Centre–parent communication about children’s learning

The effects of teaching practice on parents’ participation in their child’s early education were studied by drawing on a “collective case” of five education and care centres with 100 percent qualified teachers and a “collective case” of centres employing 50–79 percent qualified teachers. The research found noticeable gaps between parents’ aims for their child’s learning before school and the content of the information shared by early childhood teaching staff with parents and whānau in children’s portfolios. The two categories of centres differed in the nature and extent of their communication about children’s interests and programme planning to parents and whānau.