Family Influences Upon Learning Group Investigation Project

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Family Influences Upon LearningGroup
Investigation Project

• EDP 603, Summer III
• August 3, 2005
• Beth Arnos, Kristin Bixby, Angie Cowan Chris
  Tickle

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Table of Contents

• Overview
• Birth Order
• Parent Education
• Values
• Family Structure
• Conclusion

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Overview

• Role of Family in Learning
• Birth Order
• Parent Education
• Family Values
• Family Structure
• The classroom is an opportunity for teachers to
  look at the family dynamics of each student and
  determine ways to assist the child with regard to
  these factors.

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Birth Order

• Intelligence
• Zanjunc Markus (1975)
• Sample of 350,000 males
• Later born, lower IQ test score
• Based on Household Intellectual Climate
• Only-child last-born phenomenon
• Limitations

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Birth Order

• Implications for Cooperative Learning
• Typical Personality Traits by Birth Order
  (Dreikurs, 1958 Morales, 1994)
• Only Child- Unfamiliar with relating to other
  children, shy, not used to competition, lacks
  opportunities to learn how to successfully share,
  selfish.
• First Born- Most favorable position, entrusted
  with power and responsibility, positive
  self-esteem, confidence, has tutoring/teaching
  opportunity at home responds with hostility
  towards second child, feels status is threatened
  when second child is born

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Birth Order

• Typical Personality Traits by Birth Order (cont.)
• Middle Child- More relaxed, even tempered, less
  driven by parents, sometimes develops sense of
  humor to obtain attention, becomes more
  extrovertedcould develop low self-esteem, could
  develop feelings of inferiority.
• Youngest Child- More sociable, friendly, less
  demanding, less jealous, develops skills such as
  accommodation, tolerance, becomes more popular
  If too pampered, can feel weak and develop
  feeling of inferiority, not entrusted with
  responsibilityseeks situations free of
  competition, shies away from tasks for fear of
  failure.

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Birth Order

• Children arrive at school expecting that their
  classmates will behave like their siblings, their
  teachers like their parents (Romeo, 1994).
• Teachers should choose roles and groups based on
  a balance between the skills the child has and
  the skills the child needs to acquire, based on
  birth order (Morales, 1994).

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Parent Education

• Duncan Magnusan (2005)
• Higher test scores
• Dearing et al. (2005)
• Parent involvement
• Davis-Kean (2005)
• Parent education in relation to child achievement

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Parent Education

• Parent education and involvement affect the
  student in three main ways
• Instruction (cognitive ability)
• Modeling (social cognitive theory)
• Reinforcement (behaviorism)

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Family Values

• Behaviorism
• Reinforced behaviors (in early childhood) related
  to values
• Anglo Americans values promote autonomy of
  children to a greater degree than Latinos (Puerto
  Ricans and Mexicans, reportedly)
• this has the effect on Latino students of lack
  of competition for teacher attention, lack of
  competition with peers, and lower self-efficacy
• Competition self-efficacy are thought to help
  children achieve in Anglo-American based school
  systems
• Though Latinos value this as a form of unhealthy
  pride

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Family Values

• Autonomy
• Latinos(Puerto Ricans and Mexicans)
• Native Americans (Hupa Tribe in Ca.)
• In two studies, these three groups demonstrated
  a value for conformity in their young children.
  Autonomy was only valued by parents if that meant
  the parents value system was going to be
  reinforced (autonomy with regard to peers)

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Bachtold (1982) study involved California
residents and preschool children of
Anglo-American heritage and Hupa Native American
heritage

• Hupa desired their children to learn new ways and
  prosper more than previous generations
• Hupa embedded values were transmitted earlier
  than six years of age
• Hupa children conformed early to transactions of
  intimacy and cooperation that are consistent with
  the Hupa values
• altruism in their culture circumvented
  development of autonomy, assertiveness and
  competition which leads to seeking of attention
  and goal orientation in their Anglo-American
  counterparts

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Family Values

• Literacy
• One study reviewed 3 decades of data from Detroit
  Mi., including religious and ethnic diverse
  populations
• Catholics showed the greatest change in values
• increase in parental valuation of autonomy for
  children and a decrease in preference for
  obedience, from 1958 to 1983
• Approx. 25 - 30 of the differential change in
  the (entire study population) parental values
  (e.g., valuation of autonomy) was attributed to
  increased educational levels in Detroit Catholic
  parents
• Alwin (1984)

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Family Values

• Parenting Style
• Parental involvement in homework as an
  intersection of family literacy, SES, social
  support for the student
• Parents homework involvement influenced student
  academic success when parental modeling,
  reinforcement and instruction supported student
  attitudes about homework, student perceptions of
  competence and student self-regulatory skills
  (Hoover-Dempsey et al., 2001)
• Behaviorist views are supported in the findings,
  where the parental involvement served to
  reinforce childrens attitudes and
  self-regulatory skills
• Social cognitive theory is also supported due to
  the positive outcomes that resulted from parental
  modeling and parental support of students
  perceptions of competence

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Family Values

• Parenting Style 2ndary outcome - peer group
• Durbin, et al.(1993) examined an association
  between peer group orientation and parenting
  style among European-American high school
  adolescents - teens reported on the style
• authoritative (students were oriented toward
  balanced peers that rewarded both adultpeer-
  values, e.g., "jocks," "the in crowd," and
  "brains")
• authoritarian (no data trend)
• indulgent (fun-culture orientation, "partiers")
• uninvolved (mostly girls some boys, oriented
  toward crowds that didnt endorse adult values
  (e.g., "druggies")

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Family Values

• Parenting Style
• Disparity between teens expectation of the onset
  of more autonomy, compared with their parents
  expectation-values created a secondary effect
• Decreased interest in parent value system
• Promoted student attachment to peer values
• Depending on the peers selected, delinquent
  behavior resulted (a distraction from school and
  learning)
• Researchers think the the greater the teens
  PERCEPTION of disparity between the parent/teen
  values caused maladjustment in teens

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Family Structure

• Family Background
• Ford et al. 1998
• Students from two-parent families were more
  likely to be identified as gifted, than those
  from single-parent families.
• Projections suggest that more than half of the
  children born in the U.S. in the 1990s will
  spend some of their childhood in single-parent
  families, (Pong, 1997).

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Family Structure

• Affects of divorce on children
• Two years
• Malone et al. (2004)
• Kindergarten through grade 9
• Tracked students behavior of parents who were
  married in kindergarten
• Boys vs. Girls behaviors

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Family Structure

• Implications for Teachers
• Assumptions that students have two biological
  parents
• Look for acting-out behavior, especially with
  boys. Understand that this is normal
• Frieman (1997) explain to the student that, that
  behavior is unacceptable and emphasize to them
  that they are liked and valued (Maslow)

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Family Structure

• Single-Parent Homes
• Difficult to monitor after-school activities
  (lack of modeling)
• Lower income (typically)
• Traditional families are at more of an advantage
  when it comes to meeting Maslows hierarchy of
  needs, (Ormrod, 2004).

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Family Structure

• Maslows Hierarchy of Needs
• (in relation to divorce)
• People need to feel safe in their environment
  (regardless of where that may be)
• People need to feel love and belongingness
  (affectionate relationships)
• People need to feel good about themselves
  (self-esteem)

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Conclusions

• Family characteristics are factors in the
  learning process
• Families are educators
• School/teacher/class are educators
• Teachers have a unique opportunity
• partner with the family
• help children learn
• Improve self-efficacy within students

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Questions?