Beliefs about family-school relationships. Changes in pre-service teachers after receiving specific training

Teachers’ beliefs about family-school relationship vary in a continuum according to the role that parents and teachers have, and the power that they hold. Pre-service teachers also have beliefs about this relationship and their own competence to develop it. Two groups of pre-service teachers (second year students) participated in this study. One group received specific training on family-school relationship and its improvement (116 students attending a degree in Early Childhood Education, who constituted the experimental group, EG). The other group was not trained (92 students attending a degree in Primary Education, who made up the control group, CG). The Beliefs about family-school Questionnaire (CCR) was developed and applied before and after the EG was trained. Results show that students in the EG increased their beliefs about family-school collaboration in the post-test and decreased their beliefs about parental subordination to teachers’ authority and parents’ carelessness. Students in the CG kept their beliefs unchanged, which were significantly more prone to support teachers’ authority and parental subordination and parents’ carelessness compared to the EG.. Perceived competence for family-school relationship did not change significantly in either group. However, significant correlations between beliefs and perceived competence were found, pointing out the importance of working pre-service teachers’ beliefs about family-school collaboration