After reviewing five different articles, I found that parent involvement is so important to the success of the classroom and of the child. There are so many details in making parent involvement a success rather than a distraction. I never realized that parent involvement is mostly about how the parent is involved in the childs life rather than just how they are involved in the school and in the classroom. When I think about my own classroom I want to believe that I will be totally open to having parents in my class but I know that I am a perfectionist and will want to do everything myself. I really enjoyed reading about the six different parenting subsets in research. They talked about communicating and making decisions which I never really thought about when I thought about parental involvement. It was also really interesting to think about different parent status' and how they relate to their involvement. As we talked about in class, I realized that just because a parent doesn't make it to parent teacher conferences or every PTA meeting, does not mean that they are not interested. It is so important for me to get to know my parents and find out their occupation and what else they are involved in. This will help me to be able to know what parents have strengths in which areas and what parents are really willing to help. Another topic in all five of the articles on the NEA website was about communication with parents. One of the neatest ideas was to have a parent professional development day where parents come in one night and you teach them about what they will be doing in the class and what their responsibilites will be while they are involved. This is also a great opportunity to teach parents how to help their students with homework and at home. I think that I am really going to like working with parents but will need to make sure that I communicate and know them well.
1. Current research on parent involvement and the outcomes. (National Middle School Association, 2006)
2. Research brief addressing such questions as Is parent involvement a valuable resource for schools struggling to provide state-of-the-art instruction with diminishing funds? Does it instill pride and interest in schooling? K. Cotton & K. R. Wikelund (Northwest Regional Education Lab, 2001).
3. National Standards for Parent/Family Involvement Programs - Standards for effective parent and family involvement programs including activities addressed by six standards. (PTA, 1997)
4. A New Wave of Evidence: The Impact of School, Family, and Community Connections on Student Achievement (, 1.19 MB, 241pp) A. T. Henderson & K. L. Mapp. (Southwest Educational Development Laboratory, 2002)
5. (Center for Law and Education, 1996)
