Families as Partners in Learning
Principals and teaching staff
Session #1: Why are partnerships important?
The Melbourne Declaration on Educational
Goals for Young Australians
Commitment to Action: Developing stronger partnerships
• “Parents, carers and families are the first and most important
influence in a child's life, instilling the values that will support
young people to participate in schooling and contribute to
broader local and global communities.”
(Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs, December
2008)
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The Victorian Context
We need a change in focus: From
Families
Students
School/Teachers
4
We need a change in focus: To
Social
Political
Resources
Cultural
School – Early
Childhood
Service
Child
Community
Family
Services
Economy
Labour
Markets
5
Life-long and life-wide learning
Source: Banks, J et al, 2007, Learning in & out of school in diverse environments
6
“…if educators make use of the informal learning
that occurs in the homes and communities of
students, the achievement gap between
marginalized students and mainstream students
can be reduced.”
(LIFE Center – University of Washington, Stanford University & SRI
International supported by the National Science Foundation)
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The research in unequivocal…
• High performing schools have high levels of family
and community involvement
• This holds equally true for “high poverty” schools
as it does for middle class schools
• In fact, family participation in education has been
found to be twice as predictive of students’
academic success as family socio-economic
status
– Greatest impact in areas of highest disadvantage
– Holds true across ALL levels of education – all ages, all stages
Impact on intermediate variables
• Reduced absenteeism
• Increased retention
– Reduced drop out rates
• Increased engagement in school and school
work
– Improved behaviours
• Improved transition
• Increased homework completion
• Higher educational aspirations
– Stronger belief in the importance of education
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Benefits for children & young people
•
•
•
•
Higher grades and test scores
Higher self-esteem
Improved social competence
Concerns are sorted more quickly when parents have a
positive relationship with staff
• Increased on-time school graduation rates
• Increased enrolment in post-compulsory education
1
Benefits for families
• Their children do better and achieve more
• Families show more sensitivity to their children’s social,
emotional and intellectual developmental needs
• Better able to help & encourage their children
• Use more complex language with their children and
encourage their children to verbalize more
• Have more information about their children’s education
• Build their own confidence & skills
• Build trust in educational institutions
Benefits for staff
• Families bring skills which complement the teacher’s skills &
expertise
• Improved communication to and from families
• Improved community support
• Families contribute their time which frees up teachers to do more
with students
• Families reinforce the learning from school at home
• Improved student behaviour
• Improved student achievement
• Parents can give help & advice on how to reach other parents
• Increased public support for schools
Barriers to the formation of Partnerships: School
perspective
• Belief systems
• Perception that parents don’t understand the school, the education
system, its constraints etc
• Perception that parents don’t care about their children / don’t know how to
parent and therefore are likely to add little (if any) value
• Perception that parents are too demanding, interfere too much in the
school
• Lack of knowledge of the research findings on the part of schools &
parents
• Little understanding of how to effectively engage with parents and little
preparation for this role
• Structural constraints
• Report from a deficit model
• Language & cultural differences not understood by schools with no
strategies to engage ‘hard to engage’ families
Barriers to the formation of Partnerships: Parent
perspective
• Believe an authoritarian Principal or teachers are to be valued
so leave them to get on with the job
• Feel they have little to offer
• Unsure of their role – so step into management
• Embarrassed about own education level / linguistic abilities
• Feel unwelcome / intimidated / talked down to by the school or
its parent organisations
• Have little time during the school day to come into the school
but no other avenues of partnership offered
• Teacher's assumptions of parental disinterest or inability to help
with children's schooling
– Carry own baggage from their school years
So what does this mean for our school?
• 1:3:6 discussion, consider:
• What does this means for our school?
• Where might be opportunities for exploring, commencing or building
partnerships?
• What might be the barriers?
• What are the implications of not doing anything to advance familyschool partnerships?
• Be prepared to share your responses with the whole staff if
asked
Leadership is critical
• School leadership
– Principal critical in signaling intent (or not)
– Need to role model prioritising engagement with families
– Encourage whole of organisation approaches
– Provide orientation / training for parents
– Note: Collaborative leadership is based on relational power – a
move away for the authoritarian model
• Parent leadership
– Schools tend to rely on pre-existing capacities of a small number of
parents
– Alternative is to increase capacity of larger number of parents – eg
via training and support
For further information
• Education Regeneration & Community Partnerships
Division, DEECD
(www,education.vic.gov.au/)
• Family-School & Community Partnerships Bureau
(www. familyschool.org.au)