Education is an area of great importance in Singapore. Thus, most parents have very high expectations of educators. In this paper, I will talk about what are some of these expectations and how I can harness them as a force to enhance students' learning.
The traditional expectation of an educator is that he must be responsible for the academic welfare and/or excellence of the child. Do parents also expect teachers to play a part in developing the whole person, in areas such as character development? Discipline, must then be part of character development. How much do parents agree to the whole person development? To what extent do parents want teachers and schools to discipline their children? What methods are acceptable and which are not?
Recent events shed some light to the amount of expectation there is of schools and teachers and raises some interesting questions too. The Nan Chiau fiasco for example shows the expectation of the public of school discipline and in particular corporal punishment. It is difficult to bridge the gap between those who agree to what the principal did and those who did not. They did however agree to the basic tenet of discipline but not the style. This highlights to us the changes in societal views' on methods of discipline. Do these changes in expectation restrict us in achieving our goal in developing the whole child? How do we work with these changed expectations?
Increasingly, parents are expecting to play a more active role in schools in the form of Parents' Support Groups (PSG). In these committees, they may take on different projects and be in charge of their organisation. These projects can be in the form of enrichment programmes for students which may help in the disciplining if appropriate programmes are organised.
The issues related to increased parental involvement are legion. What are parents' motivations? Will parents expect something in return for their services? What kind of incentives can school offer to encourage parents to participate? Will it lead to inequity? Parents might feel that if they do not contribute as much, their children will be disadvantaged. Will they then see the PSG as an added workload to themselves? Will it disadvantage those students who come from a poor family background?
Methods to harness them as a force
There are some possible solutions in the bid to harness parental support as a force. Schools can `package' the services that parents can offer.
In today’s era, there are so many things that can interfere with how a parent is able to discipline their child. Discipline is a very thin line that can be surpassed without even knowing the harm that was done. There are many different ways a child can be disciplined such as by talking to them, taking away their favorite things, not allowing them free time, time outs, and sometimes even spanking. As children, everyone has experienced some type of discipline depending on the way parents decided to raise their children. Depending on what culture children were raised in can take part on the way parents decided to discipline their children. Parents have different beliefs on how their child should be disciplined. As parents, many are faced with
There is a monthly open school morning that the PTO has in the auditorium for parents to come by and be informed about what is going on in the school. Various programs and grades offer workshops and meeting. Every Tuesday from 2:40pm- 4pm the school has that time frame allotted for parent engagement. Parents do not have to wait to meet with teacher on the two designated parents teachers conference. Each Tuesday, the parents can come in and meet with any of their child’s teachers without an appointment. The parents can discuss any concerns or issues regarding with their child’s academics or behaviors performance. Also, the school engages parents by using an electronic system called N-grade. N-grade is a parent portal where parents login and look at their child’s assignments. The portal shows their child’s assignment grades, missing assignments and assignments they can make up to earn back their grades.
Contrary to popular belief, corporal punishment is still an accepted form of punishment in some countries. In these countries, many see this kind of punishment for children as normal, natural and harmless. Yet, human rights activists believe that it is damaging and must be stopped. For example, Gambian teachers are working to end corporal punishment. The Gambia Teachers' Union has been training teachers on alternative...
This is when we need to step up and help the parent and the child so they don’t fall through the cracks of the education system. We need to increase parent involvement in each child education. Increasing parent involvement, begins with education the parents. Parents don’t realize or know how to get involved with their child’s education. There are many ways families can be involved in the education process. The parent is the child’s most valuable teacher for their whole life. The most benefit this will bring to the families is confidence. Teachers need to help the parents know that they can assist in their child’s education and can help them at home. There are workshops and training to help families get involved. The key is to offer incentives to the training to help increase the parent’s attendance, Communication is the one key with the parents. In today’s socially they are many ways to stay in contact with parents because of technology by email, text, or social media. Invite parent to come to the classroom and volunteer and see firsthand what a day look like for their child in the classroom. Have different events that will increase parents interest and eventually great participation. Another idea could be to send home activities that encourages family involvement. This can be activity that have the parents engage with each other and can be short and dynamic. The
... importance of parental involvement in education can be found in the following statement. “Children whose parents are involved in their formal education have many advantages. They have better grades, test scores, long-term academic achievement, attitudes, and behavior than those with disinterested mothers and fathers.” (Henderson, 1988 p.1).
Parental involvement promotes the social growth of a child. Children whose parents are involved in their education have many advantages. They have better grades, test scores, long-term academic achievement, attitudes and behavior than those with disinterested mothers and fathers (Gestwicki, 2001). Parents becoming involved in their child's schooling creates extra sources of social constraint to influence the child's behavior (McNeal, 2001). For example, parents talking to their children and becoming involved in the school conveys a message to the child of education being important. Parents should be talking with your children's teacher and letting her know about your family. The more she knows about your child, the better she will be able to connect with your child.
..., Barry A. "School Discipline: “Is There a Crisis in Our Schools?" Australian Journal of
On a student’s cell phone, a teacher is caught hitting students with a thick stick. He continually hits everywhere from the students’ hips to the head harshly without a hesitation. This video is opened to the public by a student in the class posting it on the Internet. According to the other students, they were punished because they skipped class when the school inspectors came. All the people who looked at it on the Internet were surprised to see this kind of behavior. Recently, we’ve heard a lot on the media about punishment by teachers in school. Some people agree with the teacher’s power to punish, claiming that it is a part of education. However, contrary to this opinion, I disagree with corporal punishment because physical punishment brings only temporary effects in correcting children’s behavior. Also, it can humiliate a child by insulting his or her personality and have a poor affect on their self esteem. Besides, physical punishment can be abused because there aren’t any concrete standards to regulate how much punishment is proper in disciplining.
One of the most critical aspects of raising a child is the way they are disciplined. Disciplining a child starts early in their life and how it is done sets an example for them of how to respond to undesirable behaviors. Everyone’s parenting style differs, but the majority fall into four major categories: Authoritarian, Authoritative, Neglectful, and Indulgent. Electing a parenting style is hard and in most cases, the chosen or natural parenting style is based on the effects of the parenting style the parent experienced when they were young.
Our analyse of family-school partnership issue included theoretical studies and researches on family-school relationships, programmes of parent involvement and evaluations of programmes, handbooks for practitioners, as well as legislative documents on cross-national level (Table 1).
Corporal punishment is the physical disciplinary method used by parents, teachers, and school administrators in an effort to correct a child’s undesirable behaviors. The use of physical force is one that is often times controversial and usually evokes very strong reactions. These feelings surface, and opposing views clash, when scandals surrounding corporal punishment hit the media and heated arguments in the comments section of articles emerge. While corporal punishment occasionally makes its way into the limelight, it is a decision all parents are faced with eventually and often times daily. For example, when a toddler is sprawled out on the grocery store floor kicking, hitting, and flinging
To conclude, my research shows a clear link between parental involvement and children performing better in school. Children who's parents are involved in their education are showing better performance and are achieving higher grades. They also show better behaviour, more enthusiasm, ambition and higher levels of engagement. compared with children who's parent are not involved in their education. My research also shows that parental involvement has great benefits for both children and parents in many ways, so much so that the most effective schools are those who encouraged parents to be involved.
Involving parents with school activities will benefit the school parent and the child. Teachers will have more help and will know the children closely if the parents are involved. Children feel happy and secure to see their parents around and it makes them confident too. We can start the involvement by inviting parents as volunteers for story reading and school outings. The importance of parental involvement is stressed in Lev Vygotsky's Sociocultural Theory which states parents, caregivers, peers, and the culture at large were responsible for developing higher order functions. On the other hand, parents will also have a sense of inclusion in their child’s development process. Parents will share more family time and bonding with their young kids which supports the child’s psychological needs
Parental involvement in a child’s life is crucial to their motivation, and eventual success or failure in school. According to the National Education Association (NEA), students who have parents involved in their education are more likely to earn higher grades, go to school regularly, have better social skills, have more positive behavior, and proceed to secondary
Parents are an important ingredient to the perfect education. Parents who aren't involved in their children's education only impede the efforts made by teachers and students to create a good education. These parents are oftentimes uninterested with their children's education as a whole. To achieve perfection in the educational system, parents have to take an active role in that education. Parents who don't include themselves in their children's education aren't always informed about the student's progress, aren't aware of the current curriculum, and don't have any idea of the student's strengths and weaknesses in school. An involved parent is informed and sometimes included in the decision-making process. Parents who take an active role are kept informed of the progress made by their children. The parents know the curriculum and assist the children with their nightly studies, and can discuss their children's feelings about education.