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This Is What Happens When You Become a Parent
Becoming a parent enters you into a completely new and sometimes overwhelming world. Everything you don’t want to happen will happen, and you might find yourself begging for privacy and alone time.
Are you ready to spend all your money on diapers and all your waking hours with annoying children’s television shows? Just wait — there’s so much more that happens when you become a parent.
Unsolicited Advice
Once you become a parent, everyone starts having an opinion on your parenting style. You’ll receive unsolicited advice as often from people with kids as those without. What can you do about it? You’re completely allowed to ignore them.
As a parent, you’ll soon learn that there’s no advice that’s 100 percent right. While some people may have experiences similar to yours, many will not, and even those that do don’t necessarily know the best way forward for you and your kid. Sure, some advice will be useful, at the end of the day, your decisions are what matter.
Welcome to No Sleep
Parenting is the college years all over again when it comes to sleep deprivation, but with the added bonus of being older and not managing it as well. Sure, it gets better once the kids start growing up, but for the first few years, you’ll need a mind of steel to get through sleepless nights.
Of course, it’s all worth it — people still have multiple children, even though they’re fully aware their sleep schedules will never be the same again. But if you value sleep, you seriously have to consider that it’ll go down on your list of priorities once you become a parent.
Raising Kids Is Expensive
The idea of having children seems wonderful until you realize just how expensive it is. Kids eat — a lot. Especially as they get older. And it’ll be your job to feed them. On top of that, there are plenty of other expenses, like school fees, clothes and more. Basically, everything you buy for yourself, you’ll probably need to buy for your kids too.
A solid income and meticulous budgeting can help, obviously, but the sticker shock can still surprise even the most wealthy and frugal potential parents. And if you’re in the US, just giving birth will cost you thousands of dollars.
You Need to Plan Daycare Enrollment in Advance
If you’re struggling with parenting, having a job and whatever else is on your plate, you probably don’t have a lot of time and could use daycare services. Ironically, however, setting up daycare itself often takes a lot of time, especially at places that are in high demand.
It’s a real crux, but unfortunately, there’s no getting around it. As children get older, this juggling act only gets more complicated as summer camps and after-school activities enter the picture.
You’ll Get Sick More Often
Kids carry germs — that’s a fact. They get them from school, their friends and basically anyone around them. Their immune system is still developing, which means they get sick. A lot. And as a result, so will you. It’s a fact that parents get sick more often than adults without children..
No matter how robust your immune system is, you can expect it to take a beating once you have children. For your own sake, make sure you stock up on cough drops, ginger ale, chicken soup and other sick essentials — you’ll need them.
A Clean House Will Never Be a Priority Again
Messy will become your middle name. It’s impossible to dedicate any time to cleaning once you have children, at least while they’re young. Sure, there are parents who try to teach their kids about having a clean house, but most of them give up because it just gets messy again one day later.
While you should make sure your family doesn’t live in unacceptably dirty conditions, having a messy house is inevitable. Unless, of course, you can afford to hire someone to help you clean it.
The Meltdowns Are Almost Always Unexpected
If you think you know exactly when your kid’s going to have a meltdown, you’re in for a huge surprise. More often than not, the meltdowns come from the most trivial things — your child might just be hungry or need a nap.
Seriously — from giving them food from a differently-colored packet to insisting on wearing the most ridiculous clothes, tantrums can come at the most unexpected times and often inconvenient times, especially when you’re out with them in public.
They’re Extremely Impressionable
It’s no secret that kids are impressionable. From their toddler years to adulthood, your children will intentionally and subconsciously take things to heart. As a parent, you need to always be mindful of what you’re saying to them.
Everything from the way you enforce discipline to the way you interact with your significant other to the way you treat service people can potentially inform your child’s view of the world — and not always in the ways you want. It pays to be mindful and compassionate.
They Pick Up on Your Traits and Mannerisms
Speaking of being impressionable, your habits and personal foibles will rub off of kids quickly. That can be adorable under the right circumstances, but it can also have negative consequences when the behavior in question is less healthy than you’d care to admit.
Being mindful of your own behavior is just as important as watching the kid’s. And even when your own actions are fine, they can still backfire when kids take what you do out of context. Monkey see, monkey do.
How You Treat Other People Is How They’ll Treat Them, Too
Bullies often are bullies because of issues at home — that’s no secret. It’s all they know, so that’s what they act out. Having frequent fights with your significant other? Don’t be surprised if your child uses the same language when they get angry.
Bigger problems like racism and sexism are also modeled this way. Being a good parent means thinking critically about your own behavior and working to show your kids the behavior you want them to have rather than just telling them to do it.
They Won’t Get It Until They’re Older
Raising kids is frustrating. They basically think the whole world revolves around them, and their problems seem huge. The truth is, those problems really do feel enormous — but only to them. That’s why kids often get frustrated with their parents for not understanding how big of a deal something is to them.
The truth is, they won’t understand until they’re older, and sometimes it won’t even happen until they have their own kids. You have to be patient with them and not get frustrated in turn as they experience the good and bad of this world.
Your ‘Me Time’ Is Practically Non-Existent
When children come into the picture, time for personal relaxation often lasts as long as house cleanliness as a priority. With diapers to change, food to make and crying bouts to quiet, getting anything done becomes much, much harder. Try having a second child for bonus difficulty.
That doesn’t mean you stop needing time to yourself, however. While you’ll have to tough it out to a degree, you should still take what time you can for keeping your sanity together. Your time may be much more fragmented now that a baby’s in the picture, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t salvage what you can for yourself.
You Realize You Don’t Know Everything
One of the most humbling things about being a parent is that you realize you despite being an adult, you still don’t know everything — or even as much as you’d like to know. It’s something a lot of parents struggle with as kids get older and ask more questions about the world.
The truth is, it’s okay to say, “I don’t know.” While parents often lie to their children when they don’t know an answer to something, admitting your own ignorance teaches your kid that just because they don’t know something doesn’t mean that they should be afraid — instead, they have an opportunity to learn.
You Can’t Protect Them From Everything
Here’s a big truth — as your child grows up and explores the world on their own, they’ll get themselves into trouble, and you won’t always be there to protect them. It’s something that’s hard to embrace no matter how old your kids are.
The goal of parenting isn’t to prevent disaster from ever striking, because that just isn’t possible. Instead, your job is to teach your kid how to overcome those terrible moments and be a stronger person for it.
You Live in Perpetual Fear for Their Well-being
Once your kids are able to go to school, you’re in for a whole new era of worrying. Although getting more personal time is fantastic, you might find yourself experiencing crippling fear over what your child is doing while they’re away. Don’t worry — this is totally normal.
There comes a point where you have to realize that your fears might exceed reality. You shouldn’t disrupt your child’s life just because you’re worried. Be confident that whatever lessons you taught them as a parent are good enough for them to face the real world.
Kids Will Keep Secrets From You
Once your kids become teenagers, and often even before that, they’ll keep secrets from you. While they’re sometimes trivial or even adorable, like a first crush, there are other times when those secrets will be about dark, serious things that could break your heart if you knew about them.
It’s okay for them to have secrets and privacy. However, you should always make sure they know you are there for them at all times. Don’t force them to tell you things — just make sure they know they can trust you and that you’ll always be there to support them.
Sometimes You’ll Have to Make Difficult Decisions
Being a parent is tough. It’s not always about being your child’s best friend. You have to come to terms that they won’t always like you, especially when you make decisions for the family as a whole, not just for them.
The truth is, it’s okay for them to get angry with you as long as you explain why you made the choices that you did and demonstrate that you’re trying to act in their best interests, even if you’re not in agreement on what those are.
You Might Find Yourself Missing Your Independence
Being constantly surrounded by kids that depend on you at all times makes it difficult to focus on anything else, at least for the first couple of years of their lives. If you’ve been an independent person most of your life, you might find yourself struggling in the parenting world.
It’s a challenge adapting to the role of parenthood, but over time, the benefits of this arrangement also make themselves known. You get an intimate look at the formation of another human being, and you get a source of companionship later in life. Plus, they’re not that needy forever. Thank goodness.
Letting Them Grow Up Is Harder Than You Think
After having your child depend on you for years or decades, every step they take toward independence — whether it’s kindergarten or college — can go against every instinct a parent has. Nonetheless, you have to let them go, and no matter how torn up you are, you can’t bog them down with your feelings.
That doesn’t mean you need to do it alone, of course. Spouses, friends or a counselor can all help you explore your emotions in a way that allows you to better understand your own thoughts and needs while still giving your child the support they need.
Your Eating Habits Will Become Their Eating Habits
Eating healthy is something many families struggle with. Even so, It’s important to understand the basics of nutrition and set up some healthy eating habits for yourself before you decide to have children. Whatever you feed them will shape them as human beings.
If you’re used to drinking a lot of soda or eating candy, don’t be surprised if your child does the same. Proper nutrition is a never-ending battle, but it’s your responsibility to incorporate it as much as possible into your kid’s life. After all, you’re in charge of their well-being and health now.
Life Goes By Fast — Really Fast
It’s true what they say — children grow up in the blink of an eye. One day, you’re celebrating their one-year birthday, and the next, they’re turning fifteen. Cherish those moments and make the most out of being a parent.
While some stages of life may be more difficult than others, remember that you only get to experience the good parts of each part with each child once. Enjoy that fresh baby smell, the adoration of your toddler and your child’s first game or performance, and don’t linger on the bad times.
There’s a Never-Ending Amount of Laundry
You might notice that you’ll constantly have piles of clothes that need to be washed. Kids get messy, and if you don’t want to constantly buy new clothes, you have to learn how to do laundry in the most effective way possible.
Even if you did just fine washing clothes on an as-needed basis before you had kids, you’ll probably need a schedule to keep up with the sheer amount of dirty laundry coming your way. Bonus tip: Buy extra pairs of socks — they absolutely will start disappearing.
Seeing Them Hurt Will Break Your Heart
There’s nothing sadder than seeing your child in pain. Whether they’re young or old, it never gets easier. Witnessing them cry will be absolutely heartbreaking, but you have to understand that it will happen.
Prepare yourself for the fact that your kids will get hurt. All you can do for them is to be there and help them in every possible way you can. Some things might be out of your control, but they have to know that you’ll always be there for them.
Their Mental Health Issues Won’t Be Visible
Mental health is an important subject every parent should talk about with their child. But it’s just as important to know that mental health issues aren’t always visible — you might not even know your child is depressed or experiencing other issues.
It’s important to let them know they can tell you everything, especially when their mental health might not be at the best place. If things get bad, don’t shrug it off — listen to them fully, demonstrate your support, and consider therapy as an option.
You’re in Trouble When They Learn They Can Say No
At one point, your child will realize they can say no to you, and they absolutely will. The truth is, they’re totally allowed to — just because they’re your child, it doesn’t mean they have to always agree with you. You shouldn’t punish them for saying no. In fact, you should acknowledge their own preferences.
However, if you feel like they’re saying no to something that would be beneficial for them, make sure you explain and communicate why they should listen to you. Remain calm and talk to them with respect at all times.
They Have Opinions, and They Use Them
Once children become older, they develop their own opinions that might be different from what you believe. Don’t freak out when that happens, and remember that you’re raising another human, an individual, not a clone of yourself. It’s one of the hardest things for some parents to realize.
That said, while having opinions is fine, harming or disrespecting others is not. Kids sometimes forget that words can have an impact on others, so it’s up to you to model respectful, mature behavior.
They Will Be Influenced by the Internet
Whether the internet was in its early stages when you were growing up or you didn’t have it at all, it’s a different animal today. From TikTok to YouTube, children watch all sorts of things to pass the time, and some of that content isn’t a good influence.
Parental controls can help to a degree, but the most important thing is to establish a relationship with your child where they feel comfortable sharing their experiences with you. It’s also best to talk with them from an early age about how to navigate the web and the potential dangers out there.
Some Things Will Be Out of Your Control
With so many barriers to success in today’s world, it can be tempting to think that the only way for your kid to get ahead in life is to make sure they have every advantage possible. However, this kind of thinking can backfire.
You’ve probably heard of helicopter parenting — it’s when a parent tries to control every single thing in their child’s life.While it might have benefits in the short term, it comes with the risk of denying your child valuable experience and a sense of self-competence. Not only can your child probably survive a few failures, but they might even learn from them.
You’ll Have to Respect Their Feelings
Parents are often dismissive of their kids’ feelings because they believe they know what’s best for them. They feel like it doesn’t matter what their child thinks if it contradicts what they believe. It’s a recipe for a toxic relationship between yourself, your child and — should they imitate you —the rest of the world.
Whatever your child is feeling is completely valid. They may make bad decisions as a result of those feelings, but by ensuring your child recognizes that you recognize their emotions, you make them more likely to trust you and help them feel secure as they explore their own feelings.
You Might Be Annoyed by Them, But You’ll Love Them Unconditionally
As difficult as raising a child can be, both for all the emotional struggles and the unrelenting horror of what lies in wait inside baby diapers, the bond between parent and child is unique and worth cultivating.
It’s natural not just for children to be annoyed by their parents, but also parents by their children. They sometimes ignore valuable advice, forget to call and even say things they may regret, but if you’re always there for your child, odds are, they’ll always be there for you.
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Parents, have you done your homework? Children’s Health Coalition launches new campaign to help parents get up to speed on the COVID-19 vaccine for kids
Posted on February 1, 2022
Topics: All articles on Spotlight All articles on COVID-19
Just as children are asked to do their homework, now it’s time for parents to do their own to make an informed choice about COVID-19 vaccination for their children.
A new campaign aimed at providing Ontario parents with the facts about COVID-19 vaccination for children aged five to 11 flips the script on a familiar family topic. Parents, have you done your homework?
Just as children are asked to do their homework, now it’s time for parents to do their own to make an informed choice about COVID-19 vaccination for their children. It’s okay though, because the medical experts are helping to make this easy.
The “Parent Homework” COVID-19 campaign, which launched on Jan. 31, was created by the Children's Health Coalition, a collective of children's health organizations across Ontario. It features TV and digital advertising, social media content including videos ( “Homework” and “Tutor” ) and a new website – parenthomework.ca.
Parenthomework.ca offers reliable resources to families with the facts about the COVID-19 vaccine, a curated list of frequently asked questions specific to the five to 11 age group, including some of the most common questions received by the SickKids COVID-19 Vaccine Consult Service , and helps parents “talk to a tutor” through the SickKids COVID-19 Vaccine Consult Service, as well as to book vaccination appointments.
The goal: to support families by providing them with trusted information about COVID-19 vaccination for children and learn from medical experts – all in one place.
The Children's Health Coalition includes The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) , CHEO , McMaster Children’s Hospital , Children’s Hospital – London Health Sciences Centre , Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital , Children’s Mental Health Ontario , Empowered Kids Ontario and Kids Health Alliance .
To learn more, check out parenthomework.ca and follow the Children’s Health Coalition on Twitter , Facebook and Instagram .
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Dow futures, nasdaq futures, russell 2000 futures, bitcoin usd, cmc crypto 200, parents need to work on emotional homework post-covid, mon schools administrator says.
Nov. 27—Elementary school scenes from a pandemic: There was case of the little girl couldn't stop crying one morning.
In those pre-vaccine days, she was convinced her grandmother, who was coughing and sniffling with a (medically diagnosed) cold was going to die of COVID, even though the matriarch had earlier tested negative for the contagion.
There was the little boy on another morning, in another school, who worked himself into a frenzy — over a chair.
He and a handful of classmates were picked for a read-aloud exercise in the front of the room, and chairs had been set up for the occasion.
Which was fine. Except that it wasn't.
He was worried the seat designated for him wasn't "sanitized enough " — and, with a mix of anxiousness and anger, he refused to the join the group.
The student did receive a slight reprimand, as his teacher was trying to navigate the unprecedented, uncharted straits of the coronavirus among an impressionable population.
Now, some three years later, the above students are readying to move on the middle school.
And everyone is still dipping a collective toe into post-COVID waters, to see where the emotional undertows may be.
Michael Ryan, who directs diversity and inclusion services for Monongalia County Schools, did a bit of a sonar sweep for Board of Education members earlier this month.
It was an emotional inventory, of sorts, from Panorama, a national program used by the district that charts such health and well-being among students and teachers.
Data has been compiled most recently from surveys given this fall, Ryan told the board.
Initial data from the first of many surveys to come shows that 75 % of students on the elementary school level are able to better control their emotions, given shifting situations of any classroom on any day.
Same for high school — except some students whose parents are divorced, and with joint custody, say moving back and forth between the two locations every weekend makes it hard to focus on homework.
And one middle school student was shouldering weight of a different sort. He was a sports star who feared he was personally letting his classmates down — if his team lost.
"Is it that they were sequestered for so long ?" BOE member Nancy Walker asked.
She was referring to the total shift to remote learning at the height of the pandemic during 2020 and 2021, in particular.
Ryan, who was West Virginia's state school guidance counselor of the year for 2018 before moving to the central offices of Mon's school district, said yes — Walker's observation was correct, in part.
Students, he said, likely didn't have the chance to make the emotional transition to different grades of school, and different buildings altogether, which add to growth and maturity.
There's that, plus the aforementioned home life for some that can get fragmented, he said.
While the district offers emotional health classes in all grades, Ryan said he's hoping that households do some literal homework over 2023, to help smooth out the ride.
Ryan realizes, he said, that a lot of it comes from parents getting their kids into several extracurricular activities, which they may see as a way to make up for those remote-learning days.
"People are so busy, we don't have the time to sit down and have a family dinner because we have two different kids, in two different places, at the same time, " he said.
"We need to work on getting our balance back."
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Parents, have you done your homework?
Children's Health Coalition launches new campaign to help parents get up to speed on the COVID-19 vaccine for kids
A new campaign aimed at providing Ontario parents with the facts about COVID-19 vaccination for children aged five to 11 flips the script on a familiar family topic. Parents, have you done your homework?
Just as children are asked to do their homework, now it's time for parents to do their own to make an informed choice about COVID-19 vaccination for their children. It's okay though, because the medical experts are helping to make this easy.
The "Parent Homework" COVID-19 campaign, which launched this month, was created by the Children's Health Coalition, a collective of children's health organizations across Ontario. It features TV and digital advertising, social media content including videos ( "Homework" and " Tutor ") and a new website: parenthomework.ca .
Parenthomework.ca offers reliable resources to families with the facts about the COVID-19 vaccine, a curated list of frequently asked questions specific to the five to 11 age group, including some of the most common questions received by the SickKids COVID-19 Vaccine Consult Service , and helps parents "talk to a tutor" through the SickKids COVID-19 Vaccine Consult Service , as well as to book vaccination appointments.
The goal is to support families by providing them with trusted information about COVID-19 vaccination for children and learn from medical experts – all in one place.
The Children's Health Coalition includes The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) , CHEO , McMaster Children's Hospital , Children's Hospital – London Health Sciences Centre , Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital , Children's Mental Health Ontario , Empowered Kids Ontario and Kids Health Alliance .
To learn more, check out parenthomework.ca and follow the Children's Health Coalition on Twitter , Facebook and Instagram .
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Parental involvement in homework of children with learning disabilities during distance learning: Relations with fear of COVID‐19 and resilience
Thanos touloupis.
1 Department of Education, University of Nicosia, Nicosia Cyprus
The present study investigated parental involvement in the homework of children with learning disabilities, during distance learning due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) pandemic. Also, the role of parents' fear of COVID‐19 and resilience in their involvement in homework was examined. The study involved 271 parents (140 mothers and 131 fathers) of children with learning disabilities, who studied in the fifth and sixth grade from4 schools of Thessaloniki (Greece). Parents completed a set of self‐reported questionnaires, which included a scale on parental involvement in homework, a scale on fear of COVID‐19, and a scale on resilience. According to the results, both mothers and fathers expressed a high fear of COVID‐19, a low sense of resilience, and were involved in homework mostly in terms of parental control. Parental involvement in homework was not significantly differentiated by children's gender and grade. Furthermore, the path analysis model showed that parents' fear of COVID‐19 predicted, indirectly and positively, parental control through the mediating role of resilience. The findings show how parents' current emotional state affects their involvement in the homework of children with learning disabilities. Finally, the findings imply the need for parental counseling during the pandemic, to feel more resilient and consequently supportive towards children's learning.
1. INTRODUCTION
The issue of parental involvement in students' homework has attracted scientific interest of many researchers during the last two decades (e.g., Epstein, 1991 ; Fan & Chen, 2001 ; Gonida & Cortina, 2014 ; Jeynes, 2003 ; Patall et al., 2008 ). Parental involvement is defined as “the parents' or caregivers' investment in the education of their children” (LaRocque et al., 2011 , p. 116), while more specifically parental involvement in children's homework is considered the parental activities at home that are related to children's learning in school (Hoover‐Dempsey & Sandler, 1997 ). The majority of the researchers have agreed that parents' active role in their children's education is considered beneficial for their children's social, emotional, and academic development (Green et al., 2007 ), contributing in that way to their children's academic success (Graves & Brown Wright, 2011 ; Mattingly et al., 2002 ).
However, children's academic outcomes seem to depend on the type of parental involvement in homework (Balli et al., 1997 ; Fan & Chen, 2001 ; Patall et al., 2008 ; Pomerantz et al., 2007 ). In general, in international literature parental involvement is usually reflected in two different ways in which parents choose to engage in their children's homework. On the one hand, there are parents who display help and support for children's academic efforts, giving clear and consistent guidelines about homework (parental homework support). On the other hand, there are parents who exert pressure on children to complete assignments, and set strict rules, restrictions, and punishments during their involvement in their children's homework (parental homework control; Núñez et al., 2015 ; Silinskas & Kikas, 2019 ). These two types of parental involvement (parental homework support/control) seem to be negatively correlated with each other. This means, for example, that the more parents express parental control the less likely they are to adopt parental support when they involve in their children's homework, and vice versa (Núñez et al., 2015 ; Silinskas & Kikas, 2019 ). Furthermore, the available findings show that the more supportive the parents they are (e.g., being patient and clear in giving guidelines) during their involvement in school homework (parental homework support) the more likely for children to have higher academic performance. On the contrary, parents' engagement in school homework in a stricter and more controlling way (parental homework control) often makes children more prone to negative academic outcomes (Cooper et al., 2000 ; Gonida & Cortina, 2014 ; Ng et al., 2004 ).
It should be highlighted that the most important reason why the previous studies, as well as the present study, focus on parental involvement during elementary years is the fact that, in general, parents tend to involve in their children's homework to a greater extent during elementary years, as children need more guidance and supervision regarding their learning (Barnard, 2004 ). On the contrary, parents use to engage in homework less frequently as their children grow older and act more independently during their homework (Epstein & Lee, 1995 ; Hoover‐Dempsey & Sandler, 1997 ). Also, the importance of focusing on parents of school‐age students lies in the fact that information about the adopted positive (parental support) or negative type (parental control) of parental involvement in homework in the elementary years usually constitutes a predictive factor for children's later academic outcomes in the high school years (Barnard, 2004 ; Rogers et al., 2009 ).
Additionally, it is worth noting that most of the related studies that have examined the type of parental involvement in children's homework have been conducted on a sample of parents whose children did not face any learning or developmental difficulty (e.g., Antony‐Newman, 2019 ; Cooper et al., 2000 ; Gonida & Cortina, 2014 ; Kalaycı & Öz, 2018 ; Ng et al., 2004 ; Tao et al., 2019 ). Nevertheless, only a few studies have investigated this issue in parents of children with nontypical development, such as children with visual impairments or Attention‐Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD; McDonnall et al., 2012 ; Rogers et al., 2009 ). Despite the fact that learning disabilities (LD) 1 are the most common type of special educational needs (World Health Organization, 2015 ), the related studies carried out with parents of children with LD are even more limited. Children with LD can be described as those with specific developmental disorders of school skills, including (a) reading disability, (b) writing disability, and (c) arithmetic disability (World Health Organization, 2015 ). Although findings on parental involvement in the homework of children with LD are scarce, the limited studies show that the situation with parents' help in children's learning at home differs negatively from those of children without LD. For example, children with LD usually require more help from their parents, compared to their peers without LD (Ferrel, 2012 ), while having a child with LD often results in conflicts in parent–child relationships (Amerongenm & Mishna, 2004 ). The situation described before makes parents of children with LD adopt a maladaptive way of involvement in their children's homework. For instance, parents tend to exert more pressure, restrictions, and give more orders in school tasks, so that they feel that their children's learning is under control. Also, sometimes parents of children with LD, due to the objective learning difficulties, are not fully motivated to engage in their children's homework, while they often even give up doing so, because they feel less efficacious in doing this (Grolnick et al., 1997 ).
The importance of the issue of parental involvement in children's homework undoubtedly is highlighted by the recent distance learning circumstances, imposed by policymakers on student populations from many countries, such as Greece, during the period of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) pandemic. The fact that since March 2020 almost all learning activities at all educational levels are carried out exclusively online at students' home has probably affected the way parents involve in their children's homework (Sari & Maningtyas, 2020 ). However, this effect has received little attention until now. According to the available studies, on the one hand, parents seem to support and supervise their children's homework during distance learning (Novianti & Garzia, 2020 ; Sari & Maningtyas, 2020 ). On the other hand, parents report problems about how to help their children and provide them with the necessary learning facilities at home. According to parents' responses, this situation often makes them exert control and adopt strict rules when they are involved in their children's homework (Hafidz et al., 2020 ). Consequently, the findings above seem to be contradictory, as they sometimes reveal a supportive and other times a less supportive parental type during distance learning. Furthermore, these findings don't inform about the specific type of parental involvement in children's homework during the period of distance learning (e.g., parental support/control). Also, the aforementioned findings are based on parents of children with typical learning development, and consequently, we are not allowed to draw safe conclusions for parents of children with LD.
Additionally, it seems that parents' involvement in children's homework seems to be affected by parents' and children's gender. For instance, mothers mention a more extensive involvement (regardless of the type of involvement) in their children's homework, not just because they choose to themselves, but mainly because they are assigned this role due to gender‐based stereotypical behaviors (Georgiou, 2000 ). On the contrary, fathers, claim as excuses for their lower levels of involvement in homework the lack of time, occupational obligations, as well as the fact that engaging in their children's homework belongs to female duties (Nord, 1998 ). Regarding children's gender, fathers are concerned with their boys' homework, while mothers seem to engage in both, boys' and girls' homework. This could be attributed to findings which prove that fathers, compared with mothers, interact more with sons than daughters in the context of play and school‐related activities in general (Tan & Goldberg, 2009 ). Based on the findings above, it is obvious that the related studies are considerably limited without informing about the specific type of involvement adopted by each parent. This, in conjunction with the fact that the available findings are based almost exclusively on parents of children with typical development, don't offer sufficient information on whether mothers and fathers of children with LD involve in a different way in cases of boys and girls school homework.
Additionally, taking into consideration the emotionally vulnerable period of the COVID‐19 pandemic we are going through, someone could not omit to examine the contribution of parents' current emotional state to their involvement in their children's homework. This lies in the fact that recent studies confirm a negative emotional state among adults, which seems to be reflected mainly in people's high fear of COVID‐19 and low sense of resilience. As far as the first emotional factor, it is mentioned that both male and female adults express a high sense of fear of COVID‐19, namely a constant and intense worrying about being infected by a coronavirus (Campagnaro et al., 2020 ; Gabor et al., 2020 ). Furthermore, recent findings during the last year (2019–2020) highlight that people's resilience is another emotional factor that has been adversely affected during the period of pandemic. Resilience reflects individuals' ability to adapt positively to a new difficult and adverse condition (Luthar, 2006 ; Masten, 2001 ; Rutter, 2006 ). Based on the available findings, both male and female adults (such as parents) tend to express a low sense of resilience during the period of COVID‐19 pandemic (Rosenberg, 2020 ; Vinkers et al., 2020 ).
Also, it is worth mentioning that the literature confirms the existence of predictive relationships between the variables under study (parental involvement, fear of COVID‐19, and resilience) per two. For example, some researchers mention that there is a negative predictive relationship between adults' fear of COVID‐19 and their sense of resilience. In other words, adults who are processed by a high fear of COVID‐19, they are more likely to express a low sense of resilience (e.g., Karataş & Tagay, 2020 ; Seçer et al., 2020 ). Also, other studies conclude that parents' sense of resilience has been reported as a positive predictive factor for their involvement in children's learning at home (e.g., Fagan & Palkovitz, 2007 ). That is, parents who feel more resilient in general tend to adopt more beneficial (supportive) ways when they involve in their children's homework and vice versa (e.g., Fagan & Palkovitz, 2007 ). Taking into consideration the findings above, it is implied that there is a network of relationships among fear of COVID‐19, sense of resilience and parental involvement in children's homework. Nevertheless, according to the author's knowledge almost no study has been identified that addresses this network of relationships, and especially for parents of children with LD. Something that could offer a more holistic and, subsequently more realistic perspective on how emotional mechanisms explain a particular parental behavior.
1.1. Purpose, goals, and hypotheses of the present study
Based on the literature review and the literature gaps mentioned above, the present study aimed to investigate the type of parental involvement in the homework of children with LD during distance learning in the period of COVID‐19 pandemic. At the same time, the study examined the role of parents' fear of COVID‐19 and resilience in their involvement in homework. Specifically, the following research questions emerged: What type of involvement in homework of children with LD is mostly adopted by parents during distance learning? Is the type of involvement in homework affected by parents' and children's gender? What is the network of the relationships among the variables under study (parental involvement, fear of COVID‐19, and resilience)? Based on the related literature, the theoretical connection model of the variables involved is illustrated in Figure 1 .
Hypothetical structural model of the network of the relationships among variables
According to the majority of the related findings, it is expected that during distance learning in the period of COVID‐19 pandemic parents of children with LD adopt a maladaptive type of involvement in children's homework, such as parental control, to a greater extent than a beneficial one, such as parental support (Hypothesis 1; Amerongenm & Mishna, 2004 ; Ferrel, 2012 ; Grolnick et al., 1997 ). Also, regarding parents' gender (and in accordance with the previous Hypothesis) it is expected that mothers are involved in their children's homework in terms of control to a greater extent, compared to fathers (Hypothesis 2a; Georgiou, 2000 ; Nord, 1998 ). As far as children's gender, it is expected that mothers are involved in terms of control in both boys' and girls' homework, while fathers are involved in terms of control mainly in boy's homework (Hypothesis 2b; Tan & Goldberg, 2009 ). Finally, regarding the network of the relationships among the variables under study the following are expected: Parents' fear of COVID‐19 predicts indirectly (in a negative way) their support and (in a positive way) control type of involvement in homework, through the mediating role of their sense of resilience (Hypothesis 3; Fagan & Palkovitz, 2007 ; Karataş & Tagay, 2020 ; Seçer et al., 2020 ).
2.1. Sample
The pilot sample of the study consisted of 50 randomly selected parents of different families (30 [60%] mothers, 20 [40%] fathers), whose children had been diagnosed with LD and studied in the fifth and sixth grade from schools located in economically diverse districts of Thessaloniki (Greece). Parents were contacted via email by the Educational and Counseling Centers (K.E.S.Y.) of Thessaloniki, which are officially authorized centers by the Greek Ministry of Education for the diagnosis of LD among a student population of each prefecture (Ministry of Education MINEDU, 2018 ). The parents of the pilot sample were approached during the first period of lockdown in Greece (March–April 2020) due to the COVID‐19 pandemic. The parents were asked to complete a set of online self‐reported questionnaires. The pilot study did not indicate the need to modify the questionnaires. Therefore, the pilot sample ( N = 50) was integrated into the sample of the main study (221 parents), which was approached online during April–May 2020 (first period of lockdown in Greece) and November 2020 (second period of lockdown in Greece), resulting in a total sample of 271 randomly selected parents of different families (140 [52%] mothers, 131 [48%] fathers). Regarding the children of the 271 families, 151 (56%) were boys and 120 (44%) girls, while as far as their grade 140 children studied in the fifth (52%) and 131 (48%) in the sixth grade of elementary school 2 .
2.2. Instruments
For the present study, a set of self‐reported online questionnaires was used. The initial questions concerned parents' (gender) and children's demographic characteristics (diagnostic category, gender, and grade). After this introductory part, three main parts followed.
2.2.1. Questionnaire on parental involvement in homework
The measurement of parental involvement in students' homework was carried out with the Greek translation of a related questionnaire constructed by Núñez et al. ( 2015 ), to reflect the basic two dimensions of parental involvement in homework. The questionnaire has been used in other studies with elementary school students, with good psychometric properties (Núñez et al., 2015 ; Silinskas & Kikas, 2019 ). For the purpose of the present study expressive modifications were made so that the questionnaire to address parents (not children) of elementary school children. The questionnaire consists of eight items, which are grouped into two distinct factors reflecting the following two negatively correlated types of parental involvement in children's homework: (a) parental support homework (e.g., “I help my child with homework if he/she asks for assistance”), and (b) parental control homework (e.g., “I scold and punish my child if he/she doesn't do all the homework”). Parents are asked to respond to these statements on a 5‐point scale ranging from (1) = completely false to (5) = completely true .
To test the validity of the questionnaire, a principal component analysis was carried out using the main component method and Varimax‐type rotation (KMO = 0.898, Bartlett χ 2 = 1871.340, p < .001). Two distinct factors emerged with an eigenvalue more than 1.0 and significant interpretive value (Table 1 ) in line with the original factor structure: Factor 1 = parental control homework, explaining 33.23% of the total variance, and Factor 2 = parental support homework, explaining 21.15% of the total variance. The internal consistency indexes for each factor separately are: Factor 1 ( α = 0.828), and Factor 2 ( α = 0.772). The affinities (according to Pearson's correlation coefficient r ) of the score of each question by each Factor with the sum of the scores of the remaining questions of the same factor (corrected item − total correlation) are considered satisfactory 3 : Factor 1 (from r = 0.59 to r = 81), and Factor 2 (from r = 0.55 to r = 88).
Principal component analysis of the questionnaire on parental involvement in students' homework
Note 1 : F1 : Factor “Parental control homework,” F2 : Factor “Parental support homework.”
Note 2 : All of the above‐standardized loadings of the two factors are statistically significant ( p < .05).
2.2.2. Fear of COVID‐19 Scale
Parents' fear of COVID‐19 was measured with the Greek translation of the Fear of COVID‐19 Scale (FCV‐19S; Ahorsu et al., 2020 ). The scale was created to assess individuals' sense of fear of COVID‐19. The scale includes seven statements and constitutes one distinct factor measuring participants' emotional state towards COVID‐19 (e.g., “I am most afraid of coronavirus‐19,” “It makes me uncomfortable to think about coronavirus‐19.”). Participants are asked to respond to the statements based on a 5‐point Likert scale, ranging from (1) = strongly disagree to (5) = strongly agree . The index of fear of COVID‐19 derives from the average of the total score of the statements. The higher the score of the participants the higher their fear of COVID‐19.
To test the validity of the scale, a principal component analysis was carried out using the main component method and Varimax‐type rotation (KMO = 0.898, Bartlett χ 2 = 1829.191, p < .001). One factor emerged with an eigenvalue more than 1.0 and significant interpretive value (Table 2 ) in line with the original factor structure: Factor 1 = Fear of COVID‐19, explaining 58.51% of the total variance. The internal consistency index for the factor is α = 0.898. The affinities (according to Pearson's correlation coefficient r ) of the score of each question of the factor with the sum of the scores of the remaining questions of the factor (corrected item − total correlation) are considered satisfactory: Factor 1 (from r = 0.45 to r = 0.74).
Principal component analysis of the Fear of COVID‐19 Scale
Note 1 : F1 : Factor “Fear of COVID‐19.”
Note 2 : All of the above‐standardized loadings of the factor are statistically significant (p < .05).
Abbreviation: COVID‐19, coronavirus disease 2019.
2.2.3. Resilience Scale
The measurement of parents' resilience was carried out with the short version of the Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale (The Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale ‐ CD‐RISC; Connor & Davidson, 2003 ) of Campbell‐Sills and Stein ( 2007 ). The original long version of the CD‐RISC (25 items) investigates people's positive adaptation to stressful and/or difficult situations. According to Campbell‐Sills and Stein ( 2007 ), the factor structure of the original CD‐RISC is unstable across demographically equivalent samples, while the short version of the scale has excellent psychometric properties in student population. This finding demonstrates that resilience can be reliably assessed with a subset of the CD‐RISC items. Thus, in the short version of the CD‐RISC, resilience is measured through 10 representative statements/proposals (they reflect individuals' ability to tolerate experiences such as change, personal problems, illness, pressure, failure, and painful feelings), which form a single‐distinct factor “resilience” (Campbell‐Sills & Stein, 2007 ). These statements/proposals are answered on a 5‐point Likert scale (from 0 = not at all true to 4 = almost always true ). Examples of the statements/proposals are the following: “I am able to adapt to change,” “I tend to bounce back after illness or hardship,” and “I can handle unpleasant feelings.” Individual items are summed to produce an overall score, with higher scores indicating higher levels of resilience.
To test the validity of the scale, a principal component analysis was carried out using the main component method and Varimax‐type rotation (KMO = 0.819, Bartlett χ 2 = 1819.399, p < .001). One distinct factor emerged with eigenvalue more than 1.0 and significant interpretive value (Table 3 ) in line with the original factor structure: Factor 1 = resilience, explaining 65.23% of the total variance. The internal consistency index for Factor 1 is α = 0.829. The affinities (according to Pearson's correlation coefficient r ) of the score of each question by Factor 1 with the sum of the scores of the remaining questions of the factor (corrected item − total correlation) are considered satisfactory: Factor 1 (from r = 0.59 to r = 81).
Principal component analysis of the Resilience Scale
Note 1 : F1 : Factor “Resilience.”
Note 2 : All of the above‐standardized loadings of the factor are statistically significant ( p < .05).
2.3. Design
After the approval for the survey by the Greek Ministry of Education, an email was sent to 80 randomly selected parents of different families, whose children had been diagnosed with LD and studied in the fifth and sixth grade from schools located in economically diverse districts of Thessaloniki (Greece). The email was sent by the Educational and Counseling Centers (K.E.S.Y.) of Thessaloniki, where their children had been diagnosed with LD. The email included an attached consent form with details about the study and the identity of the researcher (the author of the article), who is an employee of K.E.S.Y. of Thessaloniki, as well as the link of the survey questionnaires that were designed using the online Google Drive platform. Finally, in the end of the consent form parents were asked to mention the diagnostic category of their children's LD. Out of the 80 parents, 50 responded positively to the researcher's email, coming from economically diverse districts of Thessaloniki (western, eastern, and central). The answers of the participating parents were automatically entered in a logistic sheet of the platform. The above process, which led to the selection of the pilot sample, led to no modifications of the online questionnaires. Consequently, the same process was carried out for the selection of the larger sample of the main study ( N = 221 parents), forming in that way the final sample of the study ( N = 271 parents). It should be highlighted that most of the participating parents didn't clarify the specific LD their children had been diagnosed with. This did not allow the researcher to investigate (with appropriate statistical analyses) the effect of students' diagnostic category of LD on the variables studied. The duration for the completion of the questionnaires was estimated at around 10–15 min. Undoubtedly, the participation of the parents was voluntary, while all the criteria of anonymity and confidentiality of the data were met.
3.1. Methods of analyses
For the present study, to depict parental involvement in the homework of children with LD (Hypothesis 1), as well as parents' fear of COVID‐19 and resilience descriptive statistics were applied. To test Hypotheses 2a and 2b two multivariate analyses of variance (MANOVAs) were used, setting the two types of parental involvement as dependent variables in both analyses. In the first analysis parents' gender and in the second analysis students' gender were considered as independent variables. To investigate the dyadic relationships between the variables under study (parental involvement, fear of COVID‐19, and resilience), a series of Pearson correlation analyses were carried out (Pearson r ). Finally, the confirmation of Hypothesis 3 was checked by applying path analysis to the data (using the Mplus programme with the Maximum Likelihood method) to depict the network of the relationships among the variables involved, which leads to the types of parental involvement in the homework of children with LD.
3.2. Descriptive statistics
According to the parents' responses, it seems that they use a control ( Mean = 4.15, SD = 0.70) to a greater extent, compared with support ( Mean = 2.58, SD = 0.54) when they involve in their children's homework, which confirms Hypotheses 1. Also, the results showed that parents expressed a high sense of fear of COVID‐19 ( Mean = 4.09, SD = 0.77) but a relatively low sense of resilience ( Mean = 2.05, SD = 0.85).
3.3. MANOVAs results
According to the results, parents' gender did not seem to significantly differentiate their type of involvement in their children's homework ( p > .05), rejecting in that way Hypotheses 2a. Hypotheses 2b was also rejected, as parental involvement in homework was not statistically affected by children's gender ( p > .05).
3.4. Correlations among variables
In Table 4 , it seems that parental support is negatively correlated with parental control in children's homework ( r = −0.399, p < .01). Also, there is a negative correlation between parents' fear of COVID‐19 and their sense of resilience ( r = −0.518, p < .01). Furthermore, parental control is positively correlated with parents' fear of COVID‐19 ( r = 0.151, p < .05) and negatively correlated with their sense of resilience ( r = −0.301, p < .01). On the contrary, parental support is negatively correlated with parents' fear of COVID‐19 ( r = −0.157, p < .05) and positively correlated with their sense of resilience ( r = 0.398, p < .01).
Correlations among variables
Note 1 : * p < .01, ** p < .01.
Note 2 : No statistically significant correlations ( p > .05) were omitted.
3.5. Path analyses among variables
To map the network of the relationships among the variables involved (parental involvement, fear of COVID‐19, and resilience), which leads to the type of parental involvement in the homework of children with LD, a series of preliminary analyses of linear stepwise regressions were performed to check the predictive relationships between the variables per two. Meeting the assumptions of normality and without any missing cases, the path model that emerged from the parents' responses had good fit indexes (Figure 2 ): χ 2 (27, Ν = 271) = 35.033, p > .05 (CFI = 0.991, TLI = 0.991, RMSEA = 0.064, SRMR = 0.083)
Schematic representation of the path model for parental involvement. Note 1 : The values on the arrows are standardized coefficients of the model. Note 2 : ** p < .01, (ns) = non‐significant. COVID‐19, coronavirus disease 2019
According to Figure 2 , parents' fear of COVID‐19 constitutes a direct and negative predictor of their sense of resilience. That is, parents who express a high sense of fear of COVID‐19 (as proved in the present study) tend to be characterized by a low sense of resilience. Parents' sense of resilience in turn seems to be a negative predictor of their involvement in children's homework in terms of control (parental control) but not in terms of support (parental support). In other words, parents who are characterized by a low sense of resilience (as it proved in the present study) tend to adopt a maladaptive type of parental involvement, such as parental control, in the homework of their children with LD. By examining the statistically significant mediating role of parents' sense of resilience in the relationship between their fear of COVID‐19, on the one hand, and their parental control, on the other hand, the following was found: parents' fear of COVID‐19 indirectly and positively predicts their control in homework through their sense of resilience ( Z 4 = −2.39, p < .05). This finding confirms Hypotheses 3 only partially, as parents' resilience was not proved to be a mediating variable between their fear of COVID‐19 and their support in their children's homework.
4. DISCUSSION
The present study aimed to investigate the types of parental involvement in the homework of children with LD during distance learning in the period of COVID‐19. At the same time, the role of parents' fear of COVID‐19 and resilience in their involvement in their children's homework was examined.
According to the results, parents of children with LD seemed to adopt to a great extent a less beneficial way when they engage in their children's learning at home. Specifically, they seemed to be controlling by exerting pressure on their children, interfering, and using orders during their involvement in homework (parental control). On the contrary, the beneficial type of parental involvement, such as providing consistent learning and guidance to their children when they really need it (parental support), seemed to be adopted to a lesser extent by parents of children with LD. The findings confirm Hypothesis 1, according to which it was expected that parental control is mostly expressed in case of involvement in the homework of children with LD, as well as studies, which mention that parents' engagement with the homework of children with LD usually reflects controlling, commanding, interfering or abstaining (Amerongenm & Mishna, 2004 ; Ferrel, 2012 ; Grolnick et al., 1997 ). Students' objective difficulties in specific learning domains constitute for many parents an unfamiliar field (Amerongenm & Mishna, 2004 ). This often makes parents feel that they don't have control of their children's learning situation, as they are unable to help them effectively with homework (Amerongenm & Mishna, 2004 ). Obviously, parents trying to compensate for this situation adopt a more controlling or interfering pattern of engagement in children's learning at home. Furthermore, this parents' attitude towards children's homework could be associated with the current period of distance learning during the COVID‐19 pandemic. Digital illiteracy of many parents in combination with technical and financial issues raised at home due to the online learning, such as the need for good quality of internet connection, separate room for school, teleconferences, possible purchase of more than one computer/laptop (Hafidz et al., 2020 ) could possibly trigger a more conflicting family environment, leading parents to make use of less patient and beneficial ways of helping their children with their school homework.
Furthermore, the results showed that both mothers and fathers expressed a high fear of COVID‐19 and a relatively low sense of resilience. These findings confirm related studies conducted on adults during the last year of the pandemic (e.g., Campagnaro et al., 2020 ; Gabor et al., 2020 ; Rosenberg, 2020 ; Vinkers et al., 2020 ). It is likely that the significant and sudden changes and the intense socio‐emotional consequences on people's life during lockdown due to the COVID‐19 pandemic (e.g., Rogers et al., 2021 ) made parents, regardless of their gender, experience stress, insecurity, and a low ability to adapt positively to the current difficult and adverse situation. Additionally, the present study revealed that parents' gender didn't significantly affect their type of involvement in their children's homework. This finding disconfirms Hypothesis 2a, according to which mothers were expected to be more involved in their children's school issues, regardless of the type of involvement, compared to fathers. Also, this finding is not in line with related studies, which highlight mothers' generally higher involvement in children's homework (e.g., in control or supportive way), compared with their husbands (Georgiou, 2000 ; Nord, 1998 ). Taking into consideration the fact that the studies mentioned before have been carried out with parents of children without LD, someone could argue the following: the existence of objective learning difficulties among children is likely to make both mothers and fathers more alert regarding their children's learning at home, leading parents to almost equal involvement in homework issues. However, the fact that LD often constitutes an unclear field for parents, as described earlier, possibly explains why the involvement of both mothers and fathers seems to be maladaptive (controlling and interfering). Also, the fact that both mothers and fathers seemed to get involved in children's homework could be attributed to the period of COVID‐19 pandemic. The confinement measures imposed by the Greek government to all citizens during the pandemic (Papiris et al., 2020 ) increased the time spent at home for both parents (Daniels, 2020 ), possibly making mothers and fathers more available to engage and supervise their children's homework. Nevertheless, this extra time that parents spent on their children's homework doesn't seem to be supportive in most cases. Another finding of the present study was that children's gender didn't significantly affect the types of parental involvement. This finding disconfirms Hypothesis 2b, according to which it was expected that mothers are involved in both boys' and girls' homework while fathers are involved mainly in boy's homework. Accordingly, this finding is in contrast with related studies conducted on parents of children without LD, which reveal the pattern of parental involvement described before based on children's gender (e.g., Tan & Goldberg, 2009 ). These parents' gender‐based stereotypical behaviors (Georgiou, 2000 ) don't seem to apply in the case of parents of children with LD. As mentioned before, it is likely that raising a child with LD in combination with both parents' more time spent at home during the period of lockdown (Daniels, 2020 ) make mothers and fathers more available for supervising their child's homework during distance learning (even in a maladaptive way). Therefore, based on the findings above, the following is concluded: The fact that during distance learning both parents seemed to be interested in the homework of their children with LD, regardless of their children's gender, could be considered positive. However, it seems that parents choose to involve in a less beneficial way (parental control), which is more alarming taking into consideration that children with LD usually need a more supportive and personalized way of parental guidance in their homework (Keeffe, 2017 ; Polychroni et al., 2006 ).
Finally, the results of the path analysis model revealed that parents' fear of COVID‐19 predicts indirectly and positively their control in their involvement in children's homework, through the negative mediating role of parents' resilience. This means that Hypothesis 3 was confirmed only partially. At the same time, Hypothesis 3 was partially disconfirmed, as parents' resilience didn't mediate between their fear of COVID‐19 and their support in their children's homework. The path analysis results reflect findings of previous studies, which conclude that adults' fear of COVID‐19 can lead to a low sense of resilience (e.g., Karataş & Tagay, 2020 ; Seçer et al., 2020 ), which in turn can result in adopting a less beneficial way of involvement in children's learning at home (e.g., Fagan & Palkovitz, 2007 ). Actually, the indirect (and not the direct) effect of parents' fear of COVID‐19 on their controlling involvement in their children's homework could be considered encouraging, as it implies that strengthening parents' low sense of resilience during the current period could suspend the above effect. In other words, parents who experience stressful feelings during the unstable and unsecure period of COVID‐19 pandemic does not necessarily mean that they adopt more maladaptive ways of involvement in their children's learning at home, as long as they are possessed by a high sense of resilience. Undoubtedly, this is of high practical importance for prevention/intervention actions by mental health professionals during the period of lockdown considering parents' reported vulnerable emotional state (see Contribution of the study section). Finally, the fact that parents' current emotional state (high fear of COVID‐19, low resilience) didn't significantly predict their parental support towards their children's homework could be attributed to the fact that this type of parental involvement was adopted to a much lower extent in general by the participating parents.
In summary, the present study concludes that during the current period of distance learning due to the COVID‐19 pandemic parents of children with LD tend to adopt a less beneficial type of involvement (control) in homework. Furthermore, parents' high fear of COVID‐19 and low sense of resilience, displaying the current period, seem to constitute crucial predictive factors for their control type of involvement in children's learning at home. Therefore, the present study could argue that the maladaptive way of parental involvement in the homework of children with LD (e.g., control) that has been reported before the period of the COVID‐19 pandemic (Amerongenm & Mishna, 2004 ; Grolnick et al., 1997 ) could possibly be burdened due to the evoked parents' vulnerable emotional state the current period.
4.1. Limitations, future research, and contribution of the present study
The findings of the present study should be interpreted with caution as they are subject to specific limitations. For example, the restriction to parents of a particular city limits the possibility of generalizing the results. Also, the study followed a quantitative method, which did not allow for an in‐depth qualitative investigation of the parents' relevant feelings and practices. Finally, the lack of information about the specific diagnostic category of children's LD, did not allow the examination of the effect of these diagnostic categories (e.g., dyslexia) on parental involvement. These limitations could trigger future relevant studies conducted on a sample of parents from other cities as well. A larger sample of parents would allow the investigation of the statistical effect mentioned before. Furthermore, a related study conducted on both parents and children with LD could offer a more realistic view of the issue studied, as according to some researchers (Grolnick & Slowiaczek, 1994 ; Hoover‐Dempsey et al., 2005 ; Núñez et al., 2015 ) children's perceived parental involvement in homework is more real than the actual nature or extent of parents' engagement in homework. In addition, a complementary qualitative investigation of the issue under study, through individual semi‐structured interviews or focus groups with parents, could better capture their emotional state and their experiences with their involvement in their children's homework during distance learning, possibly highlighting other parameters of the issue studied.
Nevertheless, the present study contributes to international and mainly Greek literature on the topic. It constitutes the first attempt to depict the network of the relationships between emotional (fear of COVID‐19, resilience) and behavioral factors (parental involvement) that explain the way parents of children with LD involve in learning at home during the period of distance learning. Undoubtedly, these findings constitute an important source of information and awareness for the professionals of mental health. The findings imply the need for living or even online educational and psychological support for parents during the period of pandemic. This initiative could be addressed by school counselors of each prefecture or school psychologists, who are officially responsible for organizing prevention/intervention actions (even online) for the members of the school community (e.g., parents) regarding current school issues in General and Special Education (Jacob et al., 2016 ; Perera‐Diltz & Mason, 2008 ), such as parental involvement in homework during the lockdown. Also, these actions could be supported by competent Counseling Centers under the auspices of each country's Ministry of Education, such as the Educational and Counseling Centers in Greece, where psychologists and special education teachers are in constant (even distance) cooperation with the school community, to guide and help classroom teachers and parents of children with LD to effectively adjust to adverse circumstances (Ministry of Education MINEDU, 2018 ), such as the period of the pandemic. This psychological and educational support should focus on beneficial types of parental involvement in their children's homework, promoting autonomy support and cognitive engagement, during distance learning. Furthermore, psychological help to parents, through short‐term (online) sessions, is important to address strategies about managing parents' stressful feelings about the COVID‐19 pandemic, as well as enhancing their sense of resilience during the current period. The latter strategies may act protectively against the development of dysfunctional types of parental involvement in homework, forming in that way a family environment that could be considered supportive for children's academic performance.
CONFLICT OF INTERESTS
The author declares that there is no conflict of interests.
& Touloupis, T. (2021). Parental involvement in homework of children with learning disabilities during distance learning: Relations with fear of COVID‐19 and resilience . Psychol Schs , 58 , 2345–2360. 10.1002/pits.22596 [ CrossRef ] [ Google Scholar ]
Thanos Touloupis is an adjunct faculty (Lecturer position) at the Distance Learning Master's Degree in “Special Education”, University of Nicosia.
1 From this point on and for the rest of the present article learning disabilities will be mentioned as LD.
2 In the Greek educational system, elementary school lasts 6 years followed by high school, split into junior high and senior high school (Ministry of Education MINEDU, 2018 ).
3 In a sample of 300 and 600 people, loadings of more than 0.29 and 0.21, accordingly, are accepted (Field, 2005 ).
4 Ζ = standardized normal distribution value.
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Family engagement is critical for schools’ COVID-19 recovery efforts
More than two and a half years later, the cumulative effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on children and their caregivers are coming into clear view. Surveys of both parents and educators highlight concerning trends in children’s emotional well-being and mental health. These concerns are heightened for children of color, who were significantly more likely to lose a parent or caregiver from a COVID-19 related death. Recent research evaluating the effects of the pandemic on students’ learning trajectories reflects this reality. Learning rates slowed during the pandemic for most students, and even more so for students of color and students from low-income families.
Rachel M. Perera
Fellow - governance studies , brown center on education policy - the brookings institution.
Ayesha K. Hashim
Research scientist - nwea.
Hayley R. Weddle
Assistant professor, department of educational foundations, organizations, and policy - university of pittsburgh.
To support students, families, and schools in recovering from the varied harms of the pandemic, Congress has provided U.S. public schools with $190 billion in federal relief aid over the last three years. Many school districts are using some of these resources to fund academic interventions like summer and after-school programs and high-dosage tutoring that families can sign their children up for.
News reports and recent research indicate that participation in these opt-in recovery programs may be low. Some researchers argue that low participation rates indicate low levels of parent interest in academic recovery efforts. However, a broader literature on family engagement in education suggests that insights gleaned from families’ participation in recovery programs may be limited.
Here, we interrogate what we do and do not know about families’ interest in and engagement with COVID-19 recovery programs based on the limited research to date. We also summarize broader literatures on family engagement that can support education leaders working to better engage families in COVID-19 relief efforts. [1]
Surveys of Families Provide Limited Insights
First, let’s understand what we do and do not know about parents’ interest in COVID-19 recovery programs. According to a recent nationally representative survey , low shares of parents were interested in enrolling their child in either tutoring (28%) or summer school (23%) in spring 2022. Results from the same survey reported elsewhere show significant variation by family background, with Black, Asian, Latino, and low-income families significantly more likely to express interest in academic recovery programs relative to White and more affluent families. For example, about 35% of Black parents expressed interest in summer school compared to less than 20% of White families, with similarly large differences observed for interest in tutoring.
How the authors define parent interest is an important limitation of these results (a limitation the authors acknowledge). In particular, the survey uses parents’ participation in recovery programs (conditional on being offered an available seat) as a proxy for parents’ interest. This definition likely underestimates parents’ interest in academic recovery programs. This is because families’ participation in recovery interventions is almost certainly influenced by factors unrelated to their interest—e.g., program eligibility rules, scheduling issues, and transportation access. Put another way, this definition does not account for barriers families may face in accessing COVID-19 recovery programs for their children.
More importantly, these survey results leave unanswered critical questions as to why reported participation rates may be low.
One hypothesis that some researchers have put forth is that parents are overly optimistic about their children’s academic recovery from the effects of the pandemic. For example, according to a survey released earlier this fall by Education Next , 43% of parents report that their children did not experience any learning losses during the pandemic.
These results are being framed as potentially worrisome in part because they do not comport with researchers’ understanding of the breadth and magnitude of pandemic harm on test score growth. This misalignment may be driven by differences in the types of information available to parents relative to the information used in academic research. [2]
Regardless, the research to date leaves unanswered questions that are important for ensuring the success of COVID-19 recovery efforts in schools. Questions like: How do parents understand their children’s academic and emotional well-being needs in the context of COVID-19 recovery? How are parents making decisions about whether they enroll their children in COVID-19 recovery interventions? And what potential barriers are families encountering in accessing these resources?
What can research tell us about how to effectively engage families in schools’ COVID-19 recovery programs?
Research emphasizes the important roles that parents and families play in children’s learning and development. If COVID-19 recovery efforts are going to meaningfully aid students and their families, family engagement must be a critical component of those efforts. Work in this area makes an important distinction between family involvement and family engagement .
School-Driven Family Involvement Has Limitations
Family involvement is typically characterized by structured ways for parents to support their child’s learning as prescribed by schools. For example, family involvement includes activities like attending parent-teacher conferences, chaperoning school field trips, and engaging in other volunteer activities, but can also take the form of participation in school-based decision-making bodies like parent-teacher organizations .
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While some research suggests activities like this support student learning, other scholars argue that those effects can be explained by ethno-racial and socio-economic differences in the types of parents (e.g., white, middle-class parents) most likely to engage in prescribed forms of family involvement. For example, one study found that while family involvement activities such as attending parent-teacher conferences, PTO membership, volunteering at school, and homework checking are positively associated with test scores, this relationship is notably weaker—and perhaps even negative—after accounting for students’ race/ethnicity, socio-economic status, and baseline test scores.
Indeed, scholars have cautioned that families from less socio-economically advantaged backgrounds and families of color often encounter significant barriers to participating in schools in these highly prescribed ways. For example, one study found that negative interactions with teachers and other parents, as well as scheduling challenges, limited Black parents’ involvement with school-based activities.
Moreover, conceptualizing family involvement in narrow ways that are not inclusive of families who may have less time to donate or less relational trust with educators can exacerbate educational inequalities. For example, research shows that family involvement often yields additional benefits to highly involved (typically more affluent, white) families while simultaneously perpetuating negative stereotypes about less involved families (typically low-income families and families of color).
In the context of this research, recent surveys and reports showing low family uptake of academic recovery programs may be telling us more of what we already know: when schools expect families to engage in highly prescribed ways without sufficient stakeholder engagement, families may not participate. Claims that parents lack “interest” in their children’s education based on participation rates ignore existing structures and practices that limit parents’ participation in schools and incorrectly shift blame for educational inequalities onto families.
Partnership-Driven Family Engagement Shows Promise for COVID-19 Recovery
Moving beyond prescriptive roles for parents, family engagement is characterized by reciprocal relationships (grounded in relational trust) between educators and families—with the goal of working as partners to support student learning and school improvement. According to one scholar of community organizing for school reform, “parental engagement designates parents as citizens in the fullest sense—change agents who can transform urban schools and neighborhoods.” For example, family engagement practices include educators and families working in partnership to co-design engagement agendas, strategies, and initiatives, and consistently seeking out families’ expertise in the education of their children—all with the aim of sharing decision-making power with families and communities.
Research demonstrates that family engagement has many benefits, including promoting the success of school reform efforts , deepening leaders’ and educators’ understanding of stakeholder perspectives , and supporting child development outcomes . Justice-based approaches to family engagement recognize families as experts who can help build more equitable education systems. And considering the inequality-intensifying effects of the pandemic, it is critical that any engagement work is inclusive of all families, particularly communities of color, low-income families, and immigrant families.
How can schools develop stronger approaches to family-school engagement? A report recently commissioned by the Carnegie Corporation of New York outlines a research-based framework— the Dual Capacity-Building Framework for Family-School Partnerships –for developing strong family-school engagement that is grounded in anti-racist and social justice principles. This framework argues that for schools to meaningfully improve family-school engagement, schools need to build capacity for this type of partnership work among both educators and families and work to improve certain organizational conditions necessary for family-school partnerships to be successful. (For additional ideas on strategies schools can pursue to improve family-school partnerships, see work by our colleagues in Brookings’ Center for Universal Education.)
Some of our own research in Michigan suggests that strong relationships with families helped insulate schools from the worst outcomes during the pandemic. Districts that demonstrated better-than-predicted achievement growth in the 2020-2021 school year engaged in consistent and clear two-way communication with families. Further, these districts had strong existing relationships with families that provided a foundation for effectively supporting student learning during crisis.
Moving Towards a Family-Centered Approach to COVID-19 Recovery
Recent surveys of parents above all else underscore that family engagement in COVID-19 recovery efforts cannot be an afterthought. Family engagement in COVID-19 relief spending is a priority for the Biden-Harris administration . Yet, low shares of states and districts included explicit family engagement strategies in their COVID-19 spending plans .
Some education policy experts are recommending that districts consider adopting opt-out policies where opt-in participation is low. We argue that where opt-in rates are low, district and school officials should interpret that as a clear signal that parents and families have not been sufficiently engaged in decision-making. One lesson emerging from early work on implementing COVID-19 academic recovery programs is that family engagement is critical to a program’s success. Before making voluntary programs mandatory, school leaders and educators should engage with families and students to understand why participation rates were low in the first place and determine together what adjustments should be made.
COVID-19 relief funding provides a unique opportunity to rebuild public education after an exceptionally challenging two years. As Anne Ishimaru and Megan Bang have argued , we need to “recast families and communities as co-designers of education” rather than conceptualizing families as the recipients of services or even worse as barriers to implementation.
The road ahead for districts and schools will be challenging. Family engagement efforts will have to contend with the historic failures of school systems to effectively serve marginalized communities. Researchers can aid these efforts by fostering research-practice partnerships focused on developing family engagement practices grounded in educational equity. Without these efforts, school districts risk spending limited COVID-19 relief aid on programs and initiatives that don’t meet the needs of students and families and won’t remedy pandemic harms on student learning.
[1] Note that we use the terms “parent” and “family” interchangeably as both are used in this literature. We use “parent” to describe any family member or other adult in a caregiving role. Although, we rely more on the term “family” to acknowledge the diverse contexts in which children are cared for. (Back to top)
[2] Several academic studies that estimate the effects of the pandemic on test score growth do so by using large administrative datasets and comparing students’ rates of learning during the pandemic to pre-pandemic trends in student learning. (Back to top)
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Will the Pandemic Change Homework Forever?
Key Takeaways
- During the pandemic, some kids had internet access. Others didn't. Some had parents at home to help. Others didn't. Equity needed to be considered.
- Even before the pandemic, many educators were rethinking homework. Research shows it stresses students and most of homework doesn't help learning.
- It still has its supporters, who point to homework's role in developing time management and organizational skills.
Over the last school year, as the pandemic raged and all schoolwork became homework, the debate over homework's purpose and merit returned in force.
“I didn’t want them to be on their computers all day,” says California middle- school teacher Beth Mendonca-Seufert. “If they didn’t complete an assignment, I didn’t harp on it. You don’t know what’s going on in their homes—maybe they’re trying to work while they’re watching their baby brother.”
During this time, what mattered more than homework, she decided, was that students came to class and that “they [ felt] happy and supported.”
Last year, as pandemic-related stress skyrocketed and the lines between home and school blurred, many educators opted not to assign homework, they say . Parents were overwhelmed. Students needed a break from screens—if they had them. Equity was a concern. Some students had parents at home to help with tough assignments; others did not . Some had internet access ; others none.
Now, as students and educators nationwide return to in-person learning across the country , some educators are ready for homework to return , too. Many others, however, say they hope the pandemic forced a reckoning—and that homework will never be the same.
Homework or Busywork?
Stanford University’s Denise Pop e , an expert in curriculum improvement and student engagement, has been studying homework for years. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, she found that homework usually does more harm than good, she says . For one thing, students list it among the top three stressors in their lives. For another, research shows homework—except for independent reading of books that students choose—doesn’t correlate with student success.
“When we ask students how meaningful their homework is, we often get the answer that it’s not,” says Pope.
Massachusetts third-grade teacher Kim Lopes agrees. The problem with most homework , she says, is that teachers must assign to the middle, she says. For advanced students, it’s busywork. For others, “ it’s too hard, they need more support—and not everyone has a teacher at home.” Meanwhile, students and families could be using that time to unwind and recharge, she suggests.
“In my opinion, I think ‘practice’ should happen at school, where it can be supported by the professional in the room,” Lopes says. Lopes. For years, her students have had only two kinds of homework: basic math facts and an online, individualized reading and spelling program called Lexia Learning.
The pandemic reinforced what she has thought for years about homework—it’s stressful, inequitable, and unhelpful. Now, she hopes other educators will be more aware of these issues, too.
“I just hope they will be a little more empathetic," she says. “We’ve always had students whose parents don’t speak English, or students who don’t have internet. These problems have always existed, but the pandemic really put it in the front.”
Assignments with Impact
Even before the pandemic, shoe box dioramas and other elementary-age homework projects were fading in popularity. “They tend to need a lot of parent support and parents often are working,” says Pennsylvania fourth-grade teacher Camille Baker.
But that doesn’t stop Baker from assigning other kinds of homework. “I know I’m going to sound like I’m 95 years old,” says Baker, who has taught for 35 years, “but I think homework is a necessary part of school. I think it’s maligned because of the way it’s delivered. Its value depends on what’s assigned and how it’s assigned. I t doesn’t have to be a traditional paper-and-pencil exercise.”
As students and educators nationwide return to in-person learning across the country, some educators are ready for homework to returns, too. Many others, however, say they hope the pandemic forced a reckoning—and that homework will never be the same.
Homework teaches o rganization and time management skills, as well as a sense of responsibility and self-advocacy, Baker says. If students can’t complete an assignment at home, she adds, "they need to go to school the next day and say I thought I understood this, but when I sat down to do it, I realized I didn’t.”
During the pandemic, Baker’s students kept up with at-home reading logs, which parents sign. B ut she was unable to assign her favorite homework project, in which students teach their parents a unit of study from class, like the water cycle. The work includes booking a time with their parents, drawing up a detailed lesson plan that allocates a specific number of minutes to teach the most important facts, and assessing parents’ learning.
“It’s a great way to engage parents and students,” she says. “I just wish people knew there were other ways to present homework.”
Reference s
- 1 A High School Teacher Scrapped Homework. Here's What Happened Next.
- 2 The Great Homework Debate: What's Getting Lost in the Hype
- 3 If Elementary Schools Say No to Homework, What Takes Its Place?
- 1 Implicit Bias, Microaggressions, and Stereotypes Resources
- 2 Racial Justice in Education Framework
- 3 Racial Justice in Education Resources
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On April 2, 2020, the worldwide number of confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus, which causes an illness called COVID-19, topped 1 million. Much of the uncertainty and confusion swirl around the symptoms and what you should or shouldn’t ...
Homework is good because it gives students a chance to practice and internalize information presented during classroom lessons. It also encourages parents to get involved in the student’s education.
Becoming a parent enters you into a completely new and sometimes overwhelming world. Everything you don’t want to happen will happen, and you might find yourself begging for privacy and alone time.
The “Parent Homework” COVID-19 campaign, which launched on Jan. 31, was created by the Children's Health Coalition, a collective of
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ParentHomework.ca was created by the Children's Health. Coalition with the goal of providing families with trusted information about COVID-19 vaccination for
Parents, have you done your homework? It's okay, the medical experts have made it easy. Get up to speed on the children's COVID-19 vaccine
Parents need to work on emotional homework post-COVID, Mon Schools administrator says. Read full article. 3. Jim Bissett, The Dominion Post
Children's Health Coalition launches new campaign to help parents get up to speed on the COVID-19 vaccine for kids. A new campaign aimed at providing
The present study investigated parental involvement in the homework of children with learning disabilities, during distance learning due to the coronavirus
Low parent interest in COVID-recovery interventions should worry ... PTO membership, volunteering at school, and homework checking are
Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, many parents worried about their level of preparedness and skills for guiding their children through homework and school tasks
Distance Teaching During the COVID-19 Crisis: Social Connectedness ... Although it seems intuitive that parental homework involvement should
Some students had parents at home to help with tough assignments; ... Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, she found that homework usually