7 Ways to Become Involved in Your Children's Education

According to a study published in the American Educational Research Journal, parental involvement has been shown to positively influence graduation rates, children's achievement in language and mathematics, their academic persistence, and their behavioral problems. 

You never want your child or children to think that schoolwork is too hard and either start to withdraw or stop making an effort.

If you are a single parent, parental involvement falls solely upon your shoulders. If doing this is a struggle for you, admit to it and ask a relative, a friend, your neighbor, or a pastor for help in keeping close tabs on how your children are doing and working with the school to implement an action plan for improvement.

However, if parent involvement is not a struggle for you, here are: 

7 ways to carry out your parental involvement effectively.

1. Establish and maintain an ongoing dialogue with your children's teachers. Learn how to make sense out of your children's report cards. Determine what type of question to ask at parent-teacher conferences. And, make sure you know what your child should be studying and the tests they are required to pass.

2. Set up regular time for homework completion. Establish appropriate routines at home like creating quiet time for homework as well as for recreational reading. Limit the amount of television they can watch or video games they can watch.

3. Set a good example for your children. Let the children see that you value reading and lifetime learning by enrolling in classes yourself and taking part in study groups. Moreover, if you have younger children, read to them and with them.

4. Praise the child's effort. Instead of criticizing the child's mistakes, guide them into discovering the right answers through their own efforts. If you can't help them with their homework, keep a close enough eye on them to know if they're doing it themselves.

5. Establish a relationship with other like-minded parents and community groups to strive for excellence in the school.

6. Expose your children to a variety of learning experiences. Get up on Saturday mornings and take your children to the museums or the library. Help them to turn their favorite hobbies into enjoyable learning experience.

7. Volunteer, if possible, in the classroom and at least accompany your children's classrooms on field trips. Go to the parent/teacher conferences and meet all the teachers.

The fact of the matter is that the active involvement of parents is the first step in creating a level educational playing field. Parental involvement in the school can turn it from a dropout factory into one of excellence. 
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You can influence the choice of the principal, the type of curriculum, the quality of teaching, the expectations of teachers, and the security and safety of the classrooms.