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Parent Involvement: Viewing Families as Partners in Learning
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by Natalie Tye
Including families in the classroom can take on many forms ranging from sending home information, introducing concepts, or reinforcing learning from the classroom. Supporting parents to find the right balance is difficult at best, and proves to be a challenge to new teachers with little experience on how to engage families in the learning process. The key to family involvement is providing activities that encourage a true home-school connection and take literacy learning beyond the classroom.
Family involvement is highly coveted in the early childhood school setting where it is seen as a positive strategy for strengthening student learning (Abdul-Adil & Farmer, 2006). More specifically, an increase in family involvement decreases student absences, increases student progress and grade card ratings, and has a positive effect on families’ views of school in general (Garcia & Thornton, 2014). A recent trend shows parents are now more involved in the school setting whether that be for parent conferences, school meetings, or other events (McQuiggan & Megra, 2017). Teachers need to capitalize on this increased engagement with strategies to keep families connected to classroom learning.
As an instructor of junior-level teacher candidates engaging in clinical field experiences with preschool and kindergarten age children, I have found that many new teachers are more nervous than prepared to interact with or engage families in their child’s education. It was not until several candidates had expressed a lack of preparation to work with families that I decided to add a parental involvement assignment in junior-level coursework.
Family involvement can be accomplished by creating experiences that build on learning concepts and ideas through a home-school connection. When developing family involvement activities, the experiences do not have to be difficult or expensive to create. Some ideas included making a game using recyclable materials, making a family tree using pictures from home, or asking families to go on a nature walk and creating a collage of the experience. My students fell under two categories of family involvement activities: some created activities that were simple to explain and complete at home while others supported and reviewed content learned in the early childhood classroom.
One candidate sent home the book, Harry the Dirty Dog by Gene Zion and blank paper. Families read the story with their child and asked them questions throughout the book. After reading, children and their families drew a picture of how their pet gets dirty. After implementing the candidate shared, “Next time, I might make the activity a little more complex. My intention was to keep the activity very simple but I feel like it could have been more exciting and interactive by sending home art supplies to create their dog.”
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Another candidate supported and reviewed in-class learning by sending home a bag of colored circles. She asked families to find objects around the house that matched each color. Families helped their child find objects for each color, decide on a favorite object, and then write the word on the circle. When reflecting on the experience, the candidate said families took extra time to complete the activity with their child before returning it to school. The candidate reflected, “I found it interesting because the things the child put on their circles were completely different from the things when I did the activity with him at school. His answers were things I would not have thought; it was definitely out of the box thinking.”
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