The co-creation of community with parents and teachers

M.A.The Department of Education encourages parents to become involved in their children’s education by joining the school governing bodies. However, serving on a governing body is not the ultimate form of parental involvement. Governing bodies are involved at the macro level of planning which involves the holistic planning and management of the school, they are not involved at the micro level which deals with the day to day issues that arise within the classroom. Teachers at the Geluksdal Primary School say that they cannot give children with learning difficulties the individual attention with an average of forty-five pupils per class. They have found that more than fifty percent of the children they teach do not understand the lessons. Teachers feel that the school day is short and the number of children struggling too great for them to intervene effectively. They welcome parental involvement and think that parents should assist their children individually at home. This qualitative action research study is a partnership between the researcher, parents (with children who have learning difficulties) and teachers for the co-creation of community in the best interest of children's educational development. The co-creation of community between parents and teachers requires of them to meet with each other to discuss children's needs and difficulties and to attend to these needs and difficulties. The co-creation of community refers to the joint effort of parents and teachers to better the education of children with learning problems. The focus group consisted of five parents who committed themselves and three parents who moved in an out of the group. Seven teachers participated in this study but failed to commit themselves to the forming of community. These teachers seemed de-motivated from disappointing past experiences to get parents involved in children's education, but to little avail. It appeared as if they did not believe that meeting with parents after school to build a relationship in the best interest of children would make a difference, and did not think it to be important. Another important factor that could be related to the teachers’ reactions, was that they held an ‘out-there’ philosophy which suggested that the problems experienced by children with learning difficulties was caused by the home. The research was continued with the hope to raise the teachers’ consciousness of their involvement in the educational progress of children with learning difficulties. Three teachers were interviewed individually on their views of parental involvement in education. Results showed that the co-creation of community between parents and teachers do have an impact on children’s educational development. Those parents who were committed to become involved in their children's education found that their children’s progress at school improved considerably