Another Dimension of Parent Involvement

In this Kappan article, Michele Myers, principal of an elementary school in rural South Carolina, bemoans the attitudes she sometimes encounters among her teachers – that poor parents who don’t come to school for conferences and other events don’t care about their children. Such beliefs, she says, “result in poor treatment, low expectations, and low standards.” 

To get her school out of this rut, Myers chose nine families and made multiple visits to their homes over a school year to learn about “how families involve themselves in their children’s academic lives and how families and schools could coordinate efforts to improve the lives of the children that we share.” Here’s what she learned:

• Parents can be involved even when they appear not to be. One man who was raising five grandchildren said his most important responsibility was teaching them how to “act” in school, showing respect for themselves, their family, and their teachers. When he dropped them at school, he reminded them to do “less talking and more listening.” He believed this was more important than having paper, pencils, and books. 

• Caring for kin shows support. In many cases, grandparents or other extended-family members were caring for children when family calamities – unemployment, homelessness, drug abuse, mental illness – prevented biological parents from doing so. Teachers didn’t always appreciate the way these family members were providing a safe environment for children and making it possible for them to thrive in school.

• Families work to counter certain attitudes. “Many families believed teachers had negative beliefs about poor children,” says Myers. “As a response to this, many families were adamant about taking actions to counter these beliefs.” This included sending children to school clean and immaculately dressed. “Families also fought against the belief that poor children can’t do well in school,” she continues. They told their children about the importance of education to their futures and pushed them to do things they didn’t fully understand and couldn’t do themselves. Families sometimes called on others to help their children with homework and with social and emotional struggles.

“Teachers must take the first steps in getting to know families by becoming a part of the family’s network,” concludes Myers, “redefining the limited school view of parental involvement, and learning from and with parents on how to best educate the children they share. Once they do that, they will begin to see parents in new ways and begin to understand the many ways that parents help their children negotiate schooling… Schools must stop sending the message to parents that a school’s beliefs about parental involvement are the only ‘legitimate’ ways for parents or families to be involved.” 

“Finding Common Concerns for the Children We Share” by Michele Myers in Phi Delta Kappan, May 2013 (Vol. 94, #8, p. 40-44), www.kappanmagazine.org; Myers can be reached at knowingaka@hotmail.com. 

From the Marshall Memo #486