Family Factor in Teaching

Family factors also play a role in a teacher’s ability to teach students. Principals and teachers agree that what is going on at home will impact a student’s propensity to learn. Divorce, single parents, poverty, violence and many other issues are all challenges a student brings to school every day. While some teachers and administrators try to work with children in less than ideal family environments, they can only do so much – especially when parents are often not willing to partner with the schools to provide for the children.

We were interested in finding out if there are significant differences regarding the family involvement at school or at home, given the living environment of the participants. Divorce has long been linked to behavior problems, anxiety and depression in children. This is often because single-parent homes feature parents struggling with their own feelings of depression and anxiety, accomplishing household responsibilities previously held by two people and meeting more financial demands.

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Single parents often must take on more hours at work to meet financial responsibilities, which can lead to children feeling neglected and acting out, and cause them to experience the effects of economic instability mentioned above. However, according to Priscila Comino, a researcher at the University of the Basque Country, it is not the divorce itself that affects children's behavior so much as it is the way that parents handle the divorce. In cases where both parents mutually decided on the divorce and choose to co-parent, both making decisions and providing for the child, the negative effects of divorce are lessened.

Children learn first by mimicking behavior they see modeled for them. According to a 2009 article published in on the website of the National Center for Biotechnology Information, studies show a positive correlation between the parents' level of education and their child’s attitudes toward academic achievement.

Children who have parents who encourage academic success are more likely to develop their own aspirations for higher education. In this way, parent education is a good predictor of a child’s academic success.
It is evident that familial and parental factors can either benefit or harm the chances of children receiving an education and excelling in a scholastic environment.

Almost every person experience being a student once a while in our lives, we have different stories/experiences while we are studying. Some students have crucial times while studying and at the same time dealing with family problems. Usually students are being bothered by these family matters and sometimes even if they are at school they keep on thinking of it. Family problem affects the students gradually, it affects their focus on studying when they keep thinking of it, and sometimes a part of their behavior also changes. (Ferrer, Dollentas, & Reyes, 2012) When a child misbehaves or fails to meet expectations at school, the child’s home and family life is usually considered.

Family status and relationship is one of the main factor that formulates the child’s behavior, personality and the way their minds work. When the child gain knowledge from home, he/she transfers it to the school. Then, education plays as a key step to one’s success in the future. CITATION Fer12 l 1033 (Ferrer, Dollentas, & Reyes, 2012). But education doesn’t work alone, it needs help from home. Several family factors can affect a child’s behavior and ability to perform in the classroom. These include economic stability, changes in family relationships, parental attitudes toward education and incidents of child abuse. “Does family problem affect the student’s performance at school”.

For Parents are responsible to create positive physical and mental atmosphere at home. They also must provide rest, healthy nutrition and happy peaceful life. By these, the child will be well prepared to learn, because they will have all the support and encouragement at home. Parent’s positive aspiration and motivation to their children, it will help them to believe in themselves and their skills, eventually, they will have a powerful effect on their motivation to learn.

However, overprotective and authorized parents might cause their children to crooked learning, they might be afraid for having lower grades and not seeking perfection and low self-confidence while performing. Hence, parents play a significant role in the formation of their children’s personality. The type of quality and nature that they receive from their parents will deeply impact their future development. (Jogdand & Naik, 2014)

Different problems arise from home that cause children to have depression and to perform less in school many factors that can lead to behavior that is challenging for schools to deal with. They sometimes lose hope by getting lower grades, lose their confidence and drop the school. these factors like, unstable life and family status, not feeling safe, probably ignored by his parents, poor family, and misunderstandings.

As Cardiff University stated that "In particular, children living in a family environment marked by frequent, intense and poorly resolved conflicts between parents are at greater risk for deficits in academic achievement than children living in more positive family environments"(2005) However, a research conducted the effect on parental separation on the child’s wellbeing as both long and short-term as the child grow.

Effects reported include adverse impacts on cognitive capacity, schooling, physical health, mental and emotional health, social conduct and behavior, peer relations, criminal offending, cigarette smoking, substance use, early departure from home, early-onset sexual behavior and teenage pregnancy.  (Mackay, 2005) Therefore, parent with a negative, non-caring attitude towards learning may lead to an excessive pressure on the child causing anxiety, stress, underachievement and rebellion.

Position

It is important for parents to visit school occasionally to speak to the teachers and follow up with the supervisor about her child’s behavior at the classroom and break time. Moreover, parent’s involvement and volunteering at school’s activity increases the motivation for learning and get a high self-esteem that would cause her child to behave well and have high results. It is widely agreed that an effective family involvement in children’s education is needed at the beginning of the primary education.

Families are important educational agents with a large influence on children’s development and school evolution. CITATION Mar17 l 1033 (Marin & Boco?, 2017). Furthermore, the Romanian Primary Education have identified six types of family involvement: parenting, communicating, volunteering, learning at home, decision making, and collaborating with the community, emphasizing that each type of involvement can be enhanced by different partnership practices. CITATION Mar17 l 1033 (Marin & Boco?, 2017)

Unfortunately, in our community we lack parent’s involvements at school as well as at home. Teachers really have a weary time with the students who have a lack of attention at home. Because the usually come with different behavior problems, so the teacher must work with all these types of problems. Some students and parents do respond to their calls and work with them on the given plan, but most of them they don’t. there are some parents who thinks that school and teachers are the main people who are responsible for the child’s education, behavior and future development, which it is not.

So sometimes when you call the child’s parent to complain about his/her behavior they just easily respond to you that the teacher has the problem not their child. However, teachers when they have some disruptive students in their classroom must spend additional time on behavioral management and cause reducing time for teaching. After all, students who have behavioral issues management will have more difficulty motivating themselves to study, listen in the class and do their homework. Even the best teacher in the world can’t force any student to learn if they are completely unmotivated.

Conclusion / policy implication

Family involvement in children’s education should be very beneficial to them to develop their skills and confidence to perform better at school and to have less behavioral problems. At the same time school and ministry of education should play a main role in encouraging parents to partner and help with their children’s education to have a positive and effective outcome.

The quality of time that parents spend with their children at home that helps in the development of their physical and psychological growth, as well as, practice effective skills while revising lessons given at school and helping and encouraging them to do their assignments. However, the easiest way parents can use to their children to develop their confidence are “words” once their parents encourage their children using encouragements words the child will feel safe, encouraged and enthusiastic to give more at school, so he can go back home to hear his parents telling him about how proud they are about him.

University of Leicester stated in their research that "a child whose parents put more effort into his or her education does better at school. Therefore, policies that aim at improving parental effort might be effective in strengthening educational attainment. Influencing parental effort is certainly something that is much easier than modifying their social background." (2010)

References

Cardiff University. (2005, May 9). Parental Conflict Can Affect School Performance. ScienceDaily. Retrieved April 27, 2018 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/05/050509114047.htm