Parent Engagement and Students’ Literacy Achievement: Examined Through a Multilevel Seasonal Learning Design

• In Event: 3429 - Section on Sociology of Education Refereed Roundtables (1 hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: 20. K-12 Interventions and Academic Achievement

Abstract

Parent engagement in children’s schooling has been promoted by education policymakers as a solution for narrowing achievement gaps, but the quantitative literature in this area has found weak and inconsistent findings. This study tests the hypothesis that family resources and practices positively affect literacy achievement within a strategic new testing ground: summer. A seasonal research design is optimal for testing the effects of parent engagement because in summer students are generally away from the influence teachers and peers may have on their learning progress during the school year. Drawing on a study investigating the effectiveness of summer literacy camps offered by Ontario’s public schools, we use multilevel linear models with a sample of 1, 671 students (grades 1-3) from 92 schools to compare the influence of family involvement at school and home on students’ literacy achievement on two outcomes: 1) snapshot of children’s cumulative learning in the spring; and 2) measure of children’s growth (or loss) in literacy during the summer. Out of 15 parent engagement measures, we find that only three (parents’ aspirations, home resources and discussions of school with children) are positive predictors of children’s spring literacy outcomes and that none predict summer literacy growth/loss. Overall, family SES remains a powerful predictor of achievement for both spring literacy and summer growth. We conclude by discussing our findings within three proposed mechanisms of parent engagement (cultivation ethic, realist reaction, and expressive logic).

Authors

• Cathlene Hillier, Nipissing University

• Scott Davies, University of Toronto

• Janice Aurini, University of Waterloo