The purpose of this project was to highlight the knowledge parents have of their childrens literacy education and their role in it. Futhermore to see if they are pleased with the support they reseive regarding literacy education, or if improvement in education and support to parents is needed so they can become more active participants in their children´s education.

A worldwide emphasis on literacy as a means of personal empowerment, social and human development, citizenship, lifelong learning and academic attainment draws attention to the demand for high quality literacy education for all students from their early years of schooling throughout a child’s school career (Eurydice, 2011; UNESCO, n.d.; OECD, 2010).

The importance, for childrens academic success and their literacy development, of that parents show support and active participation in their education, has been demonstrated (Hampden-Thomson, Guzman & Lippman, 2013; Jeynes, 2012). To be able to support their children in the best way, parents need to have knowledge of their childrens literacy education, well-being and needs. Wambiri and Ndani (2015) found in their research that how parents understood their role in their childrens literacy education mattered for the childrens success in reading. They concluded that it was important to work with parents to help them understand their role in the reading development of their children.

One of the things that influences how well parents are prepered to support their children in learning to read is their own education as their level of education, especially that of mothers, has been found to influence their views and knowledge of literacy teaching (Kamathi, 2014; Wambiri, 2007). In an Australian research educated mothers had more positive views towards reading, and to teaching their children to read, than did less educated mothers and this was believed to influence their childrens literacy development as well (Torr, 2008).

An important matter is that although parents actively support their childrens literacy education, and claim they are informed about emphasis in literacy education in the schools, they tend to want more information on literacy methods used at the schools and on how they can better support their children at home (BavaHarji, Letchumanan & Bhar, 2014; Li, 2006). Furthermore, the best success in the childs literacy education is gained when teachers and parents cooperate as equals to improve the childs educational and behavioural abilities (Hampden-Thomson, Guzman & Lippman, 2013; Jeynes, 2012).

In the light of this the research questions are: What do Icelandic parents know of their childrens needs, well-being and activity in relation to schools literacy education? Are parents pleased with the support they receive in regard to literacy education of their children?

In 2011 a research project on literacy education in Iceland was launched. The aim of the project was to build capacity for literacy research and contribute to the body of knowledge and understanding of literacy education, nationally and internationally. In this paper a part of the findings are presented. The data presented was obtained in 2015 from questionnere that was sent to parents of children in grades 1 and 2 in total of 121 schools. Although the response rate was only 28,4% approximately 2800 parents answered the questionnare (Sigþórsson et al., 2017) wich gives considerable strength to the findings and makes it possible to compare and draw conclusions from this research about parents in general, although it is important to keep in mind this low answering rate (see Field, 2013). The focus was on questions from the parents‘ questionnaire that were related to parents‘ knowledge on the subject of literacy education, their satisfaction with the support they receive and whether they think more support is required. A descriptive correlational design was used to explore the relation between variables but characteristic for this form of research is that it can not be stated that causality exists, although strong relationships can be demonstrated. This method is suitable to get an overview of a group, provide decriptive findings about the group and find relationship, and draw conclusions from the correltations between the variables (Field, 2013). A statistical analysis was made to explore if sertain factors influenced parents knowledge and if correlation was between their knowledge and if parents wanted more or less support. SPSS statistical program was used for processing and the results were presented with both descriptive and inferential statistics.

The preliminary findings show that parents‘ knowledge varies on aspects in literacy education. Parents did not know much about aspects of how learning and teaching is organized nor on collaboration or communication, but knew much more about the aspects concerning their children, like their needs, how they feel and pursuit in education. The results also show that parents were pleased with the support they receive and that even more parents were uncertain whether they wanted more support than they already get. Furthermore, the results showed that parents who considered themselves to have high knowledge felt they need less support with their children´s literacy education than other parents. From the study it can be concluded that there is a need for further education and information to parents about certain aspects of literacy education, as well as informing parents better on what support is available and what they can do to support their children. Teachers should be able to make these changes by improving collaboration between home and school.

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