PICTURE 3. The 2 nd and 3 rd Grade Classroom in the Bilingual School
7.2 Parents Describe Their Involvement in The Child’s Education
Parental involvement is a multifaceted phenomenon that holds a variety of forms. This chapter presents parental attitudes towards the English education in the school, the parents’ awareness of said education as well as some of the parents’ home-based and school-based forms of involvement. Moreover, the strategies the parents used when feeling unable to help due to not knowing English will be explored.
7.2.1 Parents’ Attitudes Towards English Education in the School
Parents’ attitudes towards their children’s English studies has been shown to affect the students’
own attitudes and parental support contributes to student achievement, confidence and role taking as English learners (Ávila Daza & Garavito 2009; Hurtado Torres & Castañeda-Peña 2016; Bartram 2006).
The interviewees’ attitudes towards the education that their children received was quite positive. They expressed their happiness and excitement for having their children study English.
They told they were pleased with the education that the school provided and grateful for it.
Many of them had not been able to study or learn English even if they wanted to and so, they were gratified that their children had the opportunity and that they were progressing well.
A lot of future hopes and dreams were placed on knowing English. The parents wanted their children to be fluent, to be able to read, write and communicate with ease. According to them, being proficient in English would offer their children a better future. Learning the language would open doors and possibly enable them to continue studies when they grow and provide a better job. As there are few opportunities in Honduras, several parents expressed their hopes to have their children continue their studies and find work abroad, e.g. in the US. Also, through knowing English, the children would be able to communicate and interact with people from all over the world and travel, and even take some of the family members with them and translate for them.
Maybe when they work, they can use English. Because now the situation here, you need to speak English if you want to have a job. [The mom] wants to go to the United States in the future. -- And there are some people, they are there, but they don't learn English. And life is hard for them being in a country where you don't know the language. [The parents] think that it's important to learn English, for their future. (P 1)
Among the questionnaire respondents, almost all (95,6%) agreed to some extent or totally agreed that it is important that foreign languages are taught at primary school and even earlier.
Similarly, almost all (95,6%) agreed to some extent or totally agreed that the aim of language education is to awake interest in language learning and produce functional language proficiency for everyday situations. A great majority (82,6%) also agreed that the aim of foreign language teaching is to have good grades on the school report.
Although the importance of knowing English, in particular, in the globalized world was acknowledged, almost every fifth (17,4%), answering the open-response questions wished that their children could learn another language at some point, such as Chinese or French.
In the interviews, the education in the school was described as high-quality and affordable compared to many other schools and so, the many of the parents wanted the school to continue and dreamed that it would expand, providing high school or college education someday, even though they were worried whether there would be enough teachers.
The education they receive here is progressing excellently. My sister has her children in Tegucigalpa. The education there is very expensive. The English studies are very low compared to what we have here. The economy, the quality of the language. She talked with my daughter and she said she's really surprised how she's speaking English. The way she pronounced. (P 5)
I'm praying to God that they are able to go to college [here]. It's nice to know that there's a school that has Christian values. -- Being able to see how the world is right now, it's difficult.
To be able to take them to the city when their values and principles, no respect of God. One of my goals and my expectations is that [the school] could keep growing and could have high school and college all together. (P 6)
7.2.2 Parents’ Awareness of Their Children’s English Education
Involvement is demonstrated by parents’ interest in their children’s education and being up to date with their children’s learning. In most cases, the parents showed awareness of their children’s learning progress and the process of language development. A great majority
(91,3%) of the parents taking part in the questionnaire, agreed that they were aware of how language education had changed since their own school years and almost everyone (95,6%) agreed to some extent or totally agreed that they knew what the education in the bilingual school was like. Almost four-fifths (78,2%) then agreed to some extent or totally agreed that the education in the school was sufficient for the child’s language development while only few (8,7%) totally disagreed. Nonetheless, nearly all (87%) agreed to some extent or totally agreed when asked whether their children told them about their language studies. The participants’
positive attitudes towards the education in the bilingual school seemed to reflect on their children as well, as all respondents (100%) informed that their children were interested in learning a foreign language.
The interviewees thought that their children were learning well and that for the most part they enjoyed English. One compared her child’s English development to her own, reflecting how different the child’s education was from the one she had received. Another told that learning difficulties and lack of motivation hindered the child’s learning, but that with the intervention of the teacher, some areas had improved. Overall, many parents seemed to be fairly acquainted with the level of their children’s English skills, their strengths, and needs to improve.
Parents used different strategies to keep up to date with their children’s progress. They checked the homework to monitor what topics the children were learning and how they managed to complete the tasks. Seeing that their children learned new vocabulary, could pronounce and write English, communicated freely and were able to translate, spoke volumes to them. For one parent, however, exams and achievement were basically the only way to keep track of the child’s progress, which may be because the child was still a beginner.
Even though she's struggling, and I see that -- actually she's able to keep going. With homework sometimes I tell her and she's able to tell me, “No mommy that's not how you say it, this is how it is.” She's progressing, slowly but she's getting there. But we know it's a process. (P 6)
Our small son is the one who speaks most English, the oldest one, he translates into English.
So, I see a lot of progress. (P 5)
Moreover, many parents were aware of the education not only observed at home but also in the school setting. They had opinions about foreign teachers, teaching methods, materials and textbook, and the balance of English and Spanish education, as well as what happened in the classroom. One parent also expressed worry for the children not having enough support as there were many students per one teacher in the classroom.
7.2.3 Involvement Practices at Home and at School
A majority (69,9%) of the respondents answering the questionnaire totally disagreed when asked whether they were too busy to get involved in their children’s foreign language studies while every fifth (17,4%) agreed to some extent that they did not have time. Nevertheless, all but one respondent (96,4%) agreed to some extent or totally agreed that they often talked with their child about the importance of knowing foreign languages when encountering them in their daily life and a great majority (86,9%) agreed to some extent or totally agreed that they supported their children’s foreign language related activities on their free time. All the respondents (100%) agreed to some extent or totally agreed that they supported their children in studying foreign languages and made sure that they did their homework.
Indeed, helping students with their homework seemed to be the most prevalent home-based involvement practice, which included keeping up with the homework, helping and checking it by going it over and making sure that the child understood it.
Interestingly, parental involvement in homework is a controversial topic and studies are inconsistent. The phenomenon is multifaceted and several variables, such as parenting styles and types of involvement (e.g. controlling versus autonomy-supporting), student age, ability, or subject affect it and cannot always be directly associated with positive student achievement.
(Cooper, Lindsay & Nye 2000; Gonida & Cortina 2014; Hill & Tyson 2009.) Cooper, Lindsay and Nye (2000) state that under some conditions parental homework involvement improve student learning. Moroni et al. (2015) calls the attention to the quality of involvement rather than the quantity while Gonida and Cortina (2014) further distinguish autonomy supporting practices from controlling.
Hoover-Dempsey et al. (2001, 203) present that parental homework involvement could be associated with student attributes that are closely related to achievement, thus holding implicit influence rather than explicit, and that “parental involvement in children’s homework appears to influence student outcomes because it offers modeling, reinforcement, and instruction that supports the development of attitudes, knowledge, and behaviors associated with successful school performance”. They link parental instruction with collaborative learning, which also Ávila Daza and Garavito (2009) bring out in their study in regard with English language homework, suggesting that collaboration as a strategy can enhance family interaction and relationships. Hurtado Torres and Castañeda-Peña (2016) add that and the cognitive and
emotional support which parents provide related to homework may help the students assume positive roles in English learning and contribute to learning, achievement and gaining confidence.
Involvement that took place at the school included discussing with the teachers. The parents mentioned talking to the teachers and some of them had asked advice regarding what more they could do at home to support their child; if the teacher gave tips, they often followed them to practice English with the child at home. Helping inside the classroom when needed was also brought up. One parent told having looked for help outside the school and having gone to a professional when the child was struggling with learning difficulties.
7.2.4 Strategies Which the Parents Use to Help the Child When Not Knowing English
Even though the a majority (95,6%) of the respondents taking part in the questionnaire agreed to some extent or totally agreed to be aware of what the education was like and were involved in their children’s language education in various ways, over two-thirds (65,2%) of them agreed to some extent or totally agreed that their foreign language skills were too limited for them to support their children in their language studies. A few (13%) neither agreed nor disagreed and every fifth (21,7%) totally disagreed with the statement, indicating that their skills were sufficient to help the child.
Many of the interviewees who did not know a lot of English mentioned that often it felt quite challenging to support the child. They wanted to be able to do more but did not always feel confident or did not understand enough themselves. Some parents told that they made sure that the child studied but could not help with English, although if the child translated the tasks into Spanish, helping with homework became easier. Many times, the students were the ones teaching the parents.
The interviewees appeared to have a great need to receive more information and to understand better, not only how their child was doing, but also what happened in the classroom in a pedagogical sense, which could help them to extend the learning environment at home. This,
and knowing more English would have helped with involvement and led to better results, according to one of the parents.
When they're telling me something or explaining something to me in English, when I'm able to understand, that's beautiful. Sometimes I don't understand them when they're speaking English. Sometimes I tell [the child], “Speak in Spanish so I can help you.” So, then he needs to speak to me in Spanish so that I can understand. So, when he's speaking in Spanish, I can help him. (P 1)
They are my teachers at home. I can help them very little at home. I myself know the basics.
-- They teach [me] what they learn at school. (P 5)
Indeed, the sense of not being able to help their children is shared by many other parents of ELLs (English Language Learners) (Forey & Sampson 2015; Arias & Morillo-Campbell 2008;
Ahmed 2015). It especially affects the parents’ ability to be involved through instructional activities, which Hoover-Dempsey et al. (2001, 204) lists as “directing child’s attention to task components, simplifying the task as needed, explaining new information, relating information to similar contexts, or responding to questions” when doing homework. This type of involvement can be challenging when not understanding the content, task instructions or the language learning process or strategies. Notwithstanding, parents do have the advantage of knowing their child’s learning preferences or styles and can respond to them perhaps even better than teachers. Nevertheless, providing physical and psychological structures for studying, monitoring the homework process and accuracy, guiding the child to use meta strategies to become aware of the learning process and learn self-management skills, being a role model, and using positive reinforcement are practical home-based involvement practices that do not necessarily demand English language proficiency. (Hoover-Dempsey, Battiato, Walker, Reed, DeJong & Kathleen 2001.)
However, as the interviewees expressed that supporting the child often felt quite difficult, which seems to indicate that they specifically talked about instructional involvement—indeed, they had created strategies to compensate their lack of tools to instruct their children with homework.
They often asked help from someone who did know English. The older siblings were encouraging the younger ones to study hard and were asked to help with homework. It could be difficult if there were no other siblings who could do that, but then they turned to relatives or someone in town to explain what the children were required to do.
It's been really difficult, like a dare challenge to do something. -- Because when they go with all that homework, thank God there is my daughter for all this. But there are moments when she's busy with her own homework and it's my turn to actually to help [the younger child].
It's really hard. (P 6)
They also went to talk with the teacher to ask for help or used technology and internet to find answers. One mentioned taking pictures of exams and sending them to the father who could then help from a distance.