Type 4 Parent Involvement: Learning at Home

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In the field of early childhood education, a basic belief is that parents are their children's first and most influential teachers. Parents have influence over what children do at home—the amount of time and type of programs children watch on television, amount of time spent playing video games, types of music they listen to, and amount of time spent studying and doing their homework. When children reach school age, the amount of time spent at school is less than that spent at home and in child care combined. Thus, the amount of time spent away from school is valuable for learning and building positive attitudes about education.

Home-based learning not only enhances children's learning experiences but also serves many purposes. It "should reinforce, support, and strengthen learning that has been introduced and shared at school" (Trahan & Lawler-Prince, 1999, p. 65). It involves families with their children via gamelike activities, homework, and curriculum-related activities such as mathematics, science, and social science. This also includes parents assisting their high school children to set goals for the school year or for the future and, making joint decisions on what courses to take. These activities may or may not have directions or suggestions from the teacher. Activities typically cover general skills or behaviors and specific skills. General skills activities are those that promote critical-thinking or problem-solving skills, promote language skills, enhance social and emotional skills, or reinforce certain behaviors using consistent child-guidance techniques agreed on with the teacher. Specific skills activities are those that involve families in helping children to review, complete, or extend skills that the student is working on with the teacher in class. Specific skills activities occur more often for children in grade school.

Most parents help their children through their past school experiences and knowledge of school subjects. Most parents across all grades want more information about their children's homework, homework policies, and tools for helping their children. According to Epstein (1986), 85 percent of parents spent 15 minutes or more helping their children at home when requested by teachers. These parents stated that they were willing to spend an average of 40 minutes with their children if they had directions from the teacher about how to help their child. Over 90 percent of parents reported that they assisted their children with homework occasionally, and fewer than 25 percent received requests and directions from teachers on how to assist children with specific skills.

Sample Activities for Involving Parents in Children's Home-Learning Activities

1. Backpack reading. Children bring home a book each night for parents to read or listen to their child read. Materials include a book and inventory list for parents to complete.
2. Mobile learning centers. Each bag includes two or three hands-on activities to either promote several developmental areas or a specific skill. Each bag consists of a letter to the parents, directions for each activity, parents' feedback journal, and materials needed for the activities. The activity bags are sent home with each child for a week or two and then returned. The teacher replenishes the materials and prepares the activity bag to go to the next child.
3. Home kits. Activities are theme based, and the kit includes a book with followup hands-on activities. Kits are checked out by the child for a week.
4. Home learning enablers. This is an inexpensive way of promoting parents' involvement with their children's learning by showing them how to use household materials to teach children without having to spend a large amount of money on materials. Each week HLE activities are sent home with the child. An activity card includes the name of the activity, the purpose of the activity, materials needed, directions on how to do each activity, time needed for completion, adaptation ideas, and an evaluation form for parents to complete.
5. Family lending library. Parents have the opportunity to check out books, materials, and audio- and videotapes in which teachers demonstrate or model a certain skill or activity. Children also have the opportunity to check out books, magazines, toys, and home-learning activity kits.
6. Interactive homework. This is geared more for older children in elementary, middle, and high school. Interactive homework is directly linked to course objectives and requires children to interact and communicate with family members or community members. (Epstein, 2001; Gorter-Reu & Anderson, 1998; Patton & Jones, 1997; Shoemaker, 1996; Trahan & Lawler-Prince, 1999)

Tips for Successful Planning and Implementation of Home Activities

1. Provide information and training sessions. The goal is to explain what homelearning activities entail early in the year, such as during an open house or parent meeting. Training sessions are offered throughout the year to provide opportunities for teachers to demonstrate sample activities and for parents to practice the strategies. This also allows teachers and parents to share ideas.
2. Incorporate activities into the family's schedule. Activities are designed to be completed in short periods of time. For families with very young children, design activities that can be incorporated into the child's daily routine, such as mealtime, bedtime, and bathtime.
3. Make homework interactive. Create homework that requires interaction and discussion with parents, family and extended family members, or community members.
4. Easy access of activity resources or materials. If materials are not provided for parents, then the materials should consist of common household items with special precaution for safety and age-appropriateness of the materials used.