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Parent influence is the key to school success

Author: Wendy Berliner |

The enduring influence of the effect of parent engagement on the successful education of their children comes over loud and clear in a new book based on more than ten years of research on children from the age of three.

A child’s background emerges as roughly twice as important as the pre-school or primary school they attend in how they do at school and how they develop socially, according to the research summarised in “Early Childhood Matters. Evidence from the Effective Pre-school and Primary Education Project,” edited by a team of leading researchers from the universities of Oxford and London.

A good home learning environment, in which parents encourage and develop their child, has an astonishing impact on performance. Children coming from homes with a good home learning environment show 21 per cent increases in literacy and 16 per cent increases in numeracy at the age of five.

Last Updated (Wednesday, 28 July 2010 10:51)

The Cloud with the silver haired lining – learning with ‘granny’

Author: Wendy Berliner |

You may have heard the story of the Indian slum children who taught themselves how to use computers when someone embedded a computer in his Delhi office wall for them. It proved so successful that all around the world the same experiment was repeated and each time, children taught themselves complex tasks easily – with little supervision.

But, and here is an even more interesting fact, they did even better when a ‘granny figure’ stood behind them offering encouragement – not teaching them, but just positively encouraging them and engaging with what they are doing.

So an encouraging and positive older person standing behind children who were working out how to do something themselves made them achieve more. Does that sound familiar? It is a pretty good description of good parenting and particularly in parent engagement in education.

Last Updated (Tuesday, 20 July 2010 10:29)

Use it or lose it this summer

Author: Wendy Berliner |

And carry on learning in the long school break

The long school break is upon us. Throughout the world the school uniforms and school bags are being put away, family schedules are that bit more relaxed, suitcases are being packed for the family holidays and kids activity courses of all kinds are booming."

Last Updated (Tuesday, 20 July 2010 10:36)