A 2015 education.com study revealed that nearly 80 percent of parents help their children with schoolwork more often than they received help from their own parents. Most teachers participating in the study also stated that they expect parents to help their children with schoolwork at least sometimes. This hints that the days of parents leaving academic success up to the child are potentially long gone.
You could contribute the increase in parental involvement to many factors, including the modern focus on standardized testing and the more hands-on approach that many families now apply to all aspects of parenting. If you haven’t been that active in your child’s education in the past, there are four compelling reasons to change your approach in the future.
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Active involvement is the easiest way to keep up with changing standards in the education system.
When the Common Core standards were introduced in 2009, they changed everything from the way children work math problems to what strategies they use for reading comprehension. The processes are dramatically different from what you were likely taught, so learning along with your child is the only way to understand what teachers now expect in the classroom. It will also prevent a generational gap from developing as kids learn to process information in new ways.
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Your child is more likely to value education if you treat it as something of value.
If you want someone to treat your belongings with care, it helps if you treat those items as valuable possessions. The same logic goes for your child’s education. “When you ask questions about what they’re learning, track their grades and tell them how education will impact their future, they will understand why schoolwork is so important,” said Christ Methodist Day School. This is a great source of motivation that will drive them to do their best even when you aren’t sitting in the desk next to them.
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You can help your child look into the future rather than focusing on current events.
The older your little one gets, the more their academic performance will impact their future. If you want them to score well on standardized tests and have a strong college application, you have to guide their decisions throughout middle and high school. While you want them to choose electives, sports, clubs and other activities according to their personal interests, you can help them understand how these decisions will look on job or college applications in the future. Without that insight, they may choose the easiest option rather than the best option for their future goals.
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Your child is more likely to graduate high school and continue on to higher education if you’re involved.
According to the National Education Association, research has proven that children with involved parents are more likely to earn high grades, perform well on tests, graduate high school and continue their education through post-secondary educational programs. This research highlights the importance of parents and teachers working together through school-sponsored involvement programs that make it easy for parents to stay involved. If you’re invited to parent-teacher conferences and other school events, your child’s school is embracing this researching by trying to keep you involved.
How Much Help Is Too Much?
In 2014, The Atlantic reported on an interesting analysis of the research regarding parental involvement in education. The end result was that parents make the most difference when they establish high expectations for their children while leaving it up to the child to do the work. The researchers concluded that children achieve more when they are exposed to well-educated adults with interesting careers, have regular discussions with their parents regarding the importance of college, and know that their parents want them to do well in school.
They also concluded that helping children with their homework or maintaining a physical presence at the school wasn’t as effective for boosting school performance as many believe. This conflicts with many other studies regarding parental involvement, but it does stress that there is more than one way to tune into your child’s academic career.
One option is to combine all of this research so that you remain involved while giving your child the lead. For instance, you can have your kid teach you how to do their math problems while only helping if they ask for assistance. You get to see what your student is learning, but you aren’t doing it for them. If you talk to your child about their school experience, you will come up with other creative ways to stay involved.
