| Parental involvement in childrens learning |
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| Italy: Two primary schools, Trento |
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Mario Dutto
IPRASE, Trento |
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Franca Zappini
Direttrice Didattica, Mezzolombardo,
Trento |
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Fiorenza Aste
Primary School Teacher, Rovereto |
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| Parents as Teachers |
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Parents can be involved in several
everyday school events and in the classroom itself in a number of ways:
- as experts with particular knowledge or
skills;
- as artists to demonstrate techniques or
crafts;
- to share experiences of recent local history;
and
- as helpers in organising activities, school
trips etc.
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| Sometimes parents invite classes
to visit the places where they work so that children can learn about local
craftsmanship and particular professions. |
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| The primary school of Mezzocorona |
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| Mezzocorona is a village in the
north of Trento and has a population of 4000. To celebrate the remodelling
of the local bank called Cassa Rurale, the children in the village school
researched together the story of the Co-operative organisation in Trentino.
Parents were involved in explaining the origin and the meaning of this economic
foundation which began in the early 20th Century as a way of tackling poverty.
They had an important role in explaining what happened and helping children
and teachers to dramatise the whole story. |
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| The most important aspect of
this collaboration between the school and parents was that parents did not
just teach a piece of history, but also made the children aware that co-operating
was, and is, a very important part of everyday life. Every small village
in Trentino has its own Co-operative Society, and a specific Provincial
Office helps schools to carry out co-operating activities and experiences.
Following this activity, the pupils created a small Co-operative Society
and elected the board of administration. The mission was to help
poor children by producing and selling small objects. |
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| Schools for Parents |
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| Today, education in Trento has
rightly become a partnership between home and school, so a school policy
on parental involvement is very important. How parents help at home and
the general home atmosphere are becoming more and more acknowledged as important
in the educational process. For this reason, many schools organise courses
to enhance parents' effectiveness in helping their children and to keep
them well informed about the educational progress of their children. |
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| The table below shows a useful
approach to training parents. |
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A wide range of topic titles
was discussed in parent's training meetings, for example:
- I thought of my child...;
- from a child to an adult;
- watching TV; and
- workshops for parents on how to read children's
stories well at home and helping these children play or draw and learn
craftwork.
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| The primary school of Cles (520 pupils aged 6-11) |
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| The work of this primary school
highlights a very particular way of involving parents in learning. Parents
were asked to continue the teachers' work at home after taking a course
entitled Difficulties in learning, reading and writing. |
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| The title of this project was
He could do better, but he doesn't show any will. Teachers often
stressed the second part of the statement, showing a negative view and placing
the responsibility on the pupil. In this project, the school decided to
work with parents to help their children to learn. The school distributed
an information leaflet to five hundred parents. At least three hundred parents
agreed with the proposal and paid for their training. |
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| He can do better, but he doesn't
show any will was a general way to introduce the problems that children
show at school. The aim was to help parents realise how to help their children
in co-operation and close partnership with the school. The focus was on
helping parents identify the ways in which children learn and in particular
how they learn to communicate by reading and writing. |
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The two environments which interact
in the learning/educational process are, in order of time, the family and
the school. The school had to address and agree with parents, three key
points:
- what are the respective roles of the family
and the school;
- where and when does the interaction start;
and
- what should the responsibilities of each
party be?
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As the first steps in learning
and education happen in the family, the school decided to focus on how to
assist parents in the very earliest stages of children's learning, which
could help to avoid mistakes later. The development of learning was summarised
as follows.
- Know how to communicate through body language.
- Know how to communicate with movement
or a sign and by talking, reading and writing.
- Know how to communicate with courtesy.
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| The school organised three meetings
for parents in small groups with a specialist trainer. At the end of this
course, parents agreed a firm basis on which to set up a home-school agreement. |
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| Some of the major issues in learning
to learn identified by the specialist were explained using the following
metaphors. |
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| Metaphors explaining how a child learns |
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| The fish in the bowl |
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| Educators cannot completely foresee
the outcomes of their actions. In the educational process, a child can take
many ways of learning, leading to different results. The school therefore
has to give a sure sense of direction and clear limits. |
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| The labyrinth |
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| The human being is something
unique. We must not interfere too deeply, interpreting only the signs that
he gives us. The educator should not give too many requests and should respect
the child's right to be an individual. |
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| Speaking and listening |
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| Sometimes parents do not have
enough time to listen to their children because they are very busy. The
nicest gift we can give children is to dedicate time to them. We should
speak to them in an understandable way and listen to their views without
other disturbance or interference. Choosing the appropriate moment is important. |
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| The barrel and the double litre |
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| The world we live in is over-stimulating
and so full of proposals and opportunities that it becomes noisy. It is
necessary to choose and to give consideration to all things. |
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| Time |
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| Parents often want to anticipate
time and make their child become an adult very quickly, but the child needs
a long time to organise his or her own knowledge. When learning falls into
difficulty, it is necessary to stop and start again from the point where
difficulty was found. Do not forget to respect the time needed for each
person to develop. |
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| A bridge between primary and secondary schools |
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| Every level of school should
take account of the mental and the neurological characteristics of the child
and say "s/he arrived here, start from the point where the child is!". |
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| At the end of the school year,
teachers and parents formulated a home-school agreement which highlighted
the best processes to help reach success in education. |
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The main topics discussed were:
- the importance of rules;
- the importance of listening to the children;
- the respect of a child's right to be an
individual;
- how to give appropriate stimuli;
- the respect of a child's development time;
and
- a step-by-step educational process carried
out through effective liaison between school and home.
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