Awareness of family supervision, respect for parents

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Understanding the Six Types of Family Involvement

• Keys to Successful
• Family-School Partnerships

Janie King Family Consultant, Tennessee
Department of Education Julie Sullivan Family
Voices of Tennessee Reggie Curran University of
Tennessee Center for Literacy Studies
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Defining the Terms

• What does the research say about family
  involvement?
• Who is the family of family involvement?
• What is family involvement?

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Six Types of Family Involvement

• PARENTING
• COMMUNICATING
• VOLUNTEERING
• LEARNING AT HOME
• DECISION MAKING
• COLLABORATING WITH THE COMMUNITY

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Parenting

• Assist families with
• parenting and child-rearing skills
• understanding child and adolescent development
• setting home conditions that support children as
  students at each age and grade level
• Assist schools in understanding families.

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Challenges

• Provide information to all families who want it
  or who need it, not just to the few who attend
  workshops or meetings at the school building.
• Enable families to share information with schools
  about background, culture, children's talents,
  goals, and needs.
• Make all information for families clear, usable,
• age-appropriate, and linked to children's
  success.

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• How has SIG responded to the challenges?

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Main Point

• Workshop is not only a meeting on a topic held at
  the school building at a particular time, but
  also the content of a topic to be viewed, heard,
  or read at convenient times and varied locations.

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Possible Results

• STUDENTS
• Awareness of family supervision, respect for
  parents
• Positive personal qualities, habits, beliefs, and
  values taught by family
• Balance between time spent on chores, other
  activities, and homework
• Regular attendance, awareness of importance of
  school
• PARENTS
• Self-confidence about parenting and knowledge of
  child/adolescent development
• Adjustments in home environment as children
  proceed through school
• Awareness of own and others' challenges in
  parenting
• Feeling of support from school and other parents
• TEACHERS
• Awareness of own skills to share information on
  child development
• Understanding of families' backgrounds, cultures,
  concerns, goals, needs, and views of their
  children
• Respect for families' diversity, strengths and
  effort

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Communicating

• Communicate with families about school programs
  and student progress through effective
  school-to-home and home-to-school communications.

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Challenges

• Make all memos, notices, and other print and
  non-print communications clear and understandable
  for all families.
• Consider parents who do not speak English well,
  do not read well, or need large type.
• Obtain ideas from families to improve the design
  and content of major communications such as
  newsletters, report cards, and conference
  schedules.
• Establish an easy-to-use two-way channel for
  communications from school-to-home and from
  home-to-school.

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• How has SIG responded to the challenges?

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Main Point

• Communications about school programs and student
  progress are not only from school-to-home but
  from home-to-school, parent-to-parent,
  parent-to-child, child-to-parent,
  teacher-to-teacher, etc, etc, etc.

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Possible Results

• STUDENTS
• Awareness of their own progress and skills, and
  knowledge of actions needed to maintain or
  improve grades
• Informed decisions about courses and programs
• Awareness of their own role as courier and
  communicator in school-family partnerships
• PARENTS
• Understanding school programs and policies
• Monitoring and awareness of child's progress in
  subjects and skills
• Responses to student problems
• Ease of interactions and communications with
  school and teachers
• High rating of school quality
• TEACHERS
• Diversity of communications with families
• Ability to communicate clearly
• Use of network of parents to communicate with all
  families
• Ability to understand family views and elicit
  help with
• children's progress

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VOLUNTEERING

• Improve recruitment, training, work, and
  schedules to involve families as volunteers and
  audiences at the school or in other locations to
  support students and school programs.

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Challenges

• Recruit widely for volunteers so that all
  families know that their time and talents are
  welcome.
• Make flexible schedules for volunteers,
  assemblies, and events to enable working parents
  to participate.
• Provide training for volunteers, and match time
  and talent with school needs.

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• How has SIG responded to the challenges?

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Main Point

• Volunteer doesnt just mean those who come to
  school during the day, but also those who support
  school goals and children's learning in any way,
  at any place, and at any time.

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Possible Results

• STUDENTS
• Learn communication skills through interaction
  with other adults
• Increased skills that are tutored or taught by
  volunteers
• Awareness of many skills, talents, occupations,
  and contributions of parents and other volunteers
• PARENTS
• Self-confidence about ability to work in school
  and with children
• Awareness that families are welcome and valued at
  school
• Use of school activities at home
• TEACHERS
• Organization, training, and use of volunteers
• Readiness to involve families in new ways,
  including those who do not volunteer at school
• Awareness of parents' talents and interests in
  school and children
• Individual attention to students because of help
  from volunteers

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Learning at Home

• Involve families with their children in learning
  activities at home, including homework and other
  curriculum-linked activities and decisions.

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Challenges

• Design and implement a regular schedule of
  interactive homework (e.g., weekly or bi-monthly)
  for which students take responsibility to discuss
  important things they are learning with their
  families.
• Coordinate family-linked interactive homework
  assignments if students have several teachers.
• Involve families and their children in all
  important curriculum-related decisions.

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• How has SIG responded to the challenges?

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Main Points

• "Homework" not only means work that students do
  alone, but also interactive activities that
  students share with others at home or in the
  community, linking schoolwork to real life.
• "Help" at home means how families encourage,
  listen, react, praise, guide, monitor, and
  discuss schoolwork with their children, not how
  they "teach" children school skills.

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Possible Results

• STUDENTS
• Homework completion -skills, abilities, and tests
  scores are linked to homework and class work
• Positive attitude about homework and school
• View of parent a similar to teacher and of home
  as similar to school
• Self-confidence in ability as learner
• PARENTS
• Knowledge of how to support, encourage, and help
  student at home
• Discussions of school, class work, homework, and
  future plans
• Understanding of instructional program and what
  child is learning in each subject
• Appreciation of teacher's skill and awareness of
  child as a learner
• TEACHERS
• Varied designs of homework, including interactive
  assignments
• Respect of family time
• Recognition of helpfulness of single-parent,
  dual-income, and all families in motivating and
  reinforcing student learning

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Decision Making

• Include families as partners in school decisions,
  governance, and advocacy through PTA/PTO, school
  councils, committees, and other parent
  organizations.

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Challenges

• Include parent leaders from all racial, ethnic,
  socioeconomic, and other groups in the school.
• Offer training to enable parent leaders to
  develop skills to serve as representatives of
  other families.
• Include student representatives along with
  parents in decision-making groups.

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• How has SIG responded to the challenges?

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Main Point

• Decision making means a process of partnership,
  of shared views and actions toward shared goals,
  not just a power struggle between conflicting
  ideas.

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Possible Results

• STUDENTS
• Awareness of representation of families in school
  decisions
• Understanding that student rights are protected
• Specific benefits linked to policies enacted by
  parent organizations
• PARENTS
• Input into policies that affect children's
  education
• Feeling of ownership of school
• Awareness of parents' voices in school decisions
• Shared experiences and connections with other
  families
• Awareness of school, district, and state policies
• TEACHERS
• Awareness of perspectives of families in policy
  development and school decisions
• Acceptance of equality of family representatives
  on school committees and in leadership roles

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Community Collaboration

• Coordinate resources and services for families,
  students, and the school with businesses,
  agencies, and other groups, and provide services
  to the community.

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Challenges

• Solve turf problems of roles, responsibilities,
  funds, and places for collaborative activities.
• Inform all families and students about community
  programs and services.
• Assure equal opportunities for students and
  families to obtain services or participate in
  community programs.
• Match business and community volunteers and
  resources with school goals.

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• How has SIG responded to the challenges?

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Main Point

• Community means not only the neighborhoods where
  students' homes and schools are located, but also
  all neighborhoods or locations that influence
  their learning and development.
• Community is rated not only by low or high social
  or economic qualities, but also by strengths and
  talents available to support students, families,
  and schools.
• Community includes not only families with
  children in the schools, but also all who are
  interested in and affected by the quality of
  education.

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Possible Results

• STUDENTS
• Skills and talents from enriched curricular and
  extracurricular experiences
• Knowledge and exploration of careers and options
  for future education and work
• Self-confidence and feeling of value and
  belonging in the community
• PARENTS
• Interactions with other families in community
  activities
• Awareness of community's contributions to the
  school
• Participation in activities to strengthen the
  community
• TEACHERS
• Knowledge and use of community resources to
  enrich curriculum and instruction
• Knowledge of referral processes for families and
  children with needs for specific services

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Conclusion

• Family Involvement is a win-win situation for
  all!
• Questions??

The content in this presentation is based on the
work of Joyce Epstein. Please visit
www.partnershipschools.org for more information.