Changing Parents' Beliefs About Math Learning and Implications for Constructive Parenting Practices

• In Event: Poster Session 17
  In Poster Session: Motivation in Education SIG Poster Session 2

Abstract

Parents are underutilized in children’s math development, partly due to psychological barriers that prevent parents’ involvement in math. Researchers conducted a math mindset intervention with 175 parents of 1st and 2nd grade students and assessed their math mindsets and parenting practices three-four months later. Parents read booklets describing either (1) how math ability can grow with effort or (2) parents’ role in math curriculum. Parents in the mindset condition endorsed that math ability can grow and failures in math are opportunities to grow more so than parents in the control condition. Parents’ mindsets after the intervention were also associated with constructive parenting practices around math. The results suggest that the intervention may improve parents’ practices around math learning.

Authors

• Dajung Oh, University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign

• Michael M. Barger, University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign

• Samantha Shah, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

• Andrei Cimpian

• Eva M. Pomerantz, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign