Parental involvement in homework in Form 1 in Junior Lyceums

Abstract

The aim of our dissertation is to focus on the help given to Form One students while these are tackling their homework. Our study is based on interviews which we held with parents, mostly mothers, of First Formers attending four different Junior Lyceums, two for girls and two for boys and located in the central and the southern parts of Malta. It transpires that most mothers tend to play an important role in helping children with their home assignments. The fathers involve themselves less, except when they are academically qualified and their wives are not. The help which is offered may be of different types: supplying solutions for difficulties and problems inherent in the homework; monitoring the children's progress in the homework being done; running errands such as getting books and other informative material from public libraries and other institutions particularly for project work; and offering mere moral support. Actually, where projects are concerned fathers tend to be more in demand, because they are probably more adept at helping to construct models or to draw maps. We also noted that children sometimes seek help from siblings, neighbours, friends, tutors of private lessons, as well as the Internet. Another interesting concept is that satisfactory -- and, at times, high -- scholastic achievement tends to be associated with each of these factors: parental involvement in homework, academically qualified parents and intelligent children. Furthermore, our research shows that parents find that helping with homework tends to be less demanding in Form One than in Year Six, and that Form One students tend to be more able to cope with their homework on their own.