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You are here: About us What we do Social innovation Parents and Schools Seminar 6 June

Parents and Schools…….challenges and opportunities

Seminar 6 June 2007 - Royal College of Pathologists

This seminar launched new material on the role of parents in children's education .

Debate

The debate that followed the presentations highlighted the following questions and points

• Parents' involvement in school and education has a key impact on children's well-being and attainment, the Desforges literature review showed in 2002

• Parents of primary school children have qualitatively different circumstances compared with parents of secondary school children. So strategies to involve parents need to be quite different at primary level and secondary level.

• Following Professor Sylva's account of the Home Learning Environment for young children, it would be interesting to explore the factors that make for an effective Home Learning Environment for teenagers

Issues to consider when planning a school strategy to involve parents:

• Parents need to feel supported by the school as opposed to feeling they have to support the school

• Key is for parents to be 'cheering on' their children

Parents need to stay tuned in to their children to do this – for example, services for excluded children can include parents

• Consider contact with parents outside school – if parents have a unshakeably negative view of the school environment related to their own experiences

• Consider venue, transport, childcare arrangements, times and hours to fit around work/study commitments

• Grandparents role is important – children rate time with grandparents more highly than time spent on computer games

• Teachers need training in involving and engaging with parents – not enough time in PGCE given to this topic (3 hours in the entire year)

• Using a community shop as a venue has worked to attract 300+ visits per week

• Schools may not seem like the best agents to get parents involved; but consider – who else can and will do this work? Schools need this agenda to help their children and have much to learn on this topic

• Parental choice of school – may mean children attending school outside their communities and may polarise differences between schools

• A note in the school bag won't work

• Children need 'cheering on', support, encouragement, quiet space for homework

The presentations
What difference can parents make to their children's education? 
Kathy Sylva: Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Oxford, Department of Educational Studies

School parent partnerships  
Anne Page: Policy and Public Education Manager, FPI

Choice and its impact on social capital  
Prof Irene Bruegel: Consultant: Families and Social Capital ESRC Research Group (South Bank University and Birkbeck College)

Family support in extended schools 
Joanna Apps: Senior Research Fellow, FPI, and Howard Masters: Home and Community Development Officer Little Heath Special School, Romford, Essex. Mr Masters runs family support services at Little Heath