Teachers' Experiences With Latino Families in a Science Learning Context: Empowering Teachers Through Home-School Partnerships

• In Event: Roundtable Session 25
  In Roundtable Session: Parent-Teacher Interaction and Collaboration

Abstract

Teacher-parent collaboration is critical for promoting ethnic minority students’ post-secondary education attendance and retention. Although teachers play a central role in initiating a trusting collaboration with parents, few research studies focus on teachers’ learning in working with diverse families. Informed by Nieto’s notions of highly qualified teachers and Paris’s conception of culturally sustainable pedagogy, we offer insights into the lived experiences of secondary science teachers in working with Latino parents for their children’s science learning in the context of bilingual science family workshops. Analysis of in-depth interviews with four teachers and participant observation fieldnotes from the workshops highlights the need for new professional development opportunities to support secondary teachers in collaborating with parents of different cultural, ethnic, and linguistic backgrounds.

Authors

• Mehtap Kirmaci, University of Georgia - Athens

• Martha A. Allexsaht-Snider, University of Georgia

• Yainitza Hernandez-Rodriguez, University of Georgia