Abstract
In a two-year school improvement project strategically located in communities with a large number of “new families”—ethnic minorities, new-arrivals, father- or mother-absent families—a team of early childhood teacher educators and a social work teacher joined four preschools to initiate home-school collaboration for school improvement. Ethnographic case studies in the four preschools revealed a central theme—the process for parents to cross the home-school divide entailed a re-culturing of the school community to provide parents meaningful, co-equal participation in school improvement. The re-alignment of power relationship between home and school gave parents from “new-arrival families” an empowering experience, as they worked alongside “the locals”, school people, and “experts” to find ways to enhance children’s educational experience.
Original language | English |
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Publication status | Published - 2006 |
Event | 2006 Annual Meeting of American Educational Research Association: Education Research in the Public Interest - San Francisco, United States Duration: 07 Apr 2006 → 11 Apr 2006 |
Conference
Conference | 2006 Annual Meeting of American Educational Research Association: Education Research in the Public Interest |
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Abbreviated title | AERA2006 |
Country/Territory | United States |
City | San Francisco |
Period | 07/04/06 → 11/04/06 |
Citation
Chan, P. W., Lee, W.-Y. M., Kwong, W.-M., & Yuen, L. H. (2006, April). Empowering "new families" to cross the home-school divide: A case study of the integrative function of home-school collaboration in a school improvement project. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of American Educational Research Association: Education Research in the Public Interest, San Francisco, CA.Keywords
- Early Childhood Education
- Teacher Education and Professional Development