Bode Week 4: Parent Involvement

     In my first grade class there is something that I have been noticing constantly all throughout the day and cannot seem to stop thinking about. The correlation between parent involvement outside the classroom and student work in the classroom. Since the beginning of school it has been fairly easy for me to establish which students seem to be struggling with the academic and behavioral expectations in the classroom. There are a handful of students I can think of off the top of my head that I know struggle with reading, sounding out words, writing, etc. These same students also display some behavioral issues in terms of listening, speaking out of turn, responding to teachers requests, behaving on the rug or in the halls, etc. As part of my position in the classroom, I have been looking through the Ray School Take Home Folders everyday to make sure I collect all the papers turned in by parents, make sure the parent has emptied the folder full of important papers, and check for parent initials next to EVERYDAY. By doing this I have discovered much information about which parents return papers and sign their child's folder everyday. Although I know that turning in papers and an initial may not mean much, I do analyze it to a degree. Parents are more involved when they are checking their child's folders for important papers, returning the papers that need to be filled, and signing the folder as asked to do so by the teacher. I have seen a somewhat direct correlation between the parent involvement and student work/behavior just by observing the folder system. It was no surprise to me that when I began to notice the children who were struggling in school academic and behavioral wise, their folders were almost always turned in unsigned, full of all the papers, and few had returned completed papers. It makes me upset to see the connection between these two things because it really has a poor effect on the child. I seriously feel for the children who tell me almost every day "well I can't read" and then I wonder "is there a parent, grandparent, sibling, anyone helping you at home?" I want to be concerned, and to be honest frustrated, when a child tells me they can't do something and simply give up. This makes me immediately realize maybe it's not their fault, maybe they aren't getting the support at home they need or other students in their class are getting.

     This would clearly be a case of the importance parent involvement is to the student's achievement and progress. I am not saying it is directly correlating but from my observations I have noticed a VERY close connection. In my opinion, what is happening here is that students who have little support at home may not get the practice or extra work they need to keep continuing to succeed in the classroom. Schools these days, especially Ray School, push for parent involvement and support at home because they understand that a student needs to continue practicing at home with help from their families. This also establishes a view in the student's mind that "school is important to practice not only inside school but also outside with my family and in my life." What I find important about this "issue" is the fact that students who see parents contributing to their classroom and school work are more likely to practice themselves and continue to try/practice in and outside of school. I'm not saying this doesn't happen with students whose parents may not be involved as much but i feel as though you would see a decrease in participation from those students, which is sad to see in students as little as first grade.