National Models for Parent Involvement

By Nan Fishman, Education Coordinator for Head Start Learning Tree, Parents' Source, Fall Issue, 1996

Parents are a child's first teachers. However, when children enter the school system this valuable and unique relationship somehow changes. But many schools and school districts are beginning to realize that this change need not occur and are taking steps to keep parents involved by adopting the National Head Start Model of Parent Involvement. The Head Start Model is based on the realization that parent involvement is essential in affecting positive change in children.

One new initiative, based on this Model, is called project PITCH (Project Interconnecting Teachers, Children, and Homes) for Literacy. Through Project PITCH, California schools offered a set of inservice workshops aimed at helping teachers and administrators improve home-school relationships. The workshops provided the teachers with ideas on how to positively communicate with parents. Additionally, teachers experimented with ways to involve parents and children in an effective home learning experience with the opportunity for feedback.

A second project, sponsored by the Albuquerque Public Schools in Albuquerque, New Mexico, aimed at achieving the dual goals of boosting the science and math programs while encouraging the growth of parent involvement. The program sought to involve parents in students' projects without giving parents the anxiety and pressure that usually accompanies such undertakings. Rather than simply giving children a project assignment, students were sent home with a science or math backpack containing all the materials needed to complete a project with their parents. To further develop the home-school connection, the children were encouraged to share their home activity in the classroom. Creating mini-museums and experience excursions encouraged additional interaction between parent, child, and teacher.

Both of these are projects easily adaptable to any school setting. To begin similar initiatives in your child's school, attend school district meetings and request that a study group investigate parent involvement as a permanent component of the curriculum. To find out more about the programs described above, contact Albuquerque Public Schools, Instructional Support Department at (506) 256-4211 or see "Making Parent Involvement a Reality: Helping Teachers Develop Partnerships with Parents" by Susan Brand, in "Young Children," Jan., 1996, a publication of the National Association for the Education of Young Children, 1509 16th St., N.W., Washington, DC 20036-1426. (This issue also lists over 50 references for further reading).

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