Academic Parent-Teacher Teams:

Family Engagement as an Instructional Strategy

Maria C. Paredes

What We know From Research

Students who benefit from having highly engaged parents:

Do better in school

Have a positive attitude toward learning and achievement

Enjoy greater academic socialization at home and in the community

Possess more developed social skills

Have higher rates of high school completion

Are more likely to enroll in college and obtain a degree

Dissertation in Practice

Problem of Practice:

1. Schools lack a formal system or structure to facilitate parent-teacher collaboration

2. Lack of opportunity for teachers and administrators to build capacity to meaningfully engage parents in student learning

Theoretical Framework

Concerted cultivation (Annette Lareau, 2003)

Self-efficacy model for engagement (Hoover-Dempsey, 1995, 1997, 2005)

Intervention

Academic Parent-Teacher Teams (APTT)

APTT is a classroom-based systematic approach to parent–teacher collaboration focused on student academic development.

Objective:

Every parent acquires the necessary information, skills and confidence to support student learning at home.

APTT

Two Components

1. Three 75-minute team meetings (All parents in the class come together)

2. One 30-minute individual session (The teacher, the student, and the students’ family)

The APTT Process

Welcome and icebreaker

Review foundational grade level skills

Review student progress data

Teacher demonstrates practice activities

Parents practice activities and take home practice materials

Parents set 60-day SMART goals

Participants Nine first grade classrooms in nine schools in

Phoenix, AZ.

Objective: improve reading fluency

Demographics:

92% Free or reduced lunch

80% Hispanic

45% ELL

ResultsQuantitative

DIBELS in August averaged 17 WPM

DIBELS in November averaged 46 WPM

End of the year standard for 1st grade 62 WPM

Qualitative

Increased quality and quantity of parent-teacher communication

Parents welcomed teachers invitations to participate and to be held to a higher standard of engagement

Increased teacher efficacy to engage parents

Many students met or exceeded academic expectations

APTT provided additional time and structure teachers needed

Implications With proper training and support teachers

can take action at the classroom level to engage families in the teaching and learning process

Teachers can incorporate family engagement as a key component of effective instruction

The results also validate previous research results which showed that parents value the academic success of their children, regardless of social class, race or academic attainment

APTT Impact to Date In three years, APTT has grown to include

about 2,000 classroom and about 65,000 families in six states and Washington DC.

APTT has set a new standard for sharing actionable student data with families

APTT was used as a key resource in shaping the national Family Engagement Capacity Building Framework, released by USDE in 2012

Thank you