The paper addresses the problem of how to increase preservice teachers’ awareness and understanding of the importance of building a broader level of partnership with parents that goes beyond parent-teacher conferences and phone calls. The Ministry of Higher Education in Poland has formally acknowledged that prospective teachers should have knowledge about parents as sites of pedagogical activities, as well as acquire the skills to cooperate with them (Journal of Laws of 2012). In practice, however, preservice teachers’ plans to keep parents of their future pupils at a distance have been well documented. This may be partly due to the fact that school placements specific requirements in Module 2 referring to 30 hours of pedagogical practice and Module 3 referring to 120 hours of didactic practice do not assume that trainee teachers have any (in)formal contacts with parents during their practicum (Journal of Laws of 2012). Consequently, the cases of contacts with parents during school placements are accidental, isolated and sporadic. Likewise, we doubt that the approach of dictating school mentors as to the types of family-school contacts trainee teachers are to experience can be effective, despite the fact that some school mentors do expect that ‘they are told what to do’. In the paper we describe a qualitative study which reveals that there is a statistically significant amount of evidence of an association between trainees’ personal contacts with parents during their teaching practice and their high opinion about collaboration with parents as regards supporting children in: doing homework, recognizing and developing children’s talents, as well as tackling at home those learning problems which occur during lessons.
Keywords: teacher trainees’ beliefs, field experiences, parental involvement, partnership
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Vol. 3 No. 2 (2017)
Published: 2018-02-16
10.31261/tapsla
English