Describes a parent involvement program designed by two elementary school teachers at a Phoenix, Arizona, elementary school. The K-3 teachers began with a parent training session demonstrating how parents could make manipulative learning games out of household odds and ends to use with their kids. Workshops were so successful that they were…

Evaluates recent literature regarding schools' parental involvement efforts, chronicling programs describing diverse rationales and benefits for parent participation and presenting a taxonomy for classifying underlying reasons for low parent-school involvement. School-parent communications are the key to any intervention effort. Parent-involvement…

Although parent involvement is essential, state education agencies have provided little financial support for staff and programs needed to improve school-family connections. This article discusses elements of good parent involvement programs and describes several successful examples. Advice is given for creating and managing school volunteer…

In October 1993, Kansas City Head Start project created Full Start, a pilot project with two neighborhood child care centers. Full Start is an expansion program to enable a wider range of needy children otherwise not eligible for Head Start to benefit from comprehensive services. Full Start parents are treated as equal partners participating in…

Summarizes a study of four Lutheran schools to determine whether there were significant differences between the mean degree of parent involvement in educational activities at the instructional and institutional levels and for grades K-6 and grades 7 and 8, as revealed by parent opinion. Participation is greater at the instructional level but is…

Alliance for Achievement is a community-building model allowing the principal, teachers, and parents to articulate a common base of educational values, set goals, and develop expectations for one another. Supporting Roland Barth's recommendations, the model helps principals articulate a mission and share authority and responsibility for attaining…

By focusing parent involvement programs on the parents and families instead of student "type," schools should identify parents not served by traditional outreach programs and find surrogate parents for certain students, as needed. Maintaining parent involvement depends on keeping records, respecting family culture and language, encouraging parents…

The key element in parental involvement is a sense of parent-school partnership. Parents can participate as decision makers, helpers, and coeducators. Facilitating parental involvement means removing five barriers: distance between parents and teachers, lack of teacher training, race and class biases, limited views of parental involvement, and…

This article describes a decade-long program of values education initiated by a public school system, with support from the local Parent Teacher Association council. The article also discusses cooperative efforts to develop and implement a program that includes the study and practical application of ethics and conduct codes. (IAH)

Presents a comprehensive, theoretical model for organizing parent involvement in schools. The model addresses parents' needs (for communication, liaison, education, and support) and strengths (as sources of information, collaboration, volunteer energy, and policy-making expertise) to facilitate the development of school policy and parent…

Parents of 27 preschoolers completed pretests and 14 completed posttests assessing nutrition knowledge, food purchases, and children's food intake. Children who received snacks and soybean-related instruction found both soy and nonsoy snacks acceptable, compared to those who did not receive instruction. Home eating habits did not change. (SK)

Explores how a community of learners maintains itself through the inclusion of new generations, using the example of new parent volunteers at an innovative public elementary school. Describes four models of community maintenance defining the relationship between the community and newcomers. (Author/SLD)

Explores whether fathers living apart from their children have concerns about possible disruptions in their relationships with their children. Results show: quality of the marital or partner relationship predicts fathers' concerns; fathers with a history of living apart from their child and maintaining high levels of involvement express the least…

Discusses the use of performance assessment and portfolio assessment as viable means for assessing children's efforts. Provides the basis for using both performance assessment and portfolio assessment together in order to get a more authentic assessment of children's performance in the elementary classroom. Presents guidelines to facilitate this…

Offers suggestions to promote becoming a lifetime writer: build a positive professional attitude toward writing in school; provide extended blocks of time for writing; guide learners in a variety of writing experiences; help writers to "go public"; hand students over to authors through a visiting authors program; and invite parents to be…