ABSTRACT

This paper brings together two rich bodies of knowledge that have barely intersected in research: parental involvement in the school and processes of pedagogical change. Until now, parental involvement has been studied in many contexts, but references to parental involvement in a school’s pedagogy are rare. Management of pedagogical change has also been studied extensively, but mainly by relating to the school as an organisation that functions separately from the community context. This study, conducted in 2019–2021 (including the COVID-19 pandemic period), is based on 22 in-depth, semi-structured interviews with parents, principals, and senior education officials of two elementary schools in Israel that are undergoing pedagogical changes. The schools share some similar demographic characteristics but differ in pedagogy: One is an older school characterised by a traditional pedagogy (including, for example, frontal teaching and standardised evaluation); the other is new and was founded with innovative pedagogy in the spirit of the 21st century (for example, personalised teaching and alternative evaluation). The findings reveal that the parents in both schools are interested in influencing the school’s pedagogy, but that they do so in opposite directions: The parents at the more traditional school are interested in promoting innovative learning, while the parents in the innovative school are interested in reintroducing traditional practices. The findings also contribute to the discussion of parental involvement from a gender perspective and the roles of key players. Finally, the article offers initial insights regarding parent–school relations, including the pedagogical aspects, following the COVID-19 pandemic.

摘要

本文汇集了在研究中几乎没有交叉的两个丰富的知识体系：家长参与学校和教学变革的过程。到目前为止，已经在许多情况下研究了家长参与，但很少提及家长参与学校的教学法。教学变革的管理也得到了广泛的研究，但主要是将学校作为一个独立于社区环境发挥作用的组织。这项研究于 2019 年至 2021 年（包括 COVID-19 大流行期间）进行，基于对以色列两所正在进行教学改革的小学的家长、校长和高级教育官员进行的 22 次深度半结构化访谈. 这些学校有一些相似的人口统计特征，但在教学法上有所不同：一所是一所以传统教学法为特征的老学校（例如，包括正面教学和标准化评估）；另一个是新的，是根据 21 世纪的精神建立的创新教学法（例如，个性化教学和替代评估）。调查结果表明，两所学校的家长都对影响学校的教学法感兴趣，但他们这样做的方向相反：更传统学校的家长对促进创新学习感兴趣，而创新学校的家长则对重新引入传统做法。调查结果还有助于从性别角度和关键参与者的角色讨论父母的参与。最后，文章提供了关于家长与学校关系的初步见解，