In the 60’s and 70’s of the previous century, the term ‘parental involvement’ became apparent as a result of the implementation of the compensation programs for underprivileged children in European and American schools. In the current democratized society, the concept is still – and increasingly – a relevant subject and several theoretical frameworks have been developed during the past decades. In this respect, Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory of child development (1979) is significant. Its conceptual foundation has inspired other theoretically driven models of family-school relationships, among which Epstein’s (1995) theory of overlapping spheres of influence. Schools and families are viewed as responsible for fostering the progress of children. As these institutionalised spheres have a common goal, partnership is seen as an essential condition to realise this. Parental involvement, described as the parents’ roles in educating their children at home and in school (Deslandes & Bertrand, 2005), is typified as a contextual process, formed by schools as well as individual (f)actors (Kerbow & Bernhardt, 1993). Consequently, it is necessary to involve several perspectives to describe parental involvement. The reporter of parental involvement is an important issue to consider in parental involvement research, certainly with respect to the interpretation of results (Barnard, 2004). Exemplary is the repeatedly found discrepancy between teacher’s perception of parental involvement and parents’ report of involvement (Bakker, Denessen & Brus-Laeven, 2007). In many studies, only parent and/or teacher rating of parent involvement are taken into account, which means an important methodological deficit in the research domain. Children are not passive recipients of inputs of these actors, but can actively shape their parents’ involvement in their education (Edwards & Alldred, 2000). For this reason, some have argued that pupil ratings are most appropriate (e.g. Grolnick & Slowiaczek, 1994). Keith (1991) found the child’s perception of the involvement to be more influential on later child outcomes rather than the actual activities. Though, focussing exclusively on the child’s perspective is insufficient for assessing parental involvement. Multiple informants have to be used since different raters may be more or less qualified to evaluate certain aspects of involvement (Grolnick & Slowiaczek, 1994).

Research question: Based on the deficit in current research as described above, we want to gain insight into the associations between the teachers’, pupil’s and parents’ perceptions of involvement. For this purpose, the following research question is formulated: How strong is the interrelationship between parent rating, pupil ratings and teacher ratings of parental involvement? Participants: The research group consists of 65 third-grade teachers in primary education. In each class, four pupils and their parents are selected. This results in a sample of 260 parents, 260 third-grade children and 65 third-grade teachers. Measures: Given the lack of a valid instrument at the time of this study to assess parental involvement in the education of their children, three questionnaires are constructed: one to assess the level of parental involvement in the education of their children reported by parents, one to assess children’s perceptions of the level of parental involvement and the third to assess teachers’ perceptions. All the questionnaires consist of 51 statements, based on a literature review and qualitative interviews with 40 school related actors (parents, children, teachers, school heads, educational researchers). The questionnaires are administered orally in order to give every parent and child the chance to participate. Analyses: To answer the research question, the technique of multivariate multilevel modelling is applied.

All data are gathered. Preliminary results indicate a significant difference between teacher and parent ratings of parental involvement. This seems to be especially the case for the dimensions related to home involvement. When assessing the degree of parental involvement, teachers tend to base their judgement merely on the child’s achievement level. Further, the data suggest that pupil ratings of parental involvement are more equal to parent ratings. Nevertheless, strong differences between both groups are found in the assessment of parent-teacher communication. More results will be discussed in depth during the paper presentation.