Assistant Principal - Pastoral Care

The Role of Parents in Learning

In recent years a great deal of research has emerged about our brains and learning. Traditionally, people believed that you were born with a certain level of intelligence and giftedness. This view has been well and truly debunked over the last decade.

Wendy Berliner and Deborah Eyre have written a wonderful book titled, Great Minds and How to Grow Them. They argue that:

Based on the overall body of research, we believe the balance of evidence is that genetics have minimal significance on how well you can perform at school … we believe that a combination of potential and motivation underpinned by learning opportunities and support delivers high performance … and that parents are crucial in helping to mix that learning cocktail.

Research from both the US and UK shows that:

Children of parents who were involved with the school had fewer behavioural problems, better academic outcomes and were more likely to finish high school.

The more parents are seen by their children to be working in tandem with the school the more this reinforced the importance of learning to students.

The book argues that first and foremost, parents need to support the school as an institution. If teenagers receive conflicting messages from their parents about the school, then this will undermine the student’s approach and attitude to learning. That is, the more parents run-down, challenge, ignore rules and procedures, speak disrespectfully about staff, the more likely a student is to underperform in their learning. Interestingly, the book discusses examples from English schools that have occurred at McCarthy from the delivery of takeaway food to school drop-off and pick-up procedures to uniform.

This is not to say that schools should be blindly supported – of course issues arise over time (schools are made up of humans and humans are flawed) but the authors argue that parents need to follow appropriate procedures to resolve an issue and always be mindful of what they discuss and how they talk about the school with their children. The bottom line is – how you speak about the school significantly impacts on your child’s perception of the school which influences their approach to learning.

They also list the usual activities that send a powerful message to your children that you value the institution and therefore their learning, such as:

• attending all Parent/Teacher Interviews and information sessions
• supporting school events as much as possible
• helping out wherever you are able
• joining the parent’s Association or supporting their events.

Thus, fairly conclusive research proves that the time, effort and energy that you put into the school as an institution, brings clear and definite benefits to your child’s academic growth.

The authors also outline how to support the school as a place of learning. Much of what they discuss here is similar to what I wrote in my previous newsletter. Parents need to help students develop and sustain good habits and routines at home. Parents need to regularly discuss what students are learning – what they are learning about and how they are learning. As a parent, you don’t need to be the expert or have any or all of the answers; ideally students can teach you things that they have learned. This is empowering for the young person. The more a parent is involved, the more a student receives the message that learning is important.

Another fascinating finding of their research is that parental expectations have a significant impact on a child’s educational outcomes. They conclude:

If you expect your child to be a high performance learner, they can be. You don’t need to be highly paid and highly educated to have expectations, you just have to have them. And the research proves this rubs off on your children.

So while many parents feel at a loss when their son or daughter commences high school because they start learning in new and different ways, the truth of the matter is that you have the potential to play a significant and powerful role in influencing your child’s approach to learning. Berliner and Eyre conclude by saying:

Not everyone can be Prime Minister or President, not everyone can compose music that will echo down the centuries, not everyone can be the fastest person on earth. But everyone who goes to school, who is cognitively unimpaired, can deliver educational performance that is currently associated only with the most able. It just needs more parents to take an informed interest in building the learning skills of their children and to develop values and attitudes that support that … Your children need to learn skills to prepare them for an unknown future – they need to be learning fit as well as physically fit. They need to make the most of their learning opportunities while they are at school.

This research confirms what many educators have known for a long time; that if a child is to be an effective learner it takes the efforts of both school and home, in unison, to achieve learning that will last a life-time.

 Mr Mick Larkin - Assistant Principal - Pastoral Care