A challenge of today's teacher preparation programmes is to educate teachers about families formed through international adoption and of the challenges they face, in order to meet their educational needs. This population has a unique developmental history affected by pre- and post-adoption conditions which stand to impact on learning experiences…

The purpose of this study was to gain a fuller understanding of the sort of assistance, support, or education parents feel they need from school counselors in parenting adolescents. The research question examined was: What sort of assistance, support, or education do independent school parents feel they need from school counselors in raising…

Teachers and their students increasingly come from different cultural backgrounds (Black, 2006). Aronson (2004) noted that 86% of the teaching populations in public schools were Caucasian and female and failing to connect with students was often cited in schools where the student populations were predominantly African American. Howard (2006)…

In today's political environment with the emphasis on testing, standards, and accountability, teachers can easily feel frustrated by the amount of time and resources left over for teaching--for guiding students not only in academics but also in character education. Educators can find themselves losing focus of what initially inspired them to…

From the 1960s, the development of home-school relationships in special schools has become increasingly important, culminating in the current official understanding of parents as partners. This paper traces the development of the relationship, setting out the challenges to partnership development from professional perspectives within education. A…

Parental involvement in schools, generally seen to be a good thing, is now closely linked through policy to the educational achievement of their children. In this Victorian case study, teacher and parent responses to policies advocating parental involvement are examined. It explores the intersections of gender and class in the context of changing…

Few studies have examined the link between children's early school achievement and parents' at-home practices exclusively among Latino groups. This study examined the relation between Latina mothers' reported at-home practices regarding school preparation and their children's literacy skills. Participants included 56 kindergarten children and…

In response to heightened standards and calls for accountability, schools have dramatically intensified their work to meet the growing challenges. Schools require strategies for improvement that will transcend demographic factors such as SES. Research has shown the construct of academic optimism as contributing to student achievement despite a…

The literature is sated with calls for more and better communication between home and school. Teachers believe that parents should be more involved, but seem at a loss as to how to make that happen, and parents often feel disconnected to their child's teacher and the school. Few would argue that it is the responsibility of classroom teachers to…

Background/Context: Recent trends suggest that middle-class parents may be a growing constituency in urban public schools and districts. Within the burgeoning literature on the middle class in urban public schools, most scholars have focused on parents' goals and orientations and/or the consequences of parental involvement in classroom and school…

Parent-educator partnerships are an important element of effective early childhood, K-12, and special education programs (Dunst, Trivette, & Snyder, 2000; Tabors, 2008). While early childhood and other classrooms in the United States are increasingly diverse, the teachers in those classrooms are unlikely to be of the same linguistic or cultural…

The contribution of parental involvement in the parent-teacher association (PTA) to schoolchildren's performance is an issue for evaluation research. To resolve the issue, it is reasonable to differentiate people who benefit and others who do not benefit from the involvement. Such differentiation relied on survey data from 289 pairs of Hong Kong…

Many teachers are not well prepared for, nor are they being trained to communicate effectively with, parents/caregivers from the different backgrounds and cultures with whom they will interact. Yet, one knows that teachers' professional communication skills are important as they work with parents to promote the success of all children in the…

The research in the study examined the development and effects of an alternative model of parent/teacher collaboration on behalf of student learning. The setting for the research was IMPACT School, a small independent school serving students in grades kindergarten through eighth grade. Two primary research questions were addressed: (1) What…

Society is becoming more and more culturally diverse. Schools are no exception. This poses a unique set of challenges for establishing meaningful home-school relations. Given the fact that the home and the school may represent two different cultures, families and schools may not share the same vision with regard to how children should be educated…