“critical par-ent involvement” bridges the boundary between family literacy, adult education, and parent organizing. The parents described in this research moved beyond traditional family literacy activities of schoolwork supervision, to include the development of a multicultural institute and brought parents into positions where they were teaching not only one another and their children, but also teachers.
This is a fabulous approach! First off, as educators, we create opportunities to learn from one another during professional development or other workshops, but rarely do we utilize parents to learn from. Second, this approach puts parents in an equal place of power as teachers. I think there is something to be said about the mutual respect between parents and teachers. If they can form a relationship where they learn from each other in order to educate their child in the best way. everybody wins.