The involvement of parents in their child’s emotional and cognitive development has long been established as an important aspect of a child’s development. However, most parents still don’t understand the impact that they can have on their child’s attitude towards learning – and restrict their efforts to the child’s learning routines in general. Most involved parents try to play an active role to ensure that their child learns, but what they miss out on is the fact that their contributions to general studying routines or the school curriculum is not enough for the child to acquire a positive approach towards learning.

Children at an early age have an absorbent mind that learns much more then what books have to offer, even though the knowledge they attain from books will always be important. However, the child’s perception about learning, either from books, learning tools or everyday life, is something a parent has great influence over. This is because children from the very start learn in the context of important relationships. They are influenced by what their parents, siblings or other care-givers do as part of their own daily routines, preferences and practices. They learn from the environment around them, and unlike school where they have to share the teacher’s attention, at home the child gets more personalised concern. This puts parents in a unique position to help their children develop learning and thinking skills and shape their perceptions towards these skills as well.

WHAT CAN YOU AS PARENTS DO?

1- Realize our impact
The most important thing a parent can do to foster a learning environment is realise the impact that their attitude can have on their children. Children develop thinking and reasoning skills when parents engage with them on different levels. If you seek out answers to problems and questions with your child, the probability of him/her hesitating less to ask those questions increases. However, the emphasis should be on the process of searching for an answer rather than the product, because the most important thing you can teach children, no matter what their age, is that their views and opinions are valued. It would be implausible to expect them to be confident about taking problem solving head-on, if they lack in basic self-esteem. Equipped with it however, they are more likely to feel capable and in control.

2- Provide personalised learning experiences
Every child's emotional, cognitive and physical development is unique and complex. Although children develop through a generally predictable sequence of steps and milestones, they may not proceed through these steps in the same way. At the same time, one cannot deny the fact that a child's development is greatly influenced by factors in his/her environment and the experiences s/he has. At school, even though they might be provided with some personalised attention, the environment is pretty much generic. That obviously leaves a lot of room for the parent to compensate where the school cannot. One of the most important things a parent can do is notice their child’s strengths and weaknesses and focus on methods from which he/she learns the most. Every child has their own preferences. Some learn faster from pictures and some retain more of what they hear. Some children prefer drawing over building blocks, while others still prefer storybooks or nursery rhymes. The key is to find out what interests them and help them explore it.

3- Involve both parents
Because early childhood educators tend to engage more with mothers than with fathers, the study of fathers' involvement in children's development has been neglected. However, enough research has been done to suggest that children receiving attention from both parents at an earlier age are more responsive to external stimuli. When they move beyond toddler level, children, according to one study, display a positive correlation between academic performance and high-level participation of the father in their learning processes. Even when this correlation does not necessarily exist, it is generally better for the child to receive encouragement from both parents about inculcating a better approach towards learning.

4- Connect learning to everyday life
Learning should not be perceived by the parent as something children do in an allotted time. It is actually part of every day life experiences, and that is how it should be perceived by parents as well. This will help them make every small experience a learning stimulus – especially by responding to the child’s natural questions. Learning experiences can include everything; be it measuring while cooking or reading license plates while driving or walking along the road. Keeping your children connected to what’s happening in the community and world around them is an important way to foster a learning environment as well. Start by asking questions. For instance, you could ask a 7 year old what they’ve heard about a recent event, and follow it up with a question on how they could help. In any case, listen to your child’s ideas, rather then feeding him/her with information all the time. This will help him/her become a caring and connected learner.

5- Create a print-rich environment
Like most parents teach their children how to speak by constantly talking to them when they are infants or encouraging their words when they are learning to speak or listening to what they have to say once they can talk – reading and writing skills can also be fostered to a great extent in the same way. Even though parents cannot read to the children at the same frequency as talking, providing children with multiple sources of written information, be it story books or magazines or the newspaper is a good way of inculcating reading habits. Reading these sources themselves and providing their children with opportunities to share what they have read can help reinforce reading as a valuable habit.

6- Be open to learning yourself
Parents should realise that they will always be role models for their children, and that if they are open to learning at any age in life themselves, they set a positive example for their children. Learning something new, whether a craft, language or skill, or even reading up on an unfamiliar topic is one of several ways a parent can learn something new. If you share the information with your child, or let him or her know that even you can struggle while learning would help reassure your child about his own learning processes. Parents should be open to the possibility of learning from their children as well, be it learning how to operate the computer or something new that their child learnt at school. It boosts a child’s confidence to reverse the role and be the teacher for a change.

Source:
Vivian Gadsden and Aisha Ray, “Fathers' Role in Children's Academic Achievement and Early Literacy” (Nov, 2003)
www.ericdigests.org
‘Supporting your Child: The Role of Parents’
www.pbs.org/parents
‘The Role of Parents in Literacy, Mary E. Barr, ASED 530 September 30, 1997’
www.buddies.org