Parental involvement is defined as the degree to which parents are dedicated to their parental roles and accelerate their children’s optimal development (Maccoby & Martin, 1983; in Grolnick & Slowiaczek, 1994). We can distinguish between parental involvement in general and in the educational field. In the educational field we can make the difference between behavioural, personal and cognitive involvement (Grolnick & Slowiaczek, 1994). Parental behavioural involvement is reflected in attending parent meetings and other activities at school; personal is reflected in talking to the child about school and communicating in different ways, that they are interested in his education, and cognitive involvement reflects in encouraging the child for the activities that affect his cognitive development.

A lot of researches (Hill, Castellino, Lansford, Nowlin, Dodge, Bates, & Pettit, 2004; Rosenzweig, 2001; Steinberg, Lamborn, Dornbusch & Darling, 1992) have tried to prove the existence of connections between parental involvement in educational process and their children’s success at school, their expectations and wishes about their future choice of career, and eventual behavioural difficulties. In the meta-analysis of studies with the issue of the impact of parental involvement in children's learning achievements Rosenzweig (2001) has confirmed 20 independent variables that were positively associated with children's learning achievements. Among the most important were the following: aspiration of educational achievements and expected marks, engagement of parents, authoritative style of upbringing, encouraging the child's autonomy, emotional support, enabling the development of interest, learning in the broadest sense and parental involvement with the school. Steinberg and his colleagues (1992) report that involvement of parents in their child's schooling remains an important factor in the child's success in his adolescent years. The involvement of parents in education can improve children's learning achievements by reducing behavioural problems that hinder learning (Hill etc., 2004). Not only research, in promoting achievement across elementary and secondary school levels, theories and policies also have identified the significant role of families, family-school relations, and parental involvement in education (Hill & Tyson, 2009).

The problem of the study was to examine whether the child's sex, level of education (ie primary or. secondary), the type of secondary school and parental education are related to the type and degree of parental involvement in the education of their children, and to establish the correlation between the type and degree of parental involvement in their children's education, the children's school grades in the previous school year and the expected final level of education. The hypothesis was that the child's sex and the type of secondary school he is attending were not significantly associated with the parental involvement in their child's education, that the parental involvement is lower in secondary school than primary school, that it is positively associated with the parents' education, the child's learning achievements in the previous school year and with the child's expected final level of education he will achieve.

Grolnick, W. S., Slowiaczek, M. L. (1994). Parents' involvement in children's schooling: A multidimensional conceptualization and motivational model. Child Development, 65, 237-252. Hill, N. E., Castellino, D. R., Lansford, J. E., Nowlin, P., Dodge, K. A., Bates, J. E., Pettit, G. S. (2004). Parent academic involvement as related to school behavior, achievement, and aspirations: Demographic variations across adolescence. Child Development, 75(5), 1491-1509. Hill, N. E., Tyson, D. F. (2009). Parental involvement in middle school: A meta-analytic assessment of the strategies that promote achievement. Developmental Psychology, 45, 740-763. Musitu, G., García, F., Gutiérrez, M., Krajnc, S., Pečjak, S. (1998). Vprašalnik samopodobe – SPA [The questionnaire of self-perception - SPA]. Ljubljana: Center za psihodiagnostična sredstva. Rosenzweig, C. (2001). A meta – analyisis of parenting and school succes: The role of parents in promoting student's academic performance. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American educational research association. Seattle: WA. Steinberg, L., Lamborn, S. D., Dornbusch, S. M., Darling, N. (1992). Impact of parenting practices on adolescent achievement: Authoritative parenting, school involvement, and encouragement to succeed. Child Development, 63, 1266 – 1281.