**3. Beyond the early years; continuity and cohesion in statutory education**

To maintain the gains made by early intervention, continuity between home and school practices must extend beyond the early years and continue throughout a child's school life. This is advocated by academics within the UK (For example [9, 24, 31]) and internationally: 'Efforts to support children's long-term success must extend beyond the ECE setting into elementary school' [32]. Thus, cross over and cohesion between home and school contexts remains an important paradigm throughout a child's schooling. This is evident in the common terminology used to describe home school interactions, in which the phrases parental *involvement* and parental *engagement* dominate. This engagement or involvement may take different forms and can be defined thus:

'Engagement' is taken to include:


However, the emphasis remains on the parents participating in the language and learning of school, supporting attainment through the adoption and extension of school learning practices within learning at home. Consequently, the teacher is again placed into the position of the 'knowledgeable expert' [14] who extends their expertise beyond the classroom to assist parents in understanding and emulating the pedagogies of school [16]. This is exemplified within the various forms of parental communication employed by schools and organisations to communicate with parents, wherein parental engagement is used to enhance parental understanding of school pedagogy. Within my own experience, this has been undertaken in several different ways, for example:

• Workshops, information meetings.

Here a specific area of study is chosen (for example Numeracy in Key Stage 1) and teachers illustrate the teaching methodology used within the classroom through presentations or workshops. The parents may play a passive or more active role depending on the structure of knowledge transfer planned by the professional, but rarely have reciprocal influence over the methodology.

**57**

parent group.

*Partnership Working between Home and School DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.94198*

tored by the school prior to publishing.

• Reports and Assessment Feedback.

participation by parents is rarely expected.

parents may be requested by the school.

• Home school communication booklets.

professional are encouraged to contribute.

especially within early years education.

• Learning Journals and Assessment Portfolios.

• Exhibitions, open mornings, performances.

• Newsletters, magazine articles, information booklets and blog posts.

These can be used to impart administrative, procedural and pedagogical information to parents. The former can be online or in paper format and often include pictures and examples of children's learning to enhance parental understanding of school pedagogy. The parents are usually passive receivers of information but may be able to comment if the publication is online, though comments may be moni-

These usually involve the parents and children, who share and present their learning to their parents. These may be interactive or passive, depending on the pedagogy of the school but, again, parents do not influence ensuing school practice.

Paper or electronic feedback to parents that demonstrate learning outcomes against accepted indicators of progress. They may include detailed written comments or numerical/alphabetical symbols to represent learning. Confirmation of parental receipt and/or comments may be requested by the school but further

Commonly found in Early Years settings, Learning Journals are an example of narrative assessment [33] and may contain examples of children's learning, photographs, observations and other relevant material. They are used to document and share a child's learning and progress. In the last five years, assessment portfolios are more frequently electronic. Dependent on the setting, contributions from the

Most often found in Early Years or Primary settings, these are used to share information between home and school on a regular basis. The information they contain can be administrative, procedural or pedagogical and both parents and

These examples are usually offered in addition to the traditional parent/teacher meetings wherein parent and teacher meet face to face to discuss progress, either as part of a formal school event or requested by the teacher or parents. Dependent on context, such parental meetings can be knowledge transference from teacher to parent (common in the more formal school events) or have the potential for dialogic exchange. The format of meetings is usually decided by the school management, though this may be done in conjunction with parents through the involvement of a

Throughout a child's learning, then, the dominant paradigm within home school interaction places the school and teacher as 'knowledgeable experts' [14] who, to improve outcomes for the child, expect the parents to engage with their 'voice' [34]. Within this relationship, little or no recognition of the knowledge and expertise of the parents is evident, despite the insistence that parents are the child's first and foremost educators. Nevertheless, there has been a gradual shift in this paradigm,

*Parenting - Studies by an Ecocultural and Transactional Perspective*

school in increased and outcomes improved.

forms and can be defined thus:

advisory groups.

several different ways, for example:

• Workshops, information meetings.

rarely have reciprocal influence over the methodology.

'Engagement' is taken to include:

attitudes, values, aspirations and behaviour.

• Communication: school-home; home-school.

field trips; participating as a member of an audience.

firmly positioned in the role of 'knowledgeable expert' [14] who shares their knowledge with less experienced parents, scaffolding them into a greater understanding of school languages. In turn, parents adapt their home learning practices, continuity of practice between the two contexts is heightened, motivation for learning in

**3. Beyond the early years; continuity and cohesion in statutory education**

To maintain the gains made by early intervention, continuity between home and school practices must extend beyond the early years and continue throughout a child's school life. This is advocated by academics within the UK (For example [9, 24, 31]) and internationally: 'Efforts to support children's long-term success must extend beyond the ECE setting into elementary school' [32]. Thus, cross over and cohesion between home and school contexts remains an important paradigm throughout a child's schooling. This is evident in the common terminology used to describe home school interactions, in which the phrases parental *involvement* and parental *engagement* dominate. This engagement or involvement may take different

• Learning at home: help with homework, subject skills, other skills and talents,

• In-school activities: volunteering; helping in classrooms, parents' evenings,

• Decision making: undertaking role as school governor or other committees and

• Collaborating with the community: community contributions to schools and

However, the emphasis remains on the parents participating in the language and learning of school, supporting attainment through the adoption and extension of school learning practices within learning at home. Consequently, the teacher is again placed into the position of the 'knowledgeable expert' [14] who extends their expertise beyond the classroom to assist parents in understanding and emulating the pedagogies of school [16]. This is exemplified within the various forms of parental communication employed by schools and organisations to communicate with parents, wherein parental engagement is used to enhance parental understanding of school pedagogy. Within my own experience, this has been undertaken in

Here a specific area of study is chosen (for example Numeracy in Key Stage 1) and teachers illustrate the teaching methodology used within the classroom through presentations or workshops. The parents may play a passive or more active role depending on the structure of knowledge transfer planned by the professional, but

families; family and school contributions to the community [31].

**56**

• Newsletters, magazine articles, information booklets and blog posts.

These can be used to impart administrative, procedural and pedagogical information to parents. The former can be online or in paper format and often include pictures and examples of children's learning to enhance parental understanding of school pedagogy. The parents are usually passive receivers of information but may be able to comment if the publication is online, though comments may be monitored by the school prior to publishing.

• Exhibitions, open mornings, performances.

These usually involve the parents and children, who share and present their learning to their parents. These may be interactive or passive, depending on the pedagogy of the school but, again, parents do not influence ensuing school practice.

• Reports and Assessment Feedback.

Paper or electronic feedback to parents that demonstrate learning outcomes against accepted indicators of progress. They may include detailed written comments or numerical/alphabetical symbols to represent learning. Confirmation of parental receipt and/or comments may be requested by the school but further participation by parents is rarely expected.

• Learning Journals and Assessment Portfolios.

Commonly found in Early Years settings, Learning Journals are an example of narrative assessment [33] and may contain examples of children's learning, photographs, observations and other relevant material. They are used to document and share a child's learning and progress. In the last five years, assessment portfolios are more frequently electronic. Dependent on the setting, contributions from the parents may be requested by the school.

• Home school communication booklets.

Most often found in Early Years or Primary settings, these are used to share information between home and school on a regular basis. The information they contain can be administrative, procedural or pedagogical and both parents and professional are encouraged to contribute.

These examples are usually offered in addition to the traditional parent/teacher meetings wherein parent and teacher meet face to face to discuss progress, either as part of a formal school event or requested by the teacher or parents. Dependent on context, such parental meetings can be knowledge transference from teacher to parent (common in the more formal school events) or have the potential for dialogic exchange. The format of meetings is usually decided by the school management, though this may be done in conjunction with parents through the involvement of a parent group.

Throughout a child's learning, then, the dominant paradigm within home school interaction places the school and teacher as 'knowledgeable experts' [14] who, to improve outcomes for the child, expect the parents to engage with their 'voice' [34]. Within this relationship, little or no recognition of the knowledge and expertise of the parents is evident, despite the insistence that parents are the child's first and foremost educators. Nevertheless, there has been a gradual shift in this paradigm, especially within early years education.

## **4. Partnership working with parents**

The commonly accepted link between the quality of the home learning environment and positive outcomes for the child, has fostered home-school interactions in which parental knowledge is subsumed beneath that of the more knowledgeable professional, whose expertise extends into home learning practices. However, under the influence of social constructivist theories, the relative position of parental understanding within this knowledge exchange has begun to change (For example, see [18, 20]). To return to Donaldson, her initial research was prompted by a desire to challenge Piaget's experimental approach, wherein children were viewed as solitary learners [20]. Moving away from development as a process of individual maturation, Donaldson viewed the child as learning through active participation within a social context [20]. Enhanced by the ideas of Jerome Bruner [35] and Lev Vygotsky [36], social constructivism has since become the predominant paradigm of early childhood pedagogy in the UK [3, 18, 20] and is reflected in government policy. In her governmental report on the early years statutory framework, Dame Tickell notes: 'Children's learning and development from birth to five occurs as the result of a complex interaction between the child and her/his experiences within relationships, and in the environment' [3]. The participatory and interconnected nature of learning is also reflected internationally [13, 37] and underlies the New Zealand curriculum Te Whāriki, wherein "children are positioned as confident and competent learners from birth… (who) learn by engaging in meaningful interactions with people, places and things" [38]. Thus, learning is seen as the co-construction of understanding through purposeful and meaningful interaction between the child, adult/s and environment (including culture) within a particular socio-cultural context [12, 39] Within early years pedagogy, this process is labelled 'sustained shared thinking' [18, 22] and takes place when a child and adult engage in a democratic, reciprocal and expanded interaction (verbal or otherwise) which deepens a child's understanding. Ideally this process is led by the child and the adult uses their expertise and knowledge to scaffold the child's learning, engaging in a meaningful dialogue through actively listening and responding to the child's utterances and reasoning [11, 18, 22].

Whilst first finding dominance in early years pedagogy, the concept of learning as the co-construction of meaning between active participants within a dialogic interaction is gaining influence throughout statutory education. The new curriculum currently being piloted in Wales [40], forefronts a responsive pedagogy based on reciprocal interactions. Within the 'Curriculum for Wales', communication and partnership working between practitioner, learner and community are central, prompting a more fluid and responsive co-construction of skills and knowledge [40]. The social nature of learning is also being championed by some neuroscientists. Cozolino, for example, [41] challenges the dominance within learning theory of concepts such as Maslow's hierarchy of needs [42] arguing that the brain is predominantly a social organ. Whilst it is true that infants need food, warmth and shelter to survive, Cozolino argues that these necessities are gained through successful relations with their primary caregiver. Consequently, survival is dependent on effective interaction with others. For Cozolino, this social drive has been severely underrated within learning theory and must be rectified through a more socially responsive approach to learning within schools.

Within both the UK and New Zealand, social constructivist theories of education, place greater emphasis on the role of parents within learning. If children's learning arises 'from the interplay between the inter-connected and dynamic facets of the unique child with surrounding relationships and experiences' [3] then it

**59**

renegotiation of the concepts of professional and parent.

*Partnership Working between Home and School DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.94198*

cannot be sufficient to simply inculcate parents into the schools view of their child as a learner. Greater recognition must be given to parental knowledge. This is reflected within the concept of parental partnerships, 'I would particularly like to see parents and carers more involved and working in close partnership with practitioners' [3] wherein, '… the transfer of knowledge and understanding (is) ….part of a two-way process: not only from school to home but from home to school' [31]. Thus, schools must take more note and respond to the parent's perceptions of the

Within partnership working, although potentially different from that of the professional, the knowledge and understanding of the parents is seen as valid to the child's learning and thus, cannot simply be subsumed within the school's voice. Consequently, the multiple influences and complex pathways of learning are recognised [13] and a more responsive relationship between home and school is required. This offers great potential for a more dynamic and fluid conception of learning, wherein differing perspectives are recognised and celebrated [43, 44]. This can be viewed as beneficial for several reasons. First, it could be argued that the centrality of schools in disseminating the social languages of our culture, necessitates a more responsive and intercultural curriculum, capable of reflecting multiplicity [43]. For advocates of such a curriculum, world peace and the future longevity of the human species may depend upon it [43]. Certainly, recent political and social movements have highlighted that multiplicity of voice is necessary to challenge embedded social inequality and institutional prejudice [45–47]. Furthermore, there is an increasing recognition that we are uncertain about the precise skills and knowledge our youngest learners will need in the future [48–50]. In a report published by UNICEF it is noted that, "the gap between the levels of learning that education systems are providing and what children, communities and economies need, is growing" [51]. The uncertainty created by the COVID 19 pandemic and the unknown direction that economies and educational institutions may take as a result, has further highlighted the potential, as well as the necessity for change. The rapid closure of schools and businesses due to the pandemic thrust parents and professionals into novel relationships. Whilst teachers remained in charge of designing, planning and resourcing the learning through online learning platforms, parents had to take responsibility for delivering this learning to their children. Informal discussions with parents throughout this process, indicated that while some parents found this extremely difficult and desired professional support (especially those working online from home in full time jobs), others embraced the opportunity to learn more about their children's thinking and learning. In addition, some children flourished in this new learning environment and, upon returning to school had made far greater progress in core skills than would have been expected within the classroom. These informal observations suggest that parents and children may benefit from a greater voice in education and that educational institutions play a greater role in society than providing skills and education for children, they also provide economic spaces for uninterrupted working. Thus, new pedagogies are needed that more responsive to community needs to prepare learners and families for the economies of the future [40, 50]. Within the new Curriculum for Wales [40] and 'Te Whāriki' [38] the potential for schools to respond to their local communities is inherent and it is expected that each school will be co-constructed between professional and community. Consequently, the crucial role of parents as the first and foremost educators [1–3] is paramount and their knowledge and experience is no longer subsumed to that of the professional expert but plays a greater part in the community construction of learning [14, 16, 37]. However, such participatory working may require a

child as a learner and begin working in 'partnership' with the parent.

#### *Partnership Working between Home and School DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.94198*

*Parenting - Studies by an Ecocultural and Transactional Perspective*

The commonly accepted link between the quality of the home learning environment and positive outcomes for the child, has fostered home-school interactions in which parental knowledge is subsumed beneath that of the more knowledgeable professional, whose expertise extends into home learning practices. However, under the influence of social constructivist theories, the relative position of parental understanding within this knowledge exchange has begun to change (For example, see [18, 20]). To return to Donaldson, her initial research was prompted by a desire to challenge Piaget's experimental approach, wherein children were viewed as solitary learners [20]. Moving away from development as a process of individual maturation, Donaldson viewed the child as learning through active participation within a social context [20]. Enhanced by the ideas of Jerome Bruner [35] and Lev Vygotsky [36], social constructivism has since become the predominant paradigm of early childhood pedagogy in the UK [3, 18, 20] and is reflected in government policy. In her governmental report on the early years statutory framework, Dame Tickell notes: 'Children's learning and development from birth to five occurs as the result of a complex interaction between the child and her/his experiences within relationships, and in the environment' [3]. The participatory and interconnected nature of learning is also reflected internationally [13, 37] and underlies the New Zealand curriculum Te Whāriki, wherein "children are positioned as confident and competent learners from birth… (who) learn by engaging in meaningful interactions with people, places and things" [38]. Thus, learning is seen as the co-construction of understanding through purposeful and meaningful interaction between the child, adult/s and environment (including culture) within a particular socio-cultural context [12, 39] Within early years pedagogy, this process is labelled 'sustained shared thinking' [18, 22] and takes place when a child and adult engage in a democratic, reciprocal and expanded interaction (verbal or otherwise) which deepens a child's understanding. Ideally this process is led by the child and the adult uses their expertise and knowledge to scaffold the child's learning, engaging in a meaningful dialogue through actively listening and responding to the child's utter-

Whilst first finding dominance in early years pedagogy, the concept of learning as the co-construction of meaning between active participants within a dialogic interaction is gaining influence throughout statutory education. The new curriculum currently being piloted in Wales [40], forefronts a responsive pedagogy based on reciprocal interactions. Within the 'Curriculum for Wales', communication and partnership working between practitioner, learner and community are central, prompting a more fluid and responsive co-construction of skills and knowledge [40]. The social nature of learning is also being championed by some neuroscientists. Cozolino, for example, [41] challenges the dominance within learning theory of concepts such as Maslow's hierarchy of needs [42] arguing that the brain is predominantly a social organ. Whilst it is true that infants need food, warmth and shelter to survive, Cozolino argues that these necessities are gained through successful relations with their primary caregiver. Consequently, survival is dependent on effective interaction with others. For Cozolino, this social drive has been severely underrated within learning theory and must be rectified through a more socially

Within both the UK and New Zealand, social constructivist theories of education, place greater emphasis on the role of parents within learning. If children's learning arises 'from the interplay between the inter-connected and dynamic facets of the unique child with surrounding relationships and experiences' [3] then it

**4. Partnership working with parents**

ances and reasoning [11, 18, 22].

responsive approach to learning within schools.

**58**

cannot be sufficient to simply inculcate parents into the schools view of their child as a learner. Greater recognition must be given to parental knowledge. This is reflected within the concept of parental partnerships, 'I would particularly like to see parents and carers more involved and working in close partnership with practitioners' [3] wherein, '… the transfer of knowledge and understanding (is) ….part of a two-way process: not only from school to home but from home to school' [31]. Thus, schools must take more note and respond to the parent's perceptions of the child as a learner and begin working in 'partnership' with the parent.

Within partnership working, although potentially different from that of the professional, the knowledge and understanding of the parents is seen as valid to the child's learning and thus, cannot simply be subsumed within the school's voice. Consequently, the multiple influences and complex pathways of learning are recognised [13] and a more responsive relationship between home and school is required. This offers great potential for a more dynamic and fluid conception of learning, wherein differing perspectives are recognised and celebrated [43, 44]. This can be viewed as beneficial for several reasons. First, it could be argued that the centrality of schools in disseminating the social languages of our culture, necessitates a more responsive and intercultural curriculum, capable of reflecting multiplicity [43]. For advocates of such a curriculum, world peace and the future longevity of the human species may depend upon it [43]. Certainly, recent political and social movements have highlighted that multiplicity of voice is necessary to challenge embedded social inequality and institutional prejudice [45–47]. Furthermore, there is an increasing recognition that we are uncertain about the precise skills and knowledge our youngest learners will need in the future [48–50]. In a report published by UNICEF it is noted that, "the gap between the levels of learning that education systems are providing and what children, communities and economies need, is growing" [51]. The uncertainty created by the COVID 19 pandemic and the unknown direction that economies and educational institutions may take as a result, has further highlighted the potential, as well as the necessity for change. The rapid closure of schools and businesses due to the pandemic thrust parents and professionals into novel relationships. Whilst teachers remained in charge of designing, planning and resourcing the learning through online learning platforms, parents had to take responsibility for delivering this learning to their children. Informal discussions with parents throughout this process, indicated that while some parents found this extremely difficult and desired professional support (especially those working online from home in full time jobs), others embraced the opportunity to learn more about their children's thinking and learning. In addition, some children flourished in this new learning environment and, upon returning to school had made far greater progress in core skills than would have been expected within the classroom. These informal observations suggest that parents and children may benefit from a greater voice in education and that educational institutions play a greater role in society than providing skills and education for children, they also provide economic spaces for uninterrupted working. Thus, new pedagogies are needed that more responsive to community needs to prepare learners and families for the economies of the future [40, 50]. Within the new Curriculum for Wales [40] and 'Te Whāriki' [38] the potential for schools to respond to their local communities is inherent and it is expected that each school will be co-constructed between professional and community. Consequently, the crucial role of parents as the first and foremost educators [1–3] is paramount and their knowledge and experience is no longer subsumed to that of the professional expert but plays a greater part in the community construction of learning [14, 16, 37]. However, such participatory working may require a renegotiation of the concepts of professional and parent.
