1.0 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Children interest in learning has been found to be associated with many factors. Effective pedagogical learning approaches, good teaching qualities, emphasis on critical teaching, interesting curricula, good diet and regular exercise as well as pupils- centered styles of learning have been considered as the main factors that affect learning. Compelling evidence have shown that in addition to these factors, parental involvement plays a significant role on students learning interest. This argument has been supported strongly by Henderson and Berla (1994) that when families work with schools to support learning, there is a tendency of students succeeding more not only in school but also throughout life.
While it is well researched and documented that high-achieving parents with higher socio- economic status have children that perform better in school, parenting approaches have been considered to have a direct impact on students interest in learning as well as performance even among the one low in socio- economic classes. Among the boon accruing from parental engagement and complicity in student learning have been considered to include: Behavioral and attitudinal improvement of learners to studies, decrease in absenteeism and drop- out rate, decrease in misconduct and an improved school performance (Desforges & Abouchaar. 2003).
This realization among the parents and the teachers have seen parents generally want to do more for the interest of their children and hence the significance of parental involvement in students’ welfare and performance in school can scarcely be over- emphasized. As research also indicate, parents with greater aspiration in their children tend to be more involved in children welfare in school as well as their performance. This aspirations of parents predicts later on educational performance. This research seeks to reveal the relationship between parental involvement and children interest in learning in Primary Schools in Mukuru Kayaba Slum.
1.1 PROBLEM STATEMENT
According to Terriquez (2013) parent’s involvement in their children education in Kenya is only limited to financial contribution and probably to some limited extent teacher-parent meetings. Some parents and teachers have apparently not known nor appreciated the fact that parental involvement in school play a significant role in child performance and learning interest. As such if the education system in Kenya should be improved, parental involvement will be critical. Therefore, the effectiveness of educational restructuring initiatives in Kenya will only bear fruits if parental involvement in their children education is increased.
1.2 PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
Prior research has shown over 90% of parents have positively responded to be involved in their child’s education and learning (Usher & Kober, 2012). However, data is scarce on the percentiles on what number of parent actually encourage the child on special areas of learning or encourage the child’s interest in learning. For instance, parents have not been fully documented to support the child’s interest in learning in music or science subjects especially for ethnic minorities. For teachers and education policy makers, the paper seeks to review positive need for parental involvement in their children learning interests over and above issues such as poverty, ethnicity, job prospects, literacy, and wellbeing (Alrehaly, 2011).
Investigating early childhood development is critical for parents across all ethnicities since parental involvement is not fully distinct at this point. This is due to single parent, two parent families, and families with one or more children being witnessed across all ethnicities and social backgrounds. The study also seeks to upscale the attainment of children whose parents have lesser educational attainment. A millennial cohort study conducted in 2007 parent’s shows that those with tertiary and university education had more parental involvement in their child’s interest in learning (Cole, 2011). The study will seek to find positive composite approaches to parents with low literacy in order to have more uniform development of core skills and cognitive abilities in children in reading, perception, comprehension, and science interests.
1.3 OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY
1.3.1 Main Objective
The main objective of the research is to establish the relationship between parental involvement children learning interest and strategies that can be used to motivate parents, school heads and teachers to enhance parental involvement in their schools.
1.3.2 Specific objectives
Emanating from the main objective are the following secondary objectives:
i)To identify the various types of parental involvement in Mukuru Kayaba Slum
ii)To determine the relationship between a child’s performance and their parent’s academic qualifications.
iii)To find out the extent to which parental involvement relates to a child performance in Mukuru Kayaba Slum
iv)To identify barriers to effective parental involvement
v)To investigate which type of parental involvement best increases a child performance.
1.4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS
i.What are the various forms of parental involvement in Mukuru Kayaba Slum?
ii.Does a parent’s academic qualifications relate to child’s performance?
iii.To what extend do parental involvement relates to a child performance in Mukuru Kayaba Slum?
iv.What are the factors that inhibit effective parental involvement in Mukuru Kayaba Slum?
v.What forms of parental involvement do best increase a child’s performance?
1.5 JUSTIFICATION OF THE STUDY
Surveys have indicated that some parents in consultative meeting in schools on improvement of students performance accuse teachers of been lazy and tend to give students too much homework which parents have to help the children in. This has developed an interest in research whether its the lack of school- parents partnership that cause poor performance or the the structure and the management of the school. This could related to the attitudinal, institution, logistical and expectations- related factors among the teachers and in the school.
1.6 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
The methodology initiatives for investigation will inform the implications for public policy initiatives and student-parent relationships on cognitive competence of children. The paper will try to decipher the outcomes on student’s overall performance that result from parental involvement in child educational interests and attainments. For instance, children with closer ties with parents, have more reading and communication achievement, this makes them more expressive and is able to communicate their needs and wants. Also, children with more developed social skills are less likely to be emotionally, physically or sexually abused during their young or formative years due to their ability to foster relationships with parents and adults and can speak up when they feel something bothers them (Usher & Kober, 2012).
In connection, the concept paper can allow the further exploration of parental involvement in their children learning. Parental engagement with children will foster stronger pro-social skills like sports, debating, music and singing, and science project participation. This will result to more social benefits and thus the need to explore the connection between parental involvement and child learning interests (Cole, 2011).
1.7 SCOPE OF THE STUDY
The study will be conducted in Mukuru Kayaba and will involve schools, parents and children homes. The study will take 3 months involving data collecting through questionnaires administration, interviews and focus group discussions.
2.0 LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Introduction
This section gives an understanding parental involvement idea that will illuminate the advancement of information accumulation polls and the meeting plans and additionally giving hypothetical system of the review. This part quickly gives meanings of parental involvement, distinguishes the centrality of parental involvement and the forms it takes; builds up variables and obstructions to parental involvement and also techniques of tending to the boundaries. Attribution hypothesis is utilized to give generous clarification of parental involvement in Mukuru Kayaba Slums..
2.2 Definition of parental involvement
As indicated by Myeko (2000) parental involvement is a participatory procedure of parents in different exercises in kids instruction that may run from participation of parents in school works once in a while to concentrated engagement as better instructors of their children. Nye et al (2006) definition notwithstanding this accentuates the engagement of parents with their children outside educational time in exercises that go for boosting the kids scholastic execution. These exercises may incorporate outings that have learning and scholarly bolster impacts and in addition one-on-one scholastic engagement like perusing and scholastic critical thinking exercises. Checking homework, correspondence with instructors and also participation in school based occasions have likewise been considered to fit in the bundle of parental involvement by Holloway et al (2008).
Developing the above definitions, Pate and Andrews (2006) calls attention to that parental involvement is having the mindfulness and also the involvement of parents in schoolwork, consistency in parents’ correspondence with kids teachers and also understanding parental aptitude and students’ school execution cooperation. For the motivations behind this review, Pate and Andrews (2006) meaning of parental involvement is thorough since it gives the feeling of parental engagement in school-based as well as locally situated exercises that go for improving understudies’ school execution.
2.3 Significance of parental involvement
Parental involvement in school has for long been considered to positively affect children instruction (Parhar, 2006). This has been affirmed by Vassallo (2001) who expresses that parental involvement is an intense indicator of understudies accomplishment. As Jeynes (2005) affirms, when parents buy books to enlarge those gave by the school, a youngster figures out how to value the favorable learning condition both at home and school prompting to the tyke creating great outcomes. Steady discussion too with the children about school issues makes a youngster welcome the significance of training. What’s more, as per Holloway et al (2008), the more the parents get included in the children scholarly engagement, the more probable the parent will impart the significance of instruction to the children also helping the children procure methodologies to help upgrade impression of school’s capability and accomplishment.
Parents – teachers coordinated effort has additionally been hailed as extremely instrumental in upgrading children execution since a situation is made both at home and at school. This includes the correspondence of a definitive objective of the children learning advancement and school execution between the parent and the instructors (Desforges and Abouchaar, 2003).
2.4 Types of Parental Involvement
There are two expansive types of parental involvement that effect children decidedly in school that are recognized by Hoell (2006). These are; school-based parental involvement and home- based parental involvement.
2.4.1 School-based involvement
According to Desforges & Abouchaar (2003), school based parental involvement involve the interaction between parents and school personnel. This interaction is mainly aimed at sharing child’s progress, performance and behavior in school. It also involves the establishment of a good relationship between parents and teachers that helps in discussing emergent issues. Further, this type of involvement according to Jeynes (2005) involves voluntary parents participation in school activities, attending school functions and the participation in school governance. Vogels (2002) adds to the list the involvement of parents in contribution of school learning materials which may include; contibution toward maintenance of furniture and buildings, parties and excursion, supervision of children during lunch- time as well as odd jobs like cleaning.
2.4.2 Home-based involvement
Hoell (2006) considers home-based involvement as having a greater impact on children performance than school- based involvement. In this he identifies two mode of home- based involvements as home discussion which encompasses discussion of school related activities and home supervision which involves assessing and monitoring children out- of – school engagements school as homework.
2.5 Determinants Of Parental Involvement
Different factors have been considered to determine parental engagement in school including; family and parenting demographic variables including families’ socio- economic status and parents employment status, parents’ school involvement cognitions as well as the home environment.
According to Vogel (2002), parents wit poor socio- economic status are mostly characterized with low income levels, low level of education and lack jobs. These condition are attributed to lead to reduction of self- esteem as well as lowering the disposition to be involved I school activities.
As put by Holloway et al, (2008) after studying the Japanese parental involvement in school, maternal employment status may affect parental involvement in school. The findings of research indicate that women that are employed find it difficult to balance different roles including been a mother, a wife and an employee. This ultimately leads to a decline in parents involvement in child’s academic involvement.
Home environment as put by Kajinga (2005) that may involve parents reading to children plays a critical role in the development of child’s literacy. In the study, it is clear that cognitive stimulation at the home environment that include engaging the child in reading, playing board games, visiting the museum, libraries and zoos as well using computer may lead to a child appreciating school activities and ultimately enhancing children school performance.
Another factor considered by Holloway et al (2008) is parental cognition of their role in school education. This cognition is mostly determined by the parents own educational experience. In this case parents that have and experience with education posses vision, competence and confidence in supporting their children. Education level is also considered to shape the child- parent interaction that may be very instrumental in intellectual stimulation and problem- solving.
2.6 Barriers to parental involvement
Various barriers have been attributed to leading to low parental involvement among parents. Research by Lemmer and Van Wyk (2004) show that these barriers are conceived by perceptions and attitudes of teachers, pupils and teachers. These barriers are considered to be categorized broadly as; institutional, attitudinal, expectations and logistical. According to the research,attitudinal barriers are caused by limitation in parental experience in education which result to lack of relevant skills that may be required in parental involvement.
Varying expectation between parents and teachers as put by Siririka (2007) may lead to the parties working at cross purposes which may lead to the children confused. In a situation where the teachers have expectations that are way beyond the parents capabilities and teachers not doing anything to enhance the capacity of the parents concerned, parents may get frustrated and ultimately reflect it to the children. A situation is where teachers demand the parents to help the children with their homework while not engaging the parents with how they can do it. This scenario has been attributed to poor parents- teachers communication which lead to both parties blaming each other ultimately based on child’s performance.
To mitigate this communication barrier between the parents and the teachers, the school’s institution has to put effective mechanisms in place. Institutional barriers as studied by Desforges & Abouchaar (2003) may lead to disconnection between parents and teachers. When teachers feel threatened by parental involvement in school affairs, it is the responsibility of the institution to put mechanism in place to facilitate smooth interaction between parents and teachers. Parents have a right to ask about their children welfare in school and to interact effectively with the teacher regardless of their social- economic status or their education backgrounds.
Another barrier that is studied by Siririka (2007) involves logistics and resources. Resources in question have been identified to include financial and intellectual resources. As indicated earlier, parents with lower intellectual resources courtesy of their educational background are considered to have low parental involvement levels. Financial capacity to support in school’s materials have also see children lacking the essentials and the morale to engage effectively with other children in school.
2.7 Empirical Evidence
School readiness in children within higher economic status was found to be better than from families experiencing economic hardship. Data from Australian parental- child learning engagement shows that children from richer families scored higher in “who am i” tests (Alrehaly, 2011). Such a preliminary research indicates that parental involvement might be considerable especially in families with lower job prospects or those living in poverty. Preliminary research and studies in similar topics reveal that the level of information revealed to parents and engagement between parents and teachers to encourage parental involvement is crucial. This level of engagement clearly states whether home setting is crucial for child interests in learning and education attainment levels. In other words, better informed parents, have a direct positive response in longer lasting child interests in learning (Cole, 2011).
The research will be located within the analytical model where the researcher will seek to understand the phenomenon and to explain meaning within the social and cultural background of the natural setting (McMillan and Schumacher, 2010). This will involve interacting with people in such situations, interpreting their their experiences and perceptions (Cohen and Manion, 1994). This model will allow for the investigation of how parents are involved in their children school education and how teachers supported them.
Qualitative methodology will be used in the research that will allow the gaining of first-hand information regarding the perceptions of participants that will help comprehend social behaviour from the “insider perspective” (Ary, Jacobs and Razavieh, 1996). Taking into consideration that parental involvement barriers and factors are context based, qualitative methodology will be eminently place to identify the factors that facilitate parental involvement as well as barriers that inhibit.
Focus group discussions, individual interviews, observations and open- ended questionnaires will be used to gather data which is in line with qualitative research. The individual semi- structure interviews as well as the focus group discussions will be mainly used as they all systematic observation, interview and record processing(McMillan and Schumacher, 2010). Focus group interviews in this case will be conducted in respect of parents, individual interview in respect of the school heads, open- ended questionnaires in respect of teachers while observation will be in respect of children homes activities.
3.1 LIMITATION OF THE STUDY
The full disclosure of the involvement level of parents in children learning might be withheld by the parents.