Parent Involvement- Health Education For Children

Parents are partners with schools in the effort to educate healthy children who have the skills they need to become competent and productive adults. There is no area of the curriculum where this is more true than in health education. Children acquire their basic health attitudes and behaviors within the family home. Involving parents in their children's education takes time and effort. The energy you put into involving parents will have a big reward, however, both in your classroom this year and in your students ' lives now and in the years to come. Parents are partners with schools in the effort to educate healthy children who have the skills they need to become competent and productive adults. There is no area of the curriculum where this is more true than in health education. Children acquire their basic health attitudes and behaviors within the family home. Parents purchase and prepare nutritious (or otherwise) food for children, regulate their sleeping patterns, enforce rules for how family members treat each other, and model positive or negative behaviors with regard to alcohol, tobacco and other drugs. Even as children approach adolescence and their peers become a more significant influence on their lives, parents continue to be important role models for good health. If health education is to be effective in promoting healthy behaviors, it must actively enlist parents as partners in the process. The research is clear on the value of parent involvement. Children who grow up in families who are involved in their education in positive ways achieve higher grades and test scores, attend school more regularly, complete more homework, display more positive attitudes and behaviors, graduate from high school at higher rates, and are more likely to go on to higher education (Henderson & Berla, 1994). Some of the positive ways that parents can be involved in their children's education include monitoring homework, encouraging participation in healthy extracurricular activities, limiting television viewing and video games, establishing a daily family routine, talking to their children and their children's teachers, participating in parent-teacher associations, and demonstrating that they value learning and good characte