Educational Background of Family Members

School staff recognize that parental characteristics, values, beliefs and practices have the strongest influence on the way children are socialized. As the child's first and most important teachers, parents provide the experiences that promote life skills, abilities and attitudes that underlie school success. Child rearing philosophies and beliefs about how children learn are closely tied to how the parents were raised and taught as children. Adults who may have experienced difficulties learning to read and write in school are more likely to have low self–esteem (Horsman, 1990; Purcell–Gates, 1993a). As outlined previously, many of the parents retold their experiences of having difficulties in school and not having support from home or school to help foster their learning. Some, such as Doug and Natalie, dropped out of school early in frustration. Others, like Michelle, were determined to make it and persisted on their own without the support structures in place.

Jill was one parent in the study who may not have promoted reading and writing at home in the same way as a confident reader would, expecting that her son would experience the same problems that she had in school. She was afraid of instructing him incorrectly and left the task entirely to the school. In contrast, other parents, such as Natalie, tried to overcompensate for a potential problem by anticipating that her children could have the same type of learning disability from which she suffered when she was a child in school. Therefore, she made all efforts possible to prevent its occurrence or to minimize its effect in her two sons. She worked continuously with the teachers and sought extra resources for her child.

Health Issues

Health issues play out in this study by families dealing with so many chronic and acute health concerns, that there is less time and energy available for supporting the children with homework and school activities. In all of the families in the study, a significant percentage of their income was spent on cigarettes with at least one family member smoking minimally one pack of cigarettes each day. Many of the families also spent some of their meager income on alcohol or supporting their addictive gambling habits. This left little disposable income for buying educational materials or items to support learning in their family members.