Importance

Parents involvement in their children’s education offers a great probability of success for not only
education in general but also value education. Parents iinvolvement in the education of their children
boosts the child’s morale, helps them gain a positive attitude and help them achieve academic
achievments in the subjects they undertake. Children are aloso have a sense of identity and belonging as
they associate their parents involvement in their school with being cared for, they are then able to
socially adjust to changes in their lives as they grow up. Parents involvement also helps teachers and
school administrators raise the quality of school even as they realize reforms in education.

Studies have shown that all students from elementary level to high school have a desire for their parents
participation in their studies and would be willing to enhance commuications between school and home.
As children grow they require reinforcements as they adapt behavior and way of thinking. Thrugh parent
participation, children are able to view school as an integral part of their family’s lives and do not have
tp segregate their lives into home and school. This will only be possible when they see their parents
constantly getting involved in their education through, vcommunicting with their teacher, visitng school
and participating in school activities such as, coming for afterschool football practice. Children who have
parents who invest time in ther childrens education perform better in class. This is because children
wasn’t to be constantly motivated and parents showing interst in their education while encouraging
them all together is motivation enough. According to an article by Mapp and Hederson “Tips to Increase
Parental Involvement in Education,” he states that parental involvement is the only way in which true
reforms will be achievd I the education of children. He continued to state that in the time he servd as a
school administrator, he noted that schools that have parents involved in their children’s education
registered better performance. He attributed this performance to the motivated children who aspire to
achieve prowess in not only academic undertakings but also nonacademic undertakings as well as
teachers who are more committed and motivated by the support they receive from the parents.

Role of parents

Children in their early stages of development mostly learn from what they see rather than what they are
told. The first school they attend is home. They learn from their first conact which is parents, caregivers,
gaurdians or siblings. Children learn their first language from their parents or family at large, they learn
how to sit , eat to include all mannerism.For example a child learns that stealing is wrong as when they
were young their mother peherps told them stealing sugar is wrong. Therefore, home is the first place
even bfore school wehere children can be impacted on values and pricniples. Parents guode children in
progressive path from when they are young till they become adults demonstrating to them how one is
to conduct themselves and how to behave or do things. It is parents who encourage or discourage
behaviours that children pick up through their interaction with their peers or other people by either
purnishing them or rewarding them for the behavior. For example a parent who continually pampers
their child despite the child showing an improper behavior leads to a poor development of the childs
morals.

Parents should be able to maintain a balance when bringin up their children even as they instill morals
and promote good behavior. They should be able to show care while still reprimand the child when they
do something wrong. While some parents are too linient on their children, some parents are to strict,
overpowering their children to the extent that the child cannot enjoy their childhood or bliss of their
innocence. This children end up having low self esteem or scared to express themselves and this
ultimately has an impact on not only their development but also their performance in class. This
imbalance could also result in aggressive children who grow up to be aggressive adults. Parents need to
create time for their children and ensure they not only show care and affection to them but also offer
guidance to their children especially in their early stages of life.

cooperation

In todays generation, teaching the young people morals standards is equally difficult even with the
involvement of prents. Lack of parent involvement would hpwever make this mpartation imposiible as
the teachers can only improve the students behavior andconduct while their in school but cannot be
able to guarantee the same when they are out of the school environment. For this reason the school
and family units must work in cinjuction in the values education to ensure sustainable impact on the
students. The school can use the following strategies to ensure oarents involvement in their childrens
education. The first one is : they can develop a set of values that bothe the school and the community
agree upon. Schools should not assume that the values they try to instill in the students are the same as
those families int=still in th students, the two parties must then agree upon so that as the teachers teach
them in school the parents will also tich this values at their homes. Involving parents in the decisions of
the core values of the school and the rules that their children will be required to follow helps the
parents feel like they are being consulted for what should be the rules and this intrigues a lot of
cooperation. Another way to enhance cooperation between teachers and parents is to create support
groups for parents. Through the support groups parents interact and learn are able to discover shared
values between them. Parents of the school become a community as they are familiar with one another
helping create a strong support of community of parents for the school. The third way cooperation
between teachers and parents is enhanced is through parent participation and involvement in moral
education activities and programs. The school should creare a variety of projects and programs which
create opportunities for parents to be involved in the school’s activities. Parents can also be involved in
the planning of the activities of the school year. Family film nights is an example of an activity by schools
to promote parent participation in which parents show up in larger numbers with their children where
they watch a movie where they later engage in a conversation about the movie. Schools can offer
parallel carriculums in both the classroom and home. This curriculum is drafted by a group of parents
and teachers with the aim of promoting the vlues of students to be better neighbours and citizens. At
the end of school year parents are asked to give comments of how the school year has been, any
improvement or challenges their children my have registered and then they give suggestions of how
they think the next ear should be handled to help improve their children’s performanace.