A Phenomenological Study on the Experiences of Middle-Class Parents Facilitating Homework

This study explored middle-class parents’ descriptions of their experience of the emotional “essence” of the conflicts that arose between themselves and their children as parents facilitated the homework process. This study on homework experiences sought to gain a deeper understanding and meaning experienced firsthand from the middle-class parents’ point of view. The use of phenomenological methods allowed for the deep and thick description necessary to uncover the essence of the middle-class parental perspectives on the parent-child emotional experience embedded in the homework process. The identified themes included creation of a homework routine, emotions of resistance and stress, and parental role construction. The emergent constituents were: paradox of parental role construction, tiers of stress, and desire for family harmony during homework time. The study revealed the following ramifications resulting from the relationships between emergent themes and constituents: the intersections between paradox of parental role construction and desire for family harmony, desire for family harmony and creation of a homework routine, creation of a homework routine and paradox of parental role construction and, finally, desire for family harmony and tiers of stress. These intersections manifested in the following: stress, resistance, confusion, and family tension, respectively. The significance of this study rests in its extension of current research on the experience of homework facilitation among working-class families with elementary-aged children by focusing on learning at home in the middle-class. It identified stress during this period as tiered, that middle-class parents would like training on their role during homework, and that middle-class parents had a cathartic stress-relieving experience when they were given an opportunity to share their “homework” experiences