This presentation takes its part of departure in a study of home relationships with families of immigrant backgrounds living in communities with mixed populations of ethnic Norwegians and immigrants. All of the pupils in the study are attending schools where immigrant children constitute the minority. The aim of this presentation is to elaborate on how pupils, teachers and principals in Norwegian elementary schools experience schooling and school-home relationships. The Norwegian Directorate of Education and Training, and the University College of Sør-Trøndelag finance this project.

            A sociocultural perspective emphasizes an interplay between people, their mental processes and the context. From this perspective, the context is decisive for how people think and act, and all actions are situated and context bound. Through verbal interaction and participation in social and cultural activities, basic references for people’s understanding and valuing are established (Bakhtin, 1986).

            Earlier studies in Norwegian schools have shown that pupils with immigrant backgrounds tend to have lower grades compared to ethnic Norwegian pupils. However, the school results vary according to how long pupils have lived in Norway (Bakken & Elstad, 2012), and from which country they originate (Bakken, 2010). Furthermore, the families’ socio-economic status may influence on children’s school results, but there are no unanimous conclusions here. According to Bakken and Elstad (2012) children with immigrant backgrounds perform better than ethnic Norwegian children when they have the same socio-economic backgrounds, but the Norwegian version of the PISA-survey from 2012 shows that children with immigrant backgrounds have weaker school-results even though the results are adjusted for socio-economic backgrounds (Olsen, 2013). Altogether, earlier research shows that children with immigrant backgrounds constitute a diverse group, where factors like socio-economy, length of residence, and country origin contribute. It is therefore necessary to emphasize that pupils with immigrant backgrounds should not be considered as a homogeneous group. Regarding experiences of school mastery in Norwegian schools, Frøyland and Gjerustad (2012) show that young people with and without immigrant backgrounds have approximately the same opinion of their performances, despite the fact that their results may be different. Furthermore, the same study indicate that young people with immigrant backgrounds have a more positive experience of the learning environments than ethnic Norwegian pupils have.

Research has shown that parents with immigrant backgrounds wish to take part in their children’s schooling, but that several of them do not know how to do this (Bouakaz, 2009; Steen-Olsen, 2013). Immigrant parents say that they lack knowledge of the Norwegian school system, but that they want to cooperate, and learn more about the school curriculum. Earlier studies have shown that parents’ positive attitudes and expectations to their children’s performances influence on the pupil’s school motivation and efforts (Hattie, 2009; White Paper 6, 2012 – 2013). Other studies have shown that young people with immigrant backgrounds in Oslo experience that their parents have high expectations when it comes to school results and plans of higher education (Alves et al., 2014; Frøyland & Gjerustad, 2012).

            Norwegian studies show that the contact between parents and teachers in general is rather limited, and it seems that the schools and teachers to a small degree emphasize the dialogue with parents (Nordahl, 2007). Furthermore, it is claimed that parents with immigrant backgrounds have less influence in school matters than the majority group of parents (Ericsson & Larsen, 2000). Other studies have found that one of the main reasons why parents with immigrant backgrounds are reluctant to attend meetings with the school is lack of language skills (Bouakaz, 2009; Steen-Olsen, 2013).

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