Documenti di Didattica
Documenti di Professioni
Documenti di Cultura
Artículo 167:
“La Universidad Distrital Francisco José de Caldas no será responsable por las
Code 20011165029
Code 20002165048
Bogotá, 2006
Director
Bogotá, 2006
Note of Acceptance
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
Director: _______________________________
Janeth Velásquez M.A
Jury 1:_______________________________
Professor:
Jury 2:_______________________________
Professor:
Acknowledgements
and personal development in this project, however we hope these words may
First of all, we thank God who gave us the health, support and guidance
of our steps. We also want to thank especially our mothers, they are the source
of our energy, their constant effort and devotion were the main inspiration to
would like to express our sincere thanks to Janeth Velasquez. Her disinterested
right, valuable and unconditional guide as well as her certain words and
To the Universidad Distrital for its acceptance and for bearing us along
these years in which we did the best thanks to the support of the professors that
towards English class-work when they work collaboratively with their children,
productions seen by Shuman, Kazemek & Rigg, Peyton & Staton and Street.
seventh grade in the C.E.D. de Cultura Popular and their parents. The students
English through the written way addressing those productions to their parents
After the data analysis, the results showed that written productions
developed a space for interaction among parents and children where they had
the opportunity to both learn from each other expressing high motivation level,
Introduction
.................................................................................................................................
Justification
.................................................................................................................................
Literature Review
.................................................................................................................................
Instructional Design
.................................................................................................................................
26
Research Design
.................................................................................................................................
37
Research Questions
.................................................................................................................................
38
Objectives
.................................................................................................................................
39
Type of study
.................................................................................................................................
40
Instruments
.................................................................................................................................
41
Setting
.................................................................................................................................
44
Data Analysis
.................................................................................................................................
47
Analysis of Information
.................................................................................................................................
47
50
52
55
59
61
64
Conclusions
68
Implications
.................................................................................................................................
70
References
.................................................................................................................................
72
Annexes
.................................................................................................................................
77
DATA ANALYSIS
.................................................................................................................................
55
Instruments’ Piloting
.................................................................................................................................
55
Analysis of information
.................................................................................................................................
57
60
62
65
70
74
78
CONCLUSIONS
.................................................................................................................................
83
IMPLICATIONS
List of Figures
27
34
46
49
Parents’ Perceptions 1
List of annexes
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
Parents’ Perceptions 2
Introduction
This project was born from our concerns about the difficulties presented
seventh grade when they were asked to produce writings in English. We found
that parents showed great interest in the work to be developed with their sons
and daughters when we introduced ourselves to them, and, taking into account
that we had been wondering how to accomplish the purpose to make students
learn easily English language and doing this apprenticeship really significant we
came up with the idea to involve parents in the process due to the consideration
that in the learning process only important things are stored in the brain.
(Vigotsky,1979).
Parents’ Perceptions 3
and parents read those writings, interpreted them and learnt how words and
structures meant to express many aspects and ideas. Then parents did write to
us about their perceptions about the activities done and sometimes incorporated
Children reported how good they did in English class through the
activities presented in class and parents through writings they sent to us every
week.
Moreover beyond the fact we took for granted that parents would be
find out in terms of English learning that they were carrying out a literacy
process.
pedagogical research and how we developed it. In that way the reader will find
Parents’ Perceptions 4
the description of the project, the justification, the research method, the literature
then the research design exploring the activities done to gather data, data
analysis with the findings of the study and finally the conclusions with explicit
Justification
consider about the activities performed at English classes of their sons and
daughters using the written productions as the proof through which we are going
to answer the research question and to evidence the way parents make sense
expecting parents to work with us because they can take advantage of that
process to acquire knowledge by means of their own children and their written
Parents’ Perceptions 5
child to learn at school and Parents can even learn (Becher, 1984).
secondary school students in which parents did not work in tandem with
students.
out with the students in the school as an innovative way to plan education.
When parents are involved in their children's education, both children and
to write, we require linking children’s written text to their familiar context aiming
those texts to the students’ personal expression towards their own parents.
Consequently, we have taken into account the principle established by the Ley
setting down a solid relationship among parents and school in order to work
together for the benefit of the children’s education, as Sandler (1995) confirms in
Schools can take steps to increase parents’ beliefs that they have
an important role to play in their children’s school success. Schools can
take also steps to increase parents’ and teachers’ sense of mutual
(partnership) responsibility for student educational outcomes. (Sandler,
1995).
students as they read and write. There are many possible ways to develop
students that attempt to foster collaborative work among them and parents who
inquiry to enable students to analyze and understand the social realities in their
Parents’ Perceptions 7
own lives and their communities integrating them with the topics developed at
school.
students of seventh grade and their parents, the teachers and administrative
staff in the C.E.D. Cultura Popular with a pedagogical proposal able to permit
students to stand out and have a high self esteem level and a critical mind that
let them take an active critical role in the society, consequently with the (PEI)
and with its “manual de convivencia” in which the chapter 8 is dedicated to the
words, parents are their children’s main educators consequently they should
Outcomes of this academic activity must be useful for the society and
compromised with the national identity and with the searching of new relevant
academic cultures.
la Universidad”.
Parents’ Perceptions 9
Literature Review
Based on the main question of this research that is to analyze how the
through their written productions when they work collaboratively with their
children, this chapter introduces an overview of the main constructs that oriented
the analysis and interpretation of data. This chapter starts by introducing the
where parent is any person who although not a biological parent has parental
responsibility for or care of a child or young person, and students those who are
the ALI [American Law Institute] definition; a de facto parent is a person who
shares (at least) equally in primary childcare responsibilities while residing with a
child for reasons other than money. The de facto parent’s assumption of
childcare responsibilities must be either with the agreement of the natural parent
or result from a parent’s inability to care for the child” (Mason & Zavac, 2002,
p.232). Furthermore, in this study the concepts of parents and students are both
Along the study we have done during the current term we found how
expressive parents were when referring to the work done by us at school with
their sons and daughters, that is the main reason why we decided to work on the
perceptions they had in terms of the activities presented during the academic
determined by the definition one uses in their discussion. For the purposes of
this paper, we will use a definition proposed by Forgus and Melamed (1976):
surroundings on a "higher" level than those of animals, which perceive the world
hand, perceive their world through information processing. Because all humans
extract information from their environment through the same general process,
Forgus and Melamed proposed that scientists must pursue the concept of
perception the central step in the acquisition of knowledge and higher thought.
English language through the collaborative work with their children in which they
Parents’ Perceptions 12
had to read and understand some letters or cards wrote by the children or by the
teachers and afterwards they were challenged to write back to those letters. Our
work and as the structure of the application of this study started as a concern of
to make parents able to know and monitor the work performed in classes and to
take advantage of and even learn what children could show them as part of their
academic knowledge.
advantages of having collaborative work between the students and the persons
better learning environment where the students could share their interest in the
Rivers also gave us the key to work on collaborative work. He claims that
students learn better when they are actively committed in the process. This is
evidenced through the work done at school in which we were the ones
responsible of encouraging students to work with their parents and moreover the
Another aspect that we have taken into account is that the collaborative
opportunity to express their personal meaning in the target language while at the
same time acquiring the language specific skills (Rivers, 1983). It is important to
clarify that parents are also learners in this study; this learning environment is
also the same learning event to which we are going to refer below.
Eventually the last aspect to research on is the one that says that the
“others” the other students in the classroom and the parents at home.
working in small groups tend to learn more of what is taught and retain it longer
than when the same content is presented in other instructional formats. Students
who work in collaborative groups also appear to be more satisfied with their
classes.
Parents’ Perceptions 14
have realized that having a good interaction among students and parents is
possible to make them keep in their minds significant aspects that will contribute
one of the main reasons to develop this project. The axiom that two heads are
better than one really is true when it comes to strengthening children and
individuals and groups that make a community can accomplish goals. Foyle
(1995) states that knowledge is created through interaction and not 'transferred'
important as teachers’ role when looking for their motivation, our findings have
showed that the relation home-school is useful when reporting on how revealing
isolated human beings; in fact, the child is a social being by nature and is always
school report’s day, parents expressed to us their interest at the very beginning
and as the time went by we realized how difficult it was for some of them to have
the time to fulfill their commitment and that was why we decided to make a
Sometimes parents felt with not enough basis to develop the written productions
assigned and we had a challenge to handle this situation because of the time
due to the work developed at school and the time for training students to
We found through the surveys applied at the beginning of the term that
most of the students expressed that they did the homework on their own and
that sometimes they presented some difficulties with ideas and words not clear
enough for them and they tried to ask for collaboration to their parents with not
good response because of their activities or because they considered that those
doubts had to be answered at school, in fact the students were learning, they did
not.
Parents’ Perceptions 16
We have that; language is both personal and social. It serves to think and
writing are all learned best in authentic speech and literacy events.
communication with the parents and it is the prime source of data analysis in this
research. Street (1993), views reading as a social process that takes into
account the relationship and interaction between author and reader. Meaning
of whether they are aware of it or not. The literacy event is an occurrence where
In the written productions we have collected we saw how the writer tried
to express ideas and perceptions, even when the grammar was not correct yet a
regular reader is able to give meaning to what the idea was about. In fact since
themselves, their ideas, their thoughts and perceptions in a written way rather
language to learn about the world (Newman, 1985). In addition, we can say that
the fundamental concern for someone who uses language is making sense.
because it is deeply related with our perception of written texts as a way to know
student’s perceptions and to foster social interaction with their parents. This can
be evidenced when the idea of performing this project at that school was
received with great curiosity for the head English-Teacher who gave us all the
Design.
acts in which readers and writers position one another in particular ways,
project when all the social patterns that surround the students’ environment
students took the social and cultural aspect of this celebration, they invited their
performing functionally useful tasks (Peyton & Staton, 1996). According to Freire
form of cultural politics, and not merely a process of producing knowledge, thus,
early stage. But their development lines are not parallel - they cross again and
again. At a certain moment around the age of two, the curves of development of
thought and speech, until then separated, meet and join to initiate a new form of
behavior. That is when thought becomes verbal and speech becomes rational. A
child first seems to use language for superficial social interaction, but at some
point this language goes underground to become the structure of the child's
thinking. It is then how Vigostky’s point of view become into an important tool to
us, the child shows himself as a social being who needs interaction one another
with the purpose to communicate his ideas. We wanted to apply this concept
A person since the early years is looking for the most appropriate words
to express ideas, in this process the adult is the one in charge of teaching new
words and the context to use them, the necessity to communicate is what
Then is in this part in which we consider that the relation between parents
and students will be really significant even for the kids as for their parents and
Parents’ Perceptions 19
our labor will be the means to encourage the kids to write, to acquire the first
which the students use to ask for all kind of things that are new for them and
they learn easily those words that are able to remember them a feeling or a
sensation or an attitude.
(Luria, 1976). That is, cognitive skills and patterns of thinking are not primarily
determined by innate factors, but are the products of the activities practiced in
the social institutions of the culture in which the individual grows up.
environment and all those aspects that are surrounding the learner can affect his
difficult to find a parent with his son living in the same culture and with the same
ideals, every one of them has different conceptions that have grown up with the
social conceptions from each time, with our research we are wondering how to
close these two worlds so they will communicate one another using writing as a
means to know about feelings that are focused on the social aspect. Two
they felt part of the same world without differences of age, learning is a social
Parents’ Perceptions 20
event, we found the way to make the learning event worth enough for them and
becomes more an interdependent community with all the joys and tensions and
students work together to maximize their own and each other’s learning”
important as the learning itself. The development of social skills in group work-
learning tasks were assigned to students with both academic objectives and
social skills objectives. This cooperative work is between parents and students
but we cannot left aside that in class the students need also social interaction to
reach the objectives proposed for in the class and moreover, the team work at
language in the academic context, at home they are not with the same patterns
Parents’ Perceptions 21
they have when in class, so that, is what we call the learning event that takes
place in their homes, in their own environment when there is not any person
tutoring what they are doing and how they are doing, it gives them a sense of
responsibility to behave the best they can in front of the assignment they have to
transmit the information we have taught them at school and that their parents
“debriefing” time where students reflect on how they are doing in order to learn
how to become more effective in group learning settings (Johnson, Johnson and
Holubec, 1990).
important role in the apprenticeship of the students and of their selves and in
As Street claims:
In this sense, the collaborative work in this project searched that parents
and children shared knowledge, ideas, thoughts and life experiences by creating
With our project we are looking for social practice from both parts of this
research; on the one hand students, and on the other hand the parents, as the
students are looking for a means to involve parents the topic should have an
aspect quite interesting to be worked on, as Street says: the literacy process
must be considered as the social practices of reading or/ and writing. (Street,
1984)
that moment in which writing or reading has a role “The point is to build on what
people know, and to incorporate their local cultural knowledge into schooling”
(Moll, 1992), “writing is a vehicle of social and cultural affirmation” (Street, 1984).
identifiable aspect to search for; the function of the concept of literacy event is to
facilitate this.
In this project is intended to organize and structure all the spaces in which
the teaching learning processes take place. We are aware that the place and
time in which parents and students are working together should be determined,
1983).
Parents’ Perceptions 23
that are not longer in our minds, we claim that meaningful words are more
powerful than those that do not express the way we perceived and express our
When children develop tasks and work in cooperation with their parents
all they have the opportunity to notice the view of the world that is laying down
beyond the signs and the written meaning. They learn and know about each
which they are living in and interacting. As it is evidenced in our data collection
is provided and build a new space to exchange perceptions and to re-know one
In the cognitive view, often called the "process" approach to writing, the
The point is to build on what people know, and to incorporate their local
cultural knowledge into schooling, drawing on what Luis Moll (1992) calls their
Parents’ Perceptions 24
that learners' cultural knowledge and ways of using literacy are valuable and can
stress writing for real reasons, to real audiences in order to promote authentic
instruction, which includes talk about writing, substantive, specific feedback, and
practices and genres needs to be taken into account; and all writing pedagogy
reflects a stance about the learner in relation to the social order. The most
practices and of the power of the messages that their pedagogical practices
traditional roles and creating additional stresses for all involved. Children and
There are many sources of inspiration for innovative work in family and
with schools towards agreed-upon goals; and generations who find in one
another the resources to remember their past, to manage the present, and to
the collaboration that existed among parents, children and school by means of
recognizing the importance that each one of the members of the educational
Instructional Design
the classes to work on the topics we had to teach at school based on the
syllabus for seventh grade. These written productions were planned through
outcome. Part of the aim of a topic is to provide a framework that can help
based approach is the fact that it concentrates on more general and cross-
sectional topics which involve various cultural issues. It makes students realise
that what they are learning about is not only institutions and systems but real
to children’s life and also took into account the participation of their parents. For
that reason, the activities were based on 9 topics that children had already
organized as follows:
Personality
My
Occupation
parent-
s
student
The
Likes and DAILY
Dislikes World I ACTIVITIES
live
My Neighbor-
house hood
My
Parents
Parents’ Perceptions 28
The themes searched to inquire the knowledge that children and parents
had about general information of each other. Likewise, the activities were
applied for children to acquire vocabulary and simple structures that allowed
them to describe people and real events they had lived formerly.
for each one of them. Such tasks were developed by parents and children using
the Written productions, children at school; and parents at home, with the help of
children’s lives and at the same time, to work on different topics in English.
Description: when the students began to take notes in English where they
wrote aspects of their parents’ life in a paper sheet; the idea was also that
students guided their parents in doing the same activity, but about the
English class work and trying to develop the same assignments the students
had. The following are the activities that were carried out with the students in
about the question to place in order to know about this; what are you like? And
they wrote it on a billboard, with this information they created a billboard using
Then, we fixed the billboards around the classroom and each group presented
their parents, writing what are they like and everything they thought was
Each student represented acting the occupation that their parents had.
Then, they wrote on the notebook what it was and why it was important. We
explained them how to work with the verb to be to write about their parents: “My
Parents wrote about their sons and daughters´ occupation in the future,
mentioning why they wrote that and why it was important in our society.
parents the homework. It was for their parents to do the same task but according
to their children information and if they wanted they could write a comment
Teachers gave students some material where there were activities and
dialogues from people with different activities. They organized the dialogues for
Students drew in a written production comics of their parents’ daily routine and
in each drawing they wrote the activity and the time filling the gaps in the next
format:
at____________.
English. Teachers wrote a general description of the places, the location, the
importance, etc. Then, students wrote in their notebook about the neighborhood
they lived in, mentioning what they have there and the importance of this plan.
In the next class we studied different ways to feel in front to the activities
the parents do, for example: “I do not like the work of my mom because she
works a lot.”
In this class we worked the negative sentences of the verb like and the
Individually, and with the use of their own drawings they wrote a letter to
their parents communicating them the way they felt about this, parents sent us
back their perceptions and comments about what they realized about their sons
With some pictures that the teacher gave them in order to know different
ways of houses in terms of space, location, size, etc the students selected those
pictures with the respective vocabulary that fitted better to their own house on
the purpose to write about it and to let their parents know about the way they
Parents’ Perceptions 32
see the place with characteristics of each one of them (cramped, dark, sad,
boring, happy)
Then, students made a drawing in a letter of what they would like to have
As in the previous class we worked the negative form of the verb like we
the freedom of expressing the way they feel in front of some situations and
like / dislike
We gave the students the instructions to make, with the company of their
of twelve boxes in which they would show us the moment when parent and
conversation the parents sent us a comment. This was important to us and our
research to figure out how and where is that moment when the students meet
Methodology
Along the different assignments carried out through this study, the teachers’
teachers were responsible of explaining the students’ role when working with
their parents and to communicate the information given to them about what
we expected.
teachers by explaining the topics and the activities to their parents according
to the activities they did in class. In that sense, we can see students worked
Parents’ Role: Parents were active participants who developed, with the help
actions
Week 3 Oral and written
Feb. 21 description of real giving
– 25 The World word: what facts information about
we’re living Exchanging someone is doing
points of view in
groups
Week 4 Describing
Feb.28– pictures and
Mar.4 Talking about
Use of finding
Appereances school, teachers
look like differences and
and friends
Demostrative similarities by
How are we Identifying
pronouns: pairs
changing? objects/ things
Week 5 These, those Writing a
March.7 Describing
Question composition
–11 How are things differences in
Word: How called “How is
different? people
my family
different?”
Week 6 Role plays
Mar.14 highlighting states
– 18 of mind Expressing needs
Simple
Feelings, present tense: Writing a card
moods expressing how Expressing
they feel while feelings and what
to need,
being in different they want to
to want,
places obtain
Week 7
Mar. 21
- 25
HOLY WEEK
How are
we
feeling?
Students ask
partners about
what they like and
don’t like then
Week 8 they fill in charts
Likes and
Mar.28– Writing a letter
Apr.1 dislikes to like+ telling about the Expressing likes
infinitive general likes and
or object dislikes of the and dislikes
children in the
school
Week 9 What are Grocery There is/are Reading texts and Asking for food
April 4 we Shopping Expressions fill in exercises Asking for and
–8 producin of quantity: giving prices
g? some/any Role plays Talking about
Quantitative: performing quantity and
Parents’ Perceptions 36
shopping at a
many + common grocery quality
Week Card game to
10 introduce
Apr. 11 Environmental vocabulary
- 15 Studies: Written fill in
describing exercises related
places to pictures and
Prepositions
things in the
of Place: in,
Where school context Locating people
on, under,
Week are we To make a and places
11 over
doing…? drawing of their Describing places
Apr.18 Adverbs:
neighborhood
– 22 near, far
with some
My
characters ,write a
neighborhood
composition
describing that
context and things
happening there
Week Students locate
12 Adverbs: places in pictures
Apr.25 here, there Hiding game in a Asking for and
– 29 Prepositions: park in order to giving
Travelling
next to, use prepositions information about
behind, in as instructions to where places are
front of, in find people or
things
Week Where
13 are we Verb to want
Reading and
May 2 - going? + infinitive or Asking for and
comprehension
6 object giving
check exercises
Object information about:
What do we Students write
pronouns: me, Pupils objectives
wish? short
you, him, her, Parents objectives
compositions
it, us, them Teacher and
about the things
Prepositions: school objectives
they wish
for, at vs. in
Week Where Past tense Reading legends Describing people
14 Histories and
are we verb to be: and tales and and events in the
May 10 Stories
coming was, were (all comprehension past
– 13 from? forms) check exercises Talking about the
Week Community There was/ Students search past vs. the
15 histories there were for the family and present
May 16 Simple past neighborhood Talking about
– 20 tense: regular history your childhood,
and irregular Role plays parents and family
verbs performing their
findings
Parents’ Perceptions 37
Students write a
composition with
Personal personal
insights reflections on
their family in the
past vs. in the
present
Week Students write
16 some letters to the Expressing needs,
May 23 teacher and to feelings, thoughts
– 27 Writing a letter
their parents with and asking for
free just something they
What are All the expressing what want to know
we grammar they want
Week learning? viewed Students’ self
17 evaluation self-evaluating
May 31 Whole Students’ teachers success or lack of
– Jun.3 Assesment evaluation success in
Teachers’ process communication
evaluation
Parents’ Perceptions 38
Research Design
work revealed when the parents are involved with their sons or daughters’
changed since the whole language approach could not be carried out as the
reason, we looked for another concept that was coherent with our information
omit the “whole language theory” and to include “parents’ perceptions” since this
that was discussed during a presentation of our work in the seminar class at the
university. We realized that this was not related to what we intended to study,
because it has some concerning of genre that we did not concern. Finally, we
listened some suggestions from the audience possible changes and they
allowed us to reconsider this term and look for a word that was more in
agreement to our objectives in the study, and then we decided to include in our
research question the word "children" which was more appropriate to our
in order for the question to wrap up the objective proposed in our work, and
Research Questions
Main Question:
What perceptions do parents have towards English school work when working
Sub-question:
What do written productions reveal about the manner parents make sense of the
world?
Parents’ Perceptions 40
Objectives
Main Objective:
To analyze how the perceptions are revealed when parents work collaboratively
Specific Objective:
To identify the role of English written productions when revealing the manner the
Type of study
information about a small group of people, including the accounts of the subjects
themselves.
researchers hope to find a theory that explains their data” (Goetz and Lecompte,
1984, p.4.)
the research process in which the role of teachers was played to carry out the
pedagogical intervention, which was used at the same time to collect data, we
That is, the parents are the ones who know more about their own.
out data collection. So, during these activities we collected data in which the
support findings, the students wrote reflections; and observations were made by
us.
Instruments
Parents and students did all the activities of the pedagogical intervention on
individual sheets. This instrument was a way to show the task developed in
clarify that through the parents’ papers we collected a part of the perceptions
parents had about the English class-work with the purpose to answer our
research questions.
• Surveys
used questionnaires and interviews to collect data since they both were
complementary; one of them could corroborate the information that the other
one had.
For that reason, we used three questionnaries along the project, the first
one came into use at the beginning of the research in order to get general
information about parents’ occupation, level of education, English level, and their
The second one was applied to the parents in the middle of the research
process to identify what was happening with the interaction among parent and
The third questionnaire was applied to children also in the middle of the
the research) and to their parents (at the end) with the purpose of identifying and
Parents’ Perceptions 44
reinforcing the obtained data through observations, artifacts, and surveys about
Apart from the previous instruments, we prepared a plan of surveys taking into
So, it was decided that unstructured interviews were more appropriate for our
project; designing, in this way, more than questions, topics that guided us to get
together.
(1992) calls “Briefing and explanation”. He states that “before the interview
begins, the researcher explains the nature of the research and the purpose of
the interview to the interviewee and answers any questions that he or she may
have”. So, it was necessary to make an introduction where the participants could
know general information about the project and the purposes we had when
Setting
students between 10 and 12 years of age from seventh grade in the Instituto
This Institution is a public school and emerged from the integration of three
Instituto Nacional de Cultura Popular, C.E.D. Santa Rita and C.E.D. Diego Luis
Cordoba and they were integrated in the year of 2002 by the Resolution 2361 of
Constitution, the law 115 of 94, the law 715 of 2001 and the Sectorial Plan of
and middle education with the direction of only one principal in the institution.
The institution is placed in the Barrio Ciudad Montes 3er Sector (sede A), Santa
Rita (sede B) and Alcalá (sede C), the students belong to the 1, 2 and 3 social
stratum.
but for the matter of data analysis we preferred to select only some of the
students with their respective parents. Consequently, this selection did not have
any specific parameters besides the mere intention and disposition to participate
Data Analisis
Analisis of information
explained detailed each one. We have eight participants among them four
students and four parents who were no selected at random but by the
The research revealed that when parents felt comfortable with the school,
viewed their sons or daughters motivated, and believed they had influence on
their sons or daughters, their reported involvement with the students’ learning
was high. These perceptions and beliefs were found to be stronger when parents
understood and were knowledgeable about classroom learning and felt like a
partner in their son’s or daughter’s learning. It was also important that many of
(e.g.,Biddle,1986).
Parents’ Perceptions 49
perceive invitations from their sons or daughters or from teachers suggesting that
Dempsey, 1997).
affirmations that parents had about the activity we were in charge of developing
way to show the task developed in class by students, and at home by parents
and students, also it is important to clarify that through the parents’ written
productions we collected a part of the perceptions parents had about the English
Finally the third instrument are the interviews with the parents and the
interviews with the students and even it is important to make clear that the
parents interviews were highly remarkable for this study because of the
together. These groups were analyzed, and tentative themes were developed to
Parents’ Perceptions 50
working hypotheses for later analyses of the data. Confirming and disconfirming
evidence was gathered, and the themes were revised as needed. Throughout
this process, responses obtained from the parents, anchored item responses,
the program was reviewed to confirm the validity of the themes. This triangulation
of data across sources and methods served to enhance the validity of the study's
findings.
daughters? suggestions
the English class work developed with their sons or daughters at school what is
made evident through their written productions and the interviews. From this we
collected data that when analyzed it was possible to divide it in three sub
categories converging to answer the first and main category. To give validity we
children's school are interconnected with the school's attempts to involve parents:
"Parents' attitudes about the quality of their children's school are more
highly correlated with the school's practices to involve parents (.346) than
with the parents' practices of involvement (.157). Parents who become
involved at home and at school say that the school has a positive climate.
But even more so, parents who believe that the school is actively working
to involve them say that the school is a good one." (p. 67) (Dauber and
Epstein, 1993)
In the next excerpt it is possible to see how parent 3 has expressed what
she would like in terms of the English class according to the information taken
home by her son, in fact the student is a bridge between school and home in
Parents’ Perceptions 52
The adjectives used are not part of the parents’ perception in isolation, it is
due to the comments that the students did about the class in which the form to
express their perception about the class is through the adjectives used; amenas,
didacticas y dinamicas.
the precedent interview the parent 1 used a series of adjectives to refer to the
work that was being developed at that moment at school in which she was
committed.
comparisons with the reference of previous English classes and in the form of
the way parents see the process developed in the school, the speech parents
used was divided in three sub categories, the first one is the positive
announcements. that parents have in front to what is happening with their sons
and daughters.
There is a way to express this type of study and also knowing the parents’
perceptions in which the verb me gusta takes an important role when expressing
some of the likes that emerge from what parents know about the classes through
A number of parents indicated that their children had become more eager
oriented. Parents indicated that their children displayed more positive attitudes
possible to see how the parents perceive the work that is being conducted with
figure out about the perception that parents are having about the English class at
school.
English even when it was not a mandatory activity but beyond that we were not
perception parent is having about the English class and we valued the disposition
in trying to do it even when we know that the time is a matter of fact for the
parents.
Parents’ Perceptions 56
In the next example the parent is taking as a reference the English classes
that the students had in the previous year in order to establish a comparison with
this survey be worth enough for supporting the purpose of this category,
understanding then the result of this category as the positive comments gathered
Moreover than assessing the work developed in the English classes some
This type of comments were made by the parents in an open format that
was not mandatory for them and there was not any specific structure to be
interest about the activities that are taking place in the school and also want to
continue working on that because they feel comfortable doing it, otherwise the
union with the students´ family. Thus, it should open spaces where parents can
discover and participate in what it is making; having in mind that there are many
ways in which they can do it. For that reason, Epstein (1986) states that:
perceptions of the English class was that only a few suggestions were written in
the space on the surveys reserved for program recommendations. Indeed, most
Parents’ Perceptions 59
of the comments offered in this space took the form of praise for the program
In the last excerpts we are suggested with giving more work to the
for us due to the commitment showed by the parents, in our opinion when there
Parents’ Perceptions 60
fact the two parts; parents and teachers, who were looking for a benefit in
effects on their children's lives, and saw the project as being of a great value to
these youth as this can be seen in the next excerpt of an interview made after
Along the study that we performed in the school we could see how
valuable was the process to have parents express about their sons and
perceptions of their children due to the high average of related ideas in the data
we collected.
how communicative parents were going to be. We were instilling, since the very
beginning, parents to make free comments about what they considered important
and to add free commentaries about what they wanted to tell us, it was in this
Parents’ Perceptions 61
way how we collected information to support this category that we are naming as
the perceptions that parents have of their children, who were able to use the
English class as a reason to talk about their own sons and daughters.
cultural affirmation (Street, 1984) due to the affirmation the parent did about the
involved in the activities of the school. Families whose children are doing well in
express high but realistic expectations for achievement with standards that are
appropriate for children's age and maturity, recognizing and encouraging special
76. T1: y entonces quien invita a quien a realizar las tareas de inglés?
Parents’ Perceptions 62
77. P1: bueno por lo general es la niña la que me busca cuando yo estoy en la
78. casa haciendo oficio y entonces me dice que si hacemos la tarea que tiene
79. de la clase de inglés
80. T2: entonces ella es la que esta pendiente de los trabajos o tares que tiene
81. para el colegio
82. P1: si es que ella es muy juiciosa… salio a la mamá
That interview was made with the purpose of knowing parents perceptions
about their sons and daughters, so in this case we realized that P1 was highly
compliment from some one else it raises the sense of confidence and enables
In our personal opinion and about what we listened to from the interviews
it is possible to say that parents use to refer from their sons and daughters in a
very good way, the use of positive adjectives is common, at least that
complaining about behavior or attitudes but never about the person him/herself.
ongoing, and the emotional impact of any lesson or life experience may
continue to reverberate long after the specific event." (p. 82)
When students feel good about themselves as learners, they are willing to
take the risks and focus the attention necessary for further learning. Students are
more willing to tackle tasks if they believe they can be successful. When students
become very difficult. That is why many reading programs insist on early
intervention before students develop negative feelings about their own abilities
and about their willingness to participate and take risks in school learning (Caine
memory; emotions help to store information and also trigger its recall. Caine and
"The emotional depth and range that students have...affect their actual
capacity to grasp ideas and procedures. Similarly, content that is
emotionally sterile is made more difficult to understand. ... To teach
someone any subject adequately, the subject must be embedded in all the
elements that give it meaning. People must have a way to relate to the
subject in terms of what is personally important, and this means
acknowledging both the emotional impact and their deeply held needs and
drives. Our emotions are integral to learning. When we ignore the
emotional components of any subject we teach, we actually deprive
students of meaningfulness." (p. 58) (Caine and Caine, 1991).
The excerpt below shows the form in which the parent shows her affection
for her daughter through a written production, there is a mixture of Spanish and
Parents’ Perceptions 64
English words but there is a way of expressing thoughts in which feelings are
expressed, moreover some sentences like: you are a special person for me it is a
way to show and to express the form the parent used her cultural knowledge and
and the affection, the form the parent makes sense of the world.
about themselves as learners and how schools help students develop self-
learning:
Parents’ Perceptions 65
The excerpt above is another sample of the form in which the parent used
the written production for expressing affections for her daughter using the English
as the means of involving the student. We consider that this is a way of involving
in which the language is the link for fulfilling the purpose of using the written
what the English represents for them in terms of the language itself, they
we decided to point out due to the point of view that the parent had in front of the
topic, for the parent English “es fundamental” what was an advantage for us
because since the beginning of the study we found good response from the
In the next excerpt we can see how through the written production this parent
used the previous knowledge she had for expressing her personal opinion about
English and something that was really important for us was that all of them made
us understand that in any way they understand the involvement with their sons or
daughters for fulfilling the goal that was stated for them, I think is language of
future is the way this parent expressed her perception of the language using her
way of making sense of the world even when the sense of the production is
understandable enough.
Parents’ Perceptions 67
Joyce Epstein (1986), mentions that one of the main reasons why parents
do not participate actively with the school is the lack of knowledge about what it is
happening there then this is an important point to take into account because we
could deduce that most parents wanted closer communication with the school, in
fact in this form the academic activity is involved in the family environment and it
allows parents to know the topics that we were teaching to children; in this sense
parents also be involved in school contributing with ideas about how to improve
students, we could know the students environment, family and all those factors
that might influence their behavior and also their development at school in terms
Although most parents do not know how to help their children with their
education, with guidance and support, they may become increasingly involved
Conclusions
At the beginning of the project we were concerned with the idea of going
beyond the traditional school towards the transformative school in which we took
knowing the parents perceptions about the work done by us at school and having
Along the process of fulfilling this study and the exploration of the obtained
results we realized that it is possible to develop projects like this even when
before this was considered as an unreliable project due to the difficulty of having
parents invited to join in it, but as the time went by we saw that according to the
participants used the written productions to express the way in which they make
sense of the world through writings that are not well written but have a meaning
themselves able to give the reader an understanding about what the writer wants
that the written way is an effective link to maintain a close relation with the
parents and also that they feel comfortable expressing the way they make sense
of the world through expressing all kind of perceptions, feelings, suggestions and
Parents’ Perceptions 70
expectations. It is important to state that in our opinion this mission also includes
take the different points of possible views to understand the perceptions that a
parent can have when invited to participate collaboratively with his/her son or
daughter.
Moreover we consider that the benefits are for all of the members of the
Implications
taking into account in the results obtained from the study carried out we could
state that this work could be performed in all the academic subjects. The
development of the activities that demand the help of parents are highly
rewarded by them, the teachers and the institution itself that is why it is
worthwhile to apply a similar project in which the link between parents and school
would be closer and as a result obtaining good benefits for parts involved.
Another aspect that can be explored in projects like this is about the
through written productions because we could realize the process that parents
We are also sure about the importance of giving to this kind of projects a
more formal aspect without forgetting the social reality in which we live in and
from this starting point design specific activities in which the real context could be
and that is why schools should provide the resources for making teachers be
Parents’ Perceptions 72
closer to parents’ and students’ lives because the reality that students have goes
Another fundamental aspect is the one in which the head teacher of the
school could have the commitment to continue following the process that student
teachers developed at school with the purpose to keep building up, in the
students the mentality that working together is the only means to obtain the
References
McHenry, IL: Center for Applied Linguistics & Delta Systems. (Available
Barton, D. & Ivanic, R. (eds.) (1998). Local literacies, Reading and Writing in one
ED247032)
Bowen, H.R. (1997) Investment in learning : the individual and social value of
Caine, R.N., & Caine, G. (1991). Making connections: Teaching and the human
Development.
Education.
Dauber, S.L., & Epstein, J.L. (1993). Parents' attitudes and practices of
(Ed.), Families and schools in a pluralistic society (pp. 53-71). Albany, NY:
Freire, P. and Macedo. (1987) Literacy: Reading the word and reading the world.
Houston, J.E. (Ed.). (1995). Thesaurus of ERIC descriptors (13th ed.). Phoenix,
Kazemek, F.E., & Rigg, P. (1995). "Enriching our lives: Poetry lessons for adult
Association.
Mason, M.A., & Zayac, N. (2002). Rethinking stepparent rights: Has the ALI
February
Peyton, J. & Staton, J (1996). Writing Our Lives (2nd Edition). Washington, DC &
University Press.
Street, B.V. (1993). The new literacy studies. Journal of Research in Reading,
16, 81-97.
Barcelona: Crítica.
Parents’ Perceptions 78
Annexes
Señores:
Padres de Familia
Instituto Educativo Distrital de Cultura Popular
Curso 702
Para la ejecución de tal proyecto es de vital importancia contar con la aprobación y compromiso
por parte de los padres de familia ya que este busca complementar el trabajo de aula con su
colaboración extraclase.
Atentamente,
_________________________________ ________________________________________
Firma del Padre o Tutor Nombre del estudiante
Direccion:____________________________ Telefono:_________________________
e-mail______________________________
Parents’ Perceptions 79
UNIVERSIDAD DISTRITAL
ENCUESTA
NOMBRE ACUDIENTE__________________________________________________
OCUPACION ___________________________________________________________
UNIVERSIDAD DISTRITAL
NOMBRE ACUDIENTE__________________________________________________
ENCUESTA
SI _______ NO_______
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________________________
Parents’ Perceptions 81
UNIVERSIDAD DISTRITAL
NOMBRE ACUDIENTE__________________________________________________
ENCUESTA
SI_________ NO _________
1_________2_________3_________4_________5_________
SI___________ NO ____________
Parents’ Perceptions 82
El siguiente espacio es para que usted escriba sus observaciones con respecto a esta encuesta
o las clases de inglés
_____________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________
_________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________
Parents’ Perceptions 83
Queremos comunicarles que estamos muy complacidos con el trabajo que se ha venido
realizando en las clases de Ingles por parte de los estudiantes y de ustedes que son nuestros
colaboradores en este proceso de enseñanza aprendizaje.
La presente también es con el motivo de pedirles el favor de que nos escriban sus comentarios
acerca de los escritos que los niños van a llevar a sus hogares, pues tenemos la certeza de que
ustedes puedan entender esos escritos con ayuda de los niños y entonces puedan comunicarnos
su reacción a estos.
Atentamente,
____________________________________________________________________________
Queremos comunicarles que estamos muy complacidos con el trabajo que se ha venido
realizando en las clases de Ingles por parte de los estudiantes y de ustedes que son nuestros
colaboradores en este proceso de enseñanza aprendizaje.
La presente también es con el motivo de pedirles el favor de que nos escriban sus comentarios
acerca de los escritos que los niños van a llevar a sus hogares, pues tenemos la certeza de que
ustedes puedan entender esos escritos con ayuda de los niños y entonces puedan comunicarnos
su reacción a estos.
Atentamente,
____________________________________________________________________________
Parents’ Perceptions 84
Dear Student:
Dear Student:
Dear Parents:
We wish you are fine. We want to inform you that we are doing our best in order to
present classes really motivating for your children. Also we hope you could learn
something with your children through these letters. Please write to us any comment
and suggestion you have, we will answer it.
Good Luck
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Dear Parents:
We wish you are fine. We want to inform you that we are doing our best in order to
present classes really motivating for your children. Also we hope you could learn
something with your children through these letters. Please write to us any comment
and suggestion you have, we will answer it.
Good Luck
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