of the committee members (see Appendix A for the agendas of these open sessions). Material from these open sessions is referenced in this report where relevant.

As noted above, the committee’s task included making recommendations related to promoting the wide-scale adoption of effective strategies for supporting parents and the salient knowledge, attitudes, and practices. Cost is an important consideration for the implementation of parenting programs at scale. Therefore, the committee commissioned a paper reviewing the available economic evidence for investing in parenting programs at scale to inform its deliberations on this portion of its charge. Findings and excerpts from this paper are integrated throughout Chapters 3 through 6 . The committee also commissioned a second paper summarizing evidence-based strategies used by health care systems and providers to help parents acquire and sustain knowledge, attitudes, and practices that promote healthy child development. The committee drew heavily on this paper in developing sections of the report on universal/preventive and targeted interventions for parents in health care settings. Lastly, a commissioned paper on evidence-based strategies to support parents of children with mental illness formed the basis for a report section on this population. 4

In addition, the committee conducted two sets of group and individual semistructured interviews with parents participating in family support programs at community-based organizations in Omaha, Nebraska, and Washington, D.C. Parents provided feedback on the strengths they bring to parenting, challenges they face, how services for parents can be improved, and ways they prefer to receive parenting information, among other topics. Excerpts from these interviews are presented throughout this report as “Parent Voices” to provide real-world examples of parents’ experiences and to supplement the discussion of particular concepts and the committee’s findings.

4 The papers commissioned by the committee are in the public access file for the study and can be requested at https://www8.nationalacademies.org/cp/ManageRequest.aspx?key=49669 [October 2016].

TERMINOLOGY AND STUDY PARAMETERS

As specified in the statement of task for this study ( Box 1-2 ), the term “parents” refers in this report to those individuals who are the primary caregivers of young children in the home. Therefore, the committee reviewed studies that involved not only biolofical and adoptive parents but also relative/kinship providers (e.g., grandparents), stepparents, foster parents, and other types of caregivers, although research is sparse on unique issues related to nontraditional caregivers. The terms “knowledge,” “attitudes,” and “practices” and the relationships among them were discussed earlier in this chapter, and further detail can be found in Chapter 2 ).

The committee recognized that to a certain degree, ideas about what is considered effective parenting vary across cultures and ecological conditions, including economies, social structures, religious beliefs, and moral values ( Cushman, 1995 ). To address this variation, and in accordance with its charge, the committee examined research on how core parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices differ by specific characteristics of children, parents, and contexts. However, because the research on parenting has traditionally underrepresented several populations (e.g., caregivers other than mothers), the evidence on which the committee could draw to make these comparisons was limited.

The committee interpreted “evidence-based/informed strategies” very broadly as ranging from teaching a specific parenting skill, to manualized parenting programs, to policies that may affect parenting. The term “interventions” is generally used in this report to refer to all types of strategies, while more specific terms (e.g., “program,” “well-child care”) are used to refer to particular types or sets of interventions. Also, recognizing that nearly every facet of society has a role to play in supporting parents and ensuring that children realize their full potential, the committee reviewed not only strategies designed expressly for parents (e.g., parenting skills training) but also, though to a lesser degree, programs and policies not designed specifically for parents that may nevertheless affect an individual’s capacity to parent (e.g., food assistance and housing programs, health care policies).

As noted earlier in this chapter, this report was informed by a life-course perspective on parenting, given evidence from neuroscience and a range of related research that the early years are a critical period in shaping how individuals fare throughout their lives. The committee also aimed to take a strengths/assets-based approach (e.g., to identify strategies that build upon the existing assets of parents), although the extent to which this approach could be applied was limited by the paucity of research examining parenting from this perspective.

GUIDING PRINCIPLES

A number of principles guided this study. First, following the ideas of Dunst and Espe-Sherwindt (2016) , the distinction between two types of family-centered practices—relational and participatory—informed the committee’s thinking. Relational practices are those focused primarily on intervening with families using compassion, active and reflective listening, empathy, and other techniques. Participatory practices are those that actively engage families in decision making and aim to improve families’ capabilities. In addition, family-centered practices focused on the context of successful parenting are a key third form of support for parenting. A premise of the committee is that many interventions with the most troubled families and children will require all these types of services—often delivered concurrently over a lengthy period of time.

Second, many programs are designed to serve families at particular risk for problems related to cognitive and social-emotional development, health, and well-being. Early Head Start and Head Start, for example, are means tested and designed for low-income families most of whom are known to face not just one risk factor (low income) but also others that often cluster together (e.g., living in dangerous neighborhoods, exposure to trauma, social isolation, unfamiliarity with the dominant culture or language). Special populations addressed in this report typically are at very high risk because of this exposure to multiple risk factors. Research has shown that children in such families have the poorest outcomes, in some instances reaching a level of toxic stress that seriously impairs their developmental functioning ( Shonkoff and Garner, 2012 ). Of course, in addition to characterizing developmental risk, it is essential to understand the corresponding adaptive processes and protective factors, as it is the balance of risk and protective factors that determines outcomes. In many ways, supporting parents is one way to attempt to change that balance.

From an intervention point of view, several principles are central. First, intervention strategies need to be designed to have measurable effects over time and to be sustainable. Second, it is necessary to focus on the needs of individual families and to tailor interventions to achieve desired outcomes. The importance of personalized approaches is widely acknowledged in medicine, education, and other areas. An observation perhaps best illustrated in the section on parents of children with developmental disabilities in Chapter 5 , although the committee believes this approach applies to many of the programs described in this report. A corresponding core principle of intervention is viewing parents as equal partners, experts in what both they and their children need. It is important as well that multiple kinds of services for families be integrated and coordinated. As illustrated earlier

in Box 1-1 , families may be receiving interventions from multiple sources delivered in different places, making coordination all the more important.

A useful framework for thinking about interventions is described in the National Research Council and Institute of Medicine (2009) report Preventing Mental, Emotional, and Behavioral Disorders among Young People . Prevention interventions encompass mental health promotion: universal prevention, defined as interventions that are valuable for all children; selected prevention, aimed at populations at high risk (such as children whose parents have mental illness); and indicated prevention, focused on children already manifesting symptoms. Treatment interventions include case identification, standard treatment for known disorders, accordance of long-term treatment with the goal of reduction in relapse or occurrence, and aftercare and rehabilitation ( National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2009 ).

The committee recognizes that engaging and retaining children and families in parenting interventions are critical challenges. A key to promoting such engagement may be cultural relevance. Families representing America’s diverse array of cultures, languages, and experiences are likely to derive the greatest benefit from interventions designed and implemented to allow for flexibility.

Finally, the question of widespread implementation and dissemination of parenting interventions is critically important. Given the cost of testing evidence-based parenting programs, the development of additional programs needs to be built on the work that has been done before. Collectively, interventions also are more likely to achieve a significant level of impact if they incorporate some of the elements of prior interventions. In any case, a focus on the principles of implementation and dissemination clearly is needed. As is discussed in this report, the committee calls for more study and experience with respect to taking programs to scale.

REPORT ORGANIZATION

This report is divided into eight chapters. Chapter 2 examines desired outcomes for children and reviews the existing research on parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices that support positive parent-child interactions and child outcomes. Based on the available research, this chapter identifies a set of core knowledge, attitudes, and practices. Chapter 3 provides a brief overview of some of the major federally funded programs and policies that support parents in the United States. Chapters 4 and 5 describe evidence-based and evidence-informed strategies for supporting parents and enabling the identified knowledge, attitudes, and practices, including universal and widely used interventions ( Chapter 4 ) and interventions targeted to parents of children with special needs and parents who themselves face adversities

( Chapter 5 ). Chapter 6 reviews elements of effective programs for strengthening parenting capacity and parents’ participation and retention in effective programs and systems. Chapter 7 describes a national framework for supporting parents of young children. Finally, Chapter 8 presents the committee’s conclusions and recommendations for promoting the wide-scale adoption of effective intervention strategies and parenting practices linked to healthy child outcomes, as well as areas for future research.

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Decades of research have demonstrated that the parent-child dyad and the environment of the family—which includes all primary caregivers—are at the foundation of children's well- being and healthy development. From birth, children are learning and rely on parents and the other caregivers in their lives to protect and care for them. The impact of parents may never be greater than during the earliest years of life, when a child's brain is rapidly developing and when nearly all of her or his experiences are created and shaped by parents and the family environment. Parents help children build and refine their knowledge and skills, charting a trajectory for their health and well-being during childhood and beyond. The experience of parenting also impacts parents themselves. For instance, parenting can enrich and give focus to parents' lives; generate stress or calm; and create any number of emotions, including feelings of happiness, sadness, fulfillment, and anger.

Parenting of young children today takes place in the context of significant ongoing developments. These include: a rapidly growing body of science on early childhood, increases in funding for programs and services for families, changing demographics of the U.S. population, and greater diversity of family structure. Additionally, parenting is increasingly being shaped by technology and increased access to information about parenting.

Parenting Matters identifies parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices associated with positive developmental outcomes in children ages 0-8; universal/preventive and targeted strategies used in a variety of settings that have been effective with parents of young children and that support the identified knowledge, attitudes, and practices; and barriers to and facilitators for parents' use of practices that lead to healthy child outcomes as well as their participation in effective programs and services. This report makes recommendations directed at an array of stakeholders, for promoting the wide-scale adoption of effective programs and services for parents and on areas that warrant further research to inform policy and practice. It is meant to serve as a roadmap for the future of parenting policy, research, and practice in the United States.

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