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This is to certify that the

dissertation entitled

A HISTORICAL ANALYSIS OF THE SAUDI ARABIAN MINISTRY OF
EDUCATION'S POLICIES REGARDING FATHERS' INVOLVEMENT
IN THE SCHOOLING OF THEIR CHILDREN

presented by

Abdullatif Mohammad Baltow

has been accepted towards fulfillment
of the requirements for

Ph.D. degree in Administration and
WW

 

 

Date February 15, 1983

 

 

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IN THE NANIE OF ALLAH
THE MERCIFUL THE COMPASSIONATE

A HISTORICAL ANALYSIS OF THE SAUDI ARABIAN MINISTRY OF
EDUCATION'S POLICIES REGARDING FATHERS' INVOLVEMENT
IN THE SCHOOLING OF THEIR CHILDREN

By

Abdullatif Mohammad Baltow

A DISSERTATION

Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

Department of Administration and Curriculum
(Social and Philosophical Foundations of Education)

1983

ABSTRACT

A HISTORICAL ANALYSIS OF THE SAUDI ARABIAN MINISTRY OF
EDUCATION'S POLICIES REGARDING FATHERS' INVOLVEMENT
IN THE SCHOOLING OF THEIR CHILDREN

By
Abdullatif Mohammad Baltow

Research in thelast decade has shown that parents' involvement
in their children's schooling benefits the students and their educa-
tional environment. This study investigated the policies of the
Saudi Arabian Ministry of Education toward fathers' involvement in
their sons' schooling. Because the Ministry is considered solely
responsible for male education, because centralization is a major
aspect of this organization, and because individual schools cannot
initiate this relationship with the fathers, the Ministry must sponsor
and encourage such involvement. Therefore, the answers to the research
questions were sought from the Ministry's point of view.

The historical-analysis research method was used to collect
data by inspecting Ministry documents related to the subject. Non-
standardized interviews were conducted with 21 Ministry personnel
connected with fathers' involvement in the schools, to help understand
the documents and to find as complete answers as possible to the
research questions.

The findings confirmed that the Ministry intended to use the

notion of father-teacher c00peration since its establishment in 1953,

Abdullatif Mohammad Baltow

but the following points are considered major obstacles to implement-
ing the notion:

l. The internal reorganization and external expansion of the
Ministry of Education.

2. The lack of experienced personnel to work at the Ministry
level.

3. The lack of indigenous teachers and the resulting depend—
ence on non-Saudi teachers, who were considered "intrusive individuals."

4. The high illiteracy rate among the people at the time of
the Ministry's establishment.

5. The profound belief among Saudi fathers that teachers know
best and are best qualified to teach because of their professionalism.

6. The belief among Saudi fathers that school matters are the
government's responsibility.

Great accomplishments in the areas of internal reorganization
and external expansion, as well as interest in solving students' prob-
lems, are considered major causes for the Ministry of Education's

continuous attention to fathers' involvement in the schools.

This study is dedicated to

Every child in Saudi Arabia--you are precious.

Every parent-~you are important in your child's
education.

The soul of my father, who initiated my education.

My mother for her sincere prayers and her continuous
support of my education up to this stage.

ii

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I wish to express my special and sincere gratitude to:

Dr. Marvin Grandstaff, my advisor and committee chairman,
for his valuable advice from the beginning of this study, for his
patience, and for his continuous encouragement.

The members of my guidance committee, Drs. Ted Ward, David
Heenan, Kenneth Neff, and William Ewens from the Department of Soci-
ology, for their wise counsel and constructive comments.

Dr. Hamad Al-Sallom, Assistant Deputy Minister for Student
Affairs, and Ebrahim Fouda, Attia Mubarak, and Abdullah Shousha of
the General Department for Student Guidance and Counseling at the
Ministry of Education for their help and cooperation.

My wife, Samirah, who has been patient and supportive through-
out my schooling in the United States, and my lovely Mohammad and
Thaniyah, whose cheerfulness helped relieve some of the hard times
during my doctoral program.

My brothers, sisters, and friends for their prayers, love,
and support.

Finally, the most important acknowledgment is reserved for
the Government of Saudi Arabia, which provided me with the scholarship

that made it possible for me to accomplish my educational objectives.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

LIST OF TABLES ......................... vi

LIST OF FIGURES ......................... vii
Chapter

I. INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY ................ 1

Background of the Study ................ 1

Purpose of the Study ................. 9

Need for the Study .................. 10

Research Questions .................. 13

Methodology ...................... l4

Delimitations of the Study .............. 16

Overview ....................... 17

II. REVIEW OF AMERICAN RESEARCH IN PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT . . . 18

What Is Meant by Parental Involvement? ........ 18
What Role Do Parents Play in Their Children's

Development? .................... 25
How Important Are Parents in Their Children's

Schooling? ..................... 31
Parents' Involvement in Their Children's Schooling

and Its Effect on Students' Achievement ....... 36

Parents' Involvement in Their Children's Schooling
and Its Effect on Students' Behavior and Social

Adjustment ..................... 45
Parents' Involvement in Their Children's Schooling

and Its Effect on Teachers ............. 50
Parents' Involvement in Their Children's Schooling

and Its Effect on the Parents Themselves ...... 54
Parents' Involvement in Their Children's Schooling

and Its Effect on the Schools ............ 58
Parents' Involvement in Their Children's Schooling

and Its Effect on the Community ........... 60

iv

III. REVIEW OF ISLAMIC EDUCATION LITERATURE AND PARENTS'
RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR CHILDREN'S EDUCATION .....

Foundations of Islamic Education ...........
Components of Islamic Education ............
The Nature of Saudi Arabian Educational Policies
Parents' Educational Responsibilities in Islam

IV. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION .................

Background ......................
The Ministry of Education's Policy Regarding Fathers'
Involvement in the Schools .............
The Period From 1953 to 1969 ............
The Period From 1970 to 1982 ............
Discussion ......................
Obstacles Preventing Fathers' Planned Involvement in
the Schools .....................
Factors Reinforcing the Idea of Fathers' Involvement
in the Schools ...................
Kindergarten ....................
Elementary Education ................
Intermediate Education ...............
Secondary Education .................
Other Types of Institutions Under the Ministry's
Control ......................
Student Problems Faced by the Ministry of Education .

V. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS .............

Conclusions ......................
Recommendations ....................
Recommendations for Further Research ........
Recommendations for the General Improvement of the
Concept of Fathers' Involvement in their Sons'
Schooling .....................

APPENDIX ............................
BIBLIOGRAPHY ..........................

Page

123
123
124
124
125

126
127

131

131

134
134

135
138

LIST OF TABLES

Table Page

1. Growth in Number of Schools and Student Enrollment,
1953-1957 ........................ 115

2. Growth in Number of Schools, Classes, and Student
Enrollment of Ministry of Education Schools From
1969-70 to 1980-81 ................... 128

Vi

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Page
1. The Parent-Involvement Model ............... 21

2. The Administrative Organization of Education in Saudi
Arabia During the Period From 1931 Until 1951 ..... 91

3. Organizational Chart of the Ministry of Education
Between 1953 and 1957 ................. 111

4. Organizational Chart of the Ministry of Education,
1972 .......................... 113

5. Organizational Chart of the Ministry of Education,
1982 .......................... 114

Vii

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY

Background of the Study

 

Throughout the history of many societies, parents have played
the dominant role in the instruction of their children. Parents used
to educate their children in the family circle if the parents them-
selves knew the desired subject. This not only had the social value
of strengthening the relationship between the family members, but
also had an economic value for the family and the community. Dewey
described the picture by saying,

Those of us who are here today need go back only one, two, or at
the most three generations, to find a time when the household was
particularly the center in which were carried on, or about which
were clustered, all the typical forms of industrial occupation.
The clothing worn was for the most part made in the house; the
members of the household were usually familiar also with the
shearing of the sheep, the carding and the spinning of the wool,
and the playing of the loom. Instead of pressing a button and
flooding the house with electric light, the whole process of get-
ting illumination was followed in its toilsome length, from the
killing of the animal and the trying of the fat to the making of
wicks and dipping of candles. The supply of flour, of lumber,

of foods, of building materials, of household furniture, even of
metal ware, of nails, hinges, hammers, etc., was produced in the
immediate neighborhood in shops which were constantly open to
inspection and often centers of neighborhood congregation. The
entire industrial process stood revealed, from the production on
the farm of the raw materials till the finished article was
actually put to use. Not only this, but practically every member
of the household had his own share in the work. The children,

as they gained in strength and capacity, were gradually initiated

into the mysteries of the several processes. It was a matter
of immediate and personal concern, even to the point of actual
part1c1pation.

Parents had the right to choose the educators whom they
believed would provide their children with a desirable education,
whether it was reading and writing or a profession. It was the
glorious time of apprenticeship. A person-to-person relationship
existed between the parent and the teacher because the barriers
between the two sides did not exist then as they do in schools nowadays.
Parents as well as teachers used to contact each other whenever they
desired to or found it necessary for the child's development and
progress. Because of this interaction, teachers had an opportunity to
know more about the children with whom they were dealing and had a
chance to take this knowledge into account while teaching the children.
On the other hand, parents had an opportunity to watch closely what
their children were learning from their teachers and to communicate
to the teachers the desirable and undesirable process or content of
teaching.

As the schools came into existence, there was a transition I/
from educating children at home by parents or community members to
educating them at school by professionals who did not know the stu-
dents. Tyler described the process of transition that took place in
the United States:

Another important development in the two centuries of the

nation's life has been the shifting of more and more responsi-
bilities on to the school. . . . In the Colonial Period in

 

1John Dewey, The School and Society (Carbondale: Southern
Illinois University Press, 1976), p.47.

 

America, the family was held responsible for training and edu-
cating their children. In some colonies, schools were established
but their primary role was to teach reading, writing, and reckon-
ing, as arithmetic was then called. But in the early years of

the nation, new educational purposes developed. The educational
requirements for producing an enlightened citizenry were discussed
and debated. The result was the assignment, either explicitly

or implicitly, to the school of the task of teaching citizenship.
This was followed over the years by shifting of many responsi-
bilities from the family to the school.

Since the schools' emergence, homes and schools have been
considered the first and the second major child-rearing institutions
within different societies. This division in terms of the first and
the second does not mean that each institution has to work separately
in a given society, especially if Dewey's definition of society is
kept in mind. He wrote:

A society is a number of people held together because they

are working along common lines, in a common spirit, and with
reference to common aims. The common needs and aims demand a
growing interchange of thought and growing unity of sympathetic
feeling.

Obviously, the common aim of the family and of the schools
is to produce well-educated and well-developed individuals who will
contribute to the society's development and continuity. To insure the
realization of this common aim, there must be an integrative relation-
ship between the schools and the parents. The schools and the par-
ents must work together; with this cooperation, they can solve many
problems that the students will encounter in their social, cognitive,

and psychological development. As Queen said,

 

1Ralph W. Tyler, "Parent Involvement in Curriculum Decision-
Making: Critique and Comment" (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduc-
tion Service, ED 131 596, April 1980), p. 4.

2Dewey, The School and Society, p. 10.

 

Early identification [of a problem] helps the school serve the

child and the family understand the problem. The gain: a mem-

ber of society who will not turn to anti-social acts out of
»~—-—-—~ frustration or dysfunction.

But which side is responsible for initiating the contact
with the other side? According to some educators, families are
responsible for this initiative. In Queen's words, "Families must
communicate the need to have the school life integrated into the com-
munity. [Then], the school should reflect the community as families

communicate their values, attitude and ethnicity."2

Other educators believe that, because the schools are con-
sidered the official agencies for teaching children of a particular
society, schools must pursue every means available to help them
succeed in their duties. Among these means is the establishment of a
relationship with the children's parents. There are a number of
reasons for this belief.

First, the basic duties of the schools are universally
known--that is, to teach the children the school's curriculum content
effectively and to provide the society with well-educated individuals.
Parents can help, but how? The teachers can specify the answer. In
this regard, Bronfenbrenner said,

One of the most important things is to recognize that the

schools cannot work in isolation. School people must build
bridges to the rest of the community and to the parents.

 

1Renee Queen, "Family Communications With Schools and the
Community," Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (Bethesda,
Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 166 291, June 1979),
p. 9.

21mm, p. 10.

They must create situations in which more of the community
is in the lives of kids in school, and the kids are more a
part of the community.

Second, research conducted in the area of parent-teacher
cooperation has indicated that teachers are benefiting greatly from
this cooperation. So, to avail themselves of these benefits, which
will be discussed in the next chapter, teachers can initiate inter-
action instead of waiting for the parents to do so.

In Saudi Arabia, as in other societies, educating the children
started in both informal and nonformal ways. The father's role in
educating his sons in reading the Qur'an for religious matters, or taking
him to learn a profession by attending a foreman, was normal procedure.
Mosques, which used to be managed by a religious person, and kuttabs,2
which were managed by a person who could read and write sufficiently,
played a significant role in educating boys. Sometimes the children's
fathers were included in this educational setting. The fathers' con-
cern regarding the education of their sons began to diminish when
formal schools were opened in some cities in 1926. In that year, the
General Directorate of Education was established; thus another social
agency, whose purpose was to educate the boys in Saudi society, came
into existence. It is important to note that at that time the General
Presidency of Girls' Education, whose purpose is to educate girls,

had not yet been organized. It was established in 1960. The present

 

1"On Families and Schools: A Conversation With Urie Bron-
fenbrenner," Educational Leadership_36 (April 1979): 463.

2A kuttab can be described as a small room that used to be
attached to a mosque or a space set aside in the teachers' houses .
for teaching reading, writing, Qur'a'in, and other religious instruction.

 

Ministry of Education is responsible for males' education, and the
General Presidency of Girls' Education is responsible for females'
education. When the General Directorate was established, the govern-
ment gave schools the power to build the personality of individuals

in the newly integrated nation. In this regard, Al-Ajroush wrote,

"With the power vested in him, the Director General began to establish

new schools and attempted to incorporate changes into the predomi-

nantly religion-oriented curriculum."1

For a number of reasons, which will be discussed later,

schools in Saudi Arabia started and have continued to operate withlittle

parental involvement. Educational planners have not considered the
following facts: (1) that the parents' role in assisting their
children through the learning process is considered a natural one and

that schools are considered one of the superficial means created by

societies to convey the complexity of these societies to the children

3 'g; '. a"

through the educational process;2 (2) that home teaching of Values,
behaviors, and beliefs usually lays the foundation for future learn-

ing, so it is important for teachers to know in what way this foun-

dation has been laid; (3) that every child is unique, and because” ,.-s.

parents are primarily the ones who are aware of this uniqueness, they
can assist the teacher in the educational process. As research in

this field has indicated, parental involvement is beneficial, whether

 

1Hamad Al-Ali Al-Ajroush, "A Historical Development of the
Public Secondary Curriculum in Saudi Arabia from 1930 to the Present"
(Ph.D. dissertation, The University of Oklahoma, 1981), p. 42.

2John Dewey, Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the
Philosophy of Education (NewYork: The Macmillan Co., 1925), pp. 4-5.

 

}.

the child be normal, gifted, or impaired; (4) that a family's prob-
lems can affect their child's progress in school. Being unaware of
these problems, teachers may make unreasonable or incorrect deci-
sions regarding the students; and (5) that parents can be used as
resource people to aid the schools in many ways, such as planning a
trip, sharing their experiences with teachers and aiding them, and
tutoring the students. Therefore, in Saudi Arabia, schools became
alienated from the community and did not have a role for the fathers
in the school environment.

Assuming that teachers are professional educators and that
they are the ones who know how to teach, and realizing that being
qualified for a governmental job requires professional credentials
from the school, the fathers, in turn, relinquished the educational
task to the teachers. In this regard, the following statement by
Berlin and Berlin is applicable to Saudi Arabia's condition:

The past twenty-five year period has witnessed a trend of
seeing the schools alienate themselves from the community
which they serve. Parents have increasingly been willing
to leave their child's education completely to the schools,
assuming that because education is the prerogative of edu-
cators, it is no longer that of the parents or family.

The present parental relationship with teachers in Saudi
Arabian schools can be defined as that of an audience, according to

Gordon and Breivogel's wheel of parental involvement in the schools.

In relation to this aspect of parental involvement, they wrote:

 

1Roxie Berlin and Irving N. Berlin, "Schools' Training of
Parents to Be Effective Teachers of Their Own and Other Nonlearning
Children," Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (Bethesda,
Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 099 110, April 1975),

p. l.

"Parents are informed by the school about its activities or asked
to visit the school as bystanders or observers."1

In Saudi schools, fathers can be invited to attend some of
the school activities, which are usually scheduled at the end of
each year. Father-teacher contact to discuss a particular concern
is not expected on such occasions. Even when a seven-year-old boy
enters the first grade, father-teacher contact is not required or
expected. All that is required of the father for his son's acceptance
in school is to present the official health record and birth certifi-
cate. Who is going to deal with the child on his first day of school'
and throughout the year? What kind of background does this teacher
have? What is the curriculum to which the child is going to be
introduced, and what method of teaching is the teacher going to use?
Such questions are not considered important, and the seven-year-old
must find the answers to these questions himself.

In the past few years, however, the Ministry of Education has
encouraged teachers to get in touch with fathers through "Fathers'-
Teachers' Boards," and teachers are required to present to the Ministry
a biannual report about these meetings. The Ministry has outlined a
procedure regarding the fathers' meetings. Part of this investi-

gator's aim is to find out why the Ministry of Education is making

this demand on the schools.

 

'Ira J. Gordon and William F. Breivogel, Building Effective
Home-School Relationship§_(Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc., 1976),
p. 6.

 

Purpose of the Study

 

Saudi Arabia, as one of the world's developing countries, is
experiencing a major change that was caused by the influx of oil
revenues and the resulting openness to other countries. This change
is affecting every social institution in the country. The expansion
of education at every level is considered a major factor in changing
the people in the Saudi society. Obviously, the needs of today's
generation are not the same as those of the preceding generation,
when the Ministry of Education was established. Consequently,
tomorrow's generation will be different from today's. This change
is placing a heavy burden on almost every social institution by
forcing them to keep changing their structures and services to be in
accordance with the people's needs and demands. Although accurate
statistics on the educated fathers are not available, it is safe to say
that as a result of the expansion of education, the number of educated
fathers is increasing and will continue to increase. One obvious
result will be the awareness by these educated fathers of the impor-
tance of their children's education and its usefulness and relevancy
in their children's lives.

This study is aimed at investigating the policies of the
Ministry of Education toward fathers' involvement in their children's
educational process so that further improvement of this involvement
can be based on the findings of this study. Specifically, were
there policies concerning fathers' involvement when the Ministry was
established? What is the present attitude of the Ministry of Educa-

tion toward father involvement? How is the Ministry going to deal

10

with this matter if it is demanded by fathers? Based on the answers
to these questions, it should be clear whether the Ministry of Edu-
cation will use father involvement as an instrument to solve some of

its existing problems.

Need for the Study

 

The literature shows that parents' involvement in their chil-
dren's education at home and at school has great benefits for the child
himself, for the teacher, for the parent, and for the community.1 When
parents get in touch with schools and learn through simple group dis-
cussion or parent-education programs what problems--either cognitive
or behavioral--their children are having in school, they can learn how
to help solve these problems. With parental cooperation, students'
achievement usually is raised and their behavioral problems alleviated.
Students become more motivated because they start to know that their
parents see their education as important and that their progress is

pleasing to their parents.

 

1R. J. Karraker, "Increasing Academic Performance Through
Home-Managed Contingency Programs," Journal of School Psycholo
@ 10.2 (1972); JETWWHTMW-
ration Between Teachers and Parents in Assisting Children's ea tag,"
British Journal of Educational Psychology 52 (February_19§2); Joan L.
1 Herman and Jennie P.,Xeh,"$ome Effects of Parent Invglvement in
Schools" (Béthe§§a,flMd.: ERIC Document Reproduction_§eryjce,
ED 206 963,7?" 98 Wyllon, Stephen Garber, and Kim
' e Elimination of Discipline Problems Through a Combined
School-Home Motivational System," Behavior Therapy_6 (1975); Benjamin B.
Lahey et al., "An Evaluation of Daily Report Card With Minimal Teacher
and Parent Contact as an Effective Method of Classroom Intervention,"
Behavior Modification 1 (July 1977); Thomas N. Fairchild, "Home-School
Token Economics: Bridgin the Communication Gap," Psychology in the
Schools 13 (October 1976?.

 

 

 

 

11

Parental involvement in the classroom allows teachers extra
time to concentrate on individual classroom behavior problems, which
usually interrupt the continuity of instruction and interaction with
the rest of the students. In addition, such involvement enables
parents to become aware of any disruptive behavior their own children
might be manifesting in the classroom. Teachers also become more
aware of the students' home condition, which helps them understand
more clearly how to deal with the students. An intimate relation-
ship can be established by the two sides, parents and teachers, which
helps bridge the gap between them. As the flow of communication
between teachers and parents is opened, teachers will have the oppor-
tunity to let parents know when their help is needed in organizing
and presenting school affairs. There might be volunteer positions
as well as opportunities for the use of paraprofessional talents and
services that the parents themselves could fill.1

Involved parents become more acquainted with the school envi-
ronment in which their children spend a good portion of their daily
lives and get a more integrative picture of their children's lives.
The circle of interaction between the parents and their children is
enlarged, and this strengthens their relationship. Considering them-

selves as individuals whom the schools can depend on for help in

 

1Dorothy Rich, Beverly Mattox, and James Van Dien, "Building
on Family Strengths: The 'Nondeficit" Involvement Model for Teaming
Home and School," Educational Leadership 35 (April 1979); Deirdre
Breslin and Eileen Marino, "Parents as Partners," Young Children
30 (January 1975); Betty L. Hagberg, "The Reading Therapist and
Parent Conference," Reading Horizon 10 (Spring 1970).

 

12

educating their own children can help parents by promoting positive
self-images. Parents usually acquire new knowledge when they receive
instruction from the school regarding how to help their children at
home. Parents also benefit when they actually get involved in help-
ing their children with new subject matter to which they, as parents,
have not been exposed.1

Finally, as a natural consequence of parental involvement,
the community as a whole acquires a mutual relationship with the
schools and is considered a part of the schools. Community members
are not alienated by the school any more and can use the school for
special occasions. Schools can be consulted whenever a problem
exists in the community, and a solution can mutually be found. The
community can provide cheap labor, which could save the schools some
money--money that can be spent on other projects to benefit the
students and the community.2

A final note in this regard is that parent involvement in
the schools is not to be considered a panacea to solve every problem

from which our schools are suffering. Positive outcomes like the

 

1James B. Seibert, Barbara Mathews, Carol Calvin, and Ann
Simpson, "Emerging Trends in Parent-School Communication" (Bethesda,
Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 182 734, July 1980);
Margaret M. Conant, "Teachers and Parents: Changing Roles and Goals,"
Childhood Education 48 (December 1971); Daniel Safran, "Evaluating
Parent Involvement," Issue Paper No. 1 (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document
Reproduction Service, ED 094 863, December 1974).

 

2Marian S. Stearns and others, "Parental Involvement, Defini-
tions and Findings," in Parent Involvement in Compensatory Education
Programs, published by Stanford Research Institute (Bethesda, Md.:
ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 088 588, August 1974); Herman
and Yeh, "Some Effects of Parent Involvement in Schools"; Berlin and
Berlin, "Schools' Training of Parents."

13

ones mentioned above are expected, and careful planning to achieve
parental involvement is desired.

A cooperative educational environment between fathers and
teachers in Saudi schools is needed, but before asking when and
how this is to be achieved, a complete understanding of the Ministry
of Education's policies and stand on this issue is needed. The

present study is an attempt to fulfill that need.

Research Questions

 

The investigator began with the assumption that the Ministry
of Education does not favor fathers' involvement in their sons'
schooling. Therefore, an attempt was made to find answers to the
research questions of the study to assess the possibility of initiat-
ing parental involvement in Saudi schools. Because the Ministry is
considered solely responsible for education, because centralization is
a major aspect of this organization, and because individual schools
cannot initiate this relationship with parents, such initiation must
be sponsored and encouraged by the Ministry of Education in Saudi
Arabia. The answers to the following research questions must come
from the Ministry's point of view.

1. Is there any evidence to show that in 1953 the Ministry
of Education expressed any interest in having fathers' involvement in
the Saudi schools?

2. If yes, what was the motivation behind this intention?

14

3. If the answer to the first question is positive, what
were the obstacles that prevented such involvement?

4. If the answer to the first question is negative, what
was the philosophy of the Ministry for not involving fathers in
school matters?

5. What is the nature of the present policy in regard to
father involvement?

6. What are the motivations behind the present policy?

7. Has the Ministry's past attitude about this point con-
tinued to the present?

8. Will the future of father involvement in Saudi schools

improve as a result of the findings of this study?

Methodology_

 

The historical-analysis research method was used in collect-
ing data because the main objective of this researcher was to find
out why Saudi boys' schools are lacking fathers' involvement.
Typically, one of the best ways to solve a problem is by examining
the forces that are responsible for the existence of the problem.

In this regard, Dewey asserted:

The nature of the issue cannot be understood save as we know

how they came about. The institutions and customs that exist

in the present and that gave rise to present social ills and
dislocations did not arise overnight. They have a long history
behind them. An attempt to deal with them simply on the basis
of what is obvious in the present is bound to result in adop-
tion of superficial measures which in the end will only render
existing problems more acute and more difficult to solve. Poli-
cies framed simply upon the ground of knowledge of the present

15

cut off from the past is the counterpart of heedless careless-
ness in individual conduct. The way out of scholastic systems
that made the past an end in itself is to make acquaintance
with the past a means of understanding the present. Until this
problem is worked out, the present clash of educational ideas
and practices will continue.

In relation to the study of parental involvement in schools,
the first step, in Tyler's opinion, is to study the social and politi-
cal forces behind such involvement. Then it will be possible to
establish parental involvement in the schools. Tyler noted in this
regard:

Before progress is likely to be made in effective family-school
cooperation, we need to search out the origins of conflict and
differences. An understanding of their background should make
it easier to suggest ways in which these differencei might be
resolved or channeled into productive disagreement.

On the basis of the evidence of the importance of historical
analysis as a methodology regarding the research subject, the writer
made two visits to the Ministry of Education in Riyadh City in the
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The data were obtained from the Ministry's
written documents that can be considered primary sources, such as
the official notifications of regulations, policy changes that have
been sent from the Ministry to the local districts, and reports from
the local districts to the Nfinistry regarding the subject under
consideration.

The investigator also conducted interviews with 21 of the

Ministry's official employees who were chosen on the basis of the

 

1John Dewey, Experience and Education (New York: Collier
Books, 1963), pp. 77-78.

2Tyler, "Parent Involvement in Curriculum Decision-Making."

p. 11.

16

f0110114109 two criteria: (1) that the individual had been working
for the Ministry of Education for ten years or more, because much
of the development on the subject occurred between 1970 and 1982;
and (2) that the individual '5 position was related to the subject of
the study.

The interviews were necessary to understand the documents
and to find as complete answers as possible to the research questions.
All of the interviews were conducted at the Ministry building and
were tape-recorded. The information from these resources is presented
in historical form, divided into two periods: from 1953 through 1969

and from 1970 through 1982.

Delimitations of the Study

 

The study was delimited by the following factors:

1. The investigator considered father involvement instead of
parent involvement because the study is about the Ministry of Educa-
tion's policy regarding the subject of the study. The concept "parent"
could not be used in this regard because only the fathers or male
guardians of the students were contacted since the Ministry of Educa-
tion is responsible only for males' education.

2. The investigation period was from 1953 to 1982. The
period before 1953 was not a major point in this study unless it
was needed for data interpretation because the study concerned the

Ministry of Education's policies, and the Ministry was not estab-

lished until 1953.

17

Overview

Chapter I discussed the natural role of parents in education.
In addition, the purpose of the study, need for the study, research
questions, methods used in collecting data, and delimitations of the
study were presented.

In Chapter II, a review of related literature written in the
United States is given. It is aimed at presenting answers to the
following questions: What is meant by parental involvement? Is
a child's home important to his education? What is the influence
of parental involvement on (1) students' achievement, (2) their
behavior and social adjustment, (3) teachers, (4) parents themselves,
(5) schools, and (6) the community?

Chapter III discusses the foundations of Islamic education
and fathers' involvement in their sons' schooling.

In Chapter IV, the development of the Ministry of Education's
policies toward fathers' involvement in education is discussed. In
this chapter the investigator also analyzes the development of these
policies.

Chapter V contains a summary and the conclusions of the
study and recommendations for further research and for improving

fathers' involvement in Saudi schools.

CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF AMERICAN RESEARCH IN
PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT

This part of the literature review is essentially directed
toward the importance of parents' involvement in their children's
schooling by showing the effect of this involvement on the following
areas: (1) students' achievement, (2) students' behavior and social
adjustment, (3) teachers, (4) parents, (5) school, and (6) community.

Before considering the preceding topics, it is necessary
to answer each of the following questions: What is meant by parental
involvement? What role do parents play in their children's develop-
ment? How important are parents in their children's schooling?
Answering these questions will give an integrated view of the impor-

tance of parents' involvement in their children's schooling.

What Is Meant by Parental Involvement?

In general, it can be said that parental involvement in edu-
cation is the process of assisting parents to participate in educating
their children inside and outside the school. One of the objectives
is to make parents aware of the subject matter their children are
learning at school, what kind of progress their children are making,

and, in general, the extent to which the school environment is

18

19

related to the child's life. A second objective of parental involve-
ment is to enlighten parents about helping their children in the
matters that will contribute to their development and achievement
outside the school. A third objective is to use parents as resource
people who will help in school affairs. As a whole, these objectives
contribute positively in the areas mentioned above.

Parent involvement is a combination of roles played by parents,
as Stearns and others noted:

,zre- "Parent involvement" is anything but a simple, unitary con-
cept. In theory and in practice it can take many forms--
parents as recipients of home management training, parents as
child-rearing trainees and tutors for their own children,
parents as paid professionals in the schools, and parents as
advisors and decision makers at the local school level.

Based on his experience with the parental-involvement com-
ponent of the Bilingual Program at the Education Service Center in
Austin, Texas, in which parents were used as supporters and con-
tributors to the program, Fernandez wrote:

Parental involvement is a process of community action that
enriches the total educational program. Through interaction
between the home, school, and the community, parents learn
how they can best support, influence and contribute to their
children's educational development.2

More detail was added to the notion of parental involvement

by the report of the Office of Research and Evaluation of Austin

 

1Marian S. Stearns and others, "Parental Involvement: Defi-
nitions and Findings," in Parent Involvement in Compensatory Educa-
tion Pro rams, published by StanfordiResearch Institute (Bethesda,
Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 088 588, August 1974),
p. 5.

2Irene Fernandez, "Parental Involvement in Bilingual Educa-
tion" (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 088 290,
November 1973), p. 2.

20

Independent School Districts, Austin, Texas. The Report
stated:

The term "parental involvement" has been used to refer to a
wide range of activities by parents, including:

. parents tutoring their child on specific tasks, or receiv-
ing training and using methods designed to generally enhance
their child's intellectual development in the home;

. parents performing duties within the school, either as volun-
teers, or paid employees;

. parents serving as community aids, and acting as liaisons
between the homes and schools;

. parents serving on committees and acting either as advisors
or decision makers in matters concerning school practices;

. parents simply displaying general interest in their chil-
dren's education, by keeping informed of their academic prog-
ress and/or attending parent-teacher conferences or PTA
meetings.

In Gordon and Breivogel's opinion, parental involvement
includes five basic roles. They presented these roles in a wheel-
shaped diagram, which is shown in Figure 1. According to these
authors, every spoke is important in conceiving the notion of parental
involvement, and parents should be distributed equally on every spoke
so that the wheel can turn. This distribution can be established
according to the parents' ability to contribute. Every spoke can be
given a number from one to five, beginning with parents as audience
and ending with parents as decision makers.2

\ As is clear from the wheel, parents can be involved in

children's school affairs as an audience--that is, as recipients of

 

lAustin Independent School District, Texas, Office of Research
and Evaluation, "Review of Research in Parental Involvement in Educa-
tion, Interim Report: Low SES and Minority Students Achievement Study"
(Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 161 980,
March 1979), p. 7.

2Ira J. Gordon and William F. Breivogel, Building_Effective
Home-School Relationships (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc.:'1976),
p. 6.

 

21

 

 

 

 

’3
Tee r... 0
c6 '3' (a? (5
'?a I} 6° VM’
0 55 $5
‘1 d}
E.“
'e
,9
Parent as
decision maker P
’b
Vbe_‘Ptab
0 ate
in 30., 0"
“I o
«u ~
2' D.
e 5
('5
nn'xfl
i?
CL

 

Figure 1.--The parent-involvement model. (From Ira J. Gordon and
William F. Breivogel, Building Effective Home-School
Relationships. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc., 1976,

p.*7.)

 

 

the information that schools usually distribute during the school
year regarding either activities or the students' progress or prob-
lems. In the audience role, parents are acting as receivers or as
persons who are being informed of what has been going on in the

school. Gordon and Breivogel wrote:

22

First, the parents' most common role in involvement is as an
audience. Parents are informed by the school about its activi-
ties or are asked to visit the school as bystanders or observ-
ers. The custom of "Open School Week" or of the classic PTA
meeting in the fall, in which parents follow their child's
schedules and meet each teacher, are examples of participation
along this spoke.1

The second role parents can play in their child's schooling
is that of teaching their children--that is, following up what the
children have been taught in the school, knowing whether they have
homework to do, and encouraging or helping them to accomplish it.
Gordon and Breivogel said that when parents play this role, not only
do they contribute to the betterment of their children, but they also
usually learn something new from this involvement.

The parent is involved as a direct and active teacher of
his or her own child. This role is central in this book. The
importance of parent as teacher, dimly seen a decade ago, is far
more clearly understood today. Now, in contrast to the early
1960's, the concept has been stripped of some of the social
class and ethnic notions of superiority and inferiority. We
recognize instead that not only are all parents teachers of
their children, but all parents are learners in improving their
ways of working with their children.

There is, then, a special place in the home-school partner-
ship for helping parents learn more effective ways of working
with their children at home. All parents need support and
help: (1) to show them procedures and activities they had not
tought about, (2) to support what they are doing that is soundly
based in child development, (3) to encourage them to use and
expand upon what they know, and (4) to encourage them to share
with other parents what has worked well for them. This means
the path is a two-way street. . . .2

In the third role of involvement in their children's educa-
tion, parents are considered as active participants by devoting some
of their time and effort to performing different tasks, under the

school's direction, that usually help the school accomplish its

 

'Ibid. 21bid., p. 7.

23.

objective of educating their children. According to Gordon and
Breivogel,

Parents are involved in an active role in the school as aides

and volunteers. The original notion in various programs was

that such work would help the school do its role more effec-

tively by increasing the adult-child ratio, as well as by inform-
ing parents about school operations. Experience has taught,

in our Florida Parent Education Model and in similar efforts,

that bringing parents in to work as volunteers and aides changes

Eeachers and schools as much as it influences parents and chil-
ren.

In the fourth role, parents can be hired by the school to
work as a link between the students' homes and the school. Parents
can visit the students' homes and convey the school's concerns regard-
ing their children's future and, at the same time, bring back to the
school the parents' expectations and information about their living
conditions. Such information can be taken into account by the stu-
dents' teachers. Working as paraprofessionals for the school, parents
can invite and attract other parents to visit the school and to become
involved in its affairs.

Finally, parents can participate in establishing and direct-
ing the school's policies. In Gordon and Breivogel's opinion, this
role is not a new one. Parents used to participate in hiring teachers
for their local schools.

This is a long tradition in our country, and the fifth spoke
represents the efforts to get back to these roots. 0n the
legislative level such a move is also under way. Federal
legislation for Title I, as well as for Head Start and Follow
Through, mandates parent participation in decision making.

[On the state level], Florida law now requires that a Citizen
Advisory Council be established at least at the school district

 

1Ibid., p. 8.

24

and encourages the establishment of such councils at the school
level. Further, schools are now required to submit annual
progress reports to the parents.1

From this presentation, it is clear that there are many roles
for parents to play inside and outside the schools. The major objec-
tive of playing these roles is to enrich their children's education.
The process of enhancing their children's education can be directly
accomplished when they teach their children at home, or when they
teach them at school under the teachers' direction; it can be ful-
filled indirectly when parents participate in improving the school
environment, which will be reflected in their children later on.

The notion of parents' involvement in their children's school-
ing is a sound one if the schools can initiate an appropriate pro-
gram to bring parents and teachers together. In this regard, Wilson
wrote: "To say that parental involvement can have an impact on schools
cannot be doubted. Whether the impact the parents has is effective or
non-effective depends upon the programs developed to help parents
become involved."2

For Stearns and others, parental involvement can be produc-

tive if it is implemented properly. They believed that the main

reasons for the failure of programs using parental involvement are

 

'Ibid.

2Frank Hunter Wilson, "Parental Involvement With Their Chil-
dren's Education on the Junior High Level in Urban Schools and Its
Relationship to Student Achievement (as Indicated by Grade Point
Average, Rates of Attendance and Citizenship Average), uJParental
Status, to Distance of the Home From School and to Parents' Sex"
(Ph.D. dissertation, Michigan State University, 1976), p. 36.

25

the meager participation by parents and the difficulty of recruiting
parents to be involved in school affairs. In this regard, they said:

The primary reason why parent involvement most often fails to
have an impact on child achievement is because there is in fact
no involvement or it is only minimal. Obtaining participation
of parents is certainly the greatest difficulty for parent
education programs. To have any impact on parents' life styles
or ways of allocating time to their children or methods of
interacting with their children, the participation of the par-
ents must be intensive.

Researchers have found that parents can make a difference in
their children's education. The crucial factor in making this differ—
ence lies in the hands of the school personnel, in providing parents
with a suitable and productive environment in which to participate.

What Role Do Parents Play in Their
Children's Development?

 

 

Child development is a continuous process that begins at the
moment of conception. Optimally, during pregnancy, the mother takes
care of her physical and psychological health, concerned that any
negative event in these two major domains in her life will affect the
unborn child. The parents' share in the child's development usually
continues until the grown child leaves the parents' home by getting
married, for example, or by seeking independence.

From the moment of birth, the parents' direct participation
in their children's develOpment begins with the socialization process.
McKee defined socialization as follows:

Socialization is the basic process by which the human organism
becomes a person and a functioning member of society and by

 

1Stearns and others, "Parental Involvement," p. 41.

26

which such persons are continually integrated into groups by

acquiring as their own the norms, values, and perspectives of
such groups. It is, therefore, a process essential for indi-
viduals, else they could not become human.1

Obviously, then, the socialization process is essential for

the human being because through this process he acquires the values,
beliefs, and living norms of his groupi>rAlso, socialization is a
continuous process. It cannot be said, for example, that from the
moment of birth to the age of six there is an independent phase of
development or socialization that belongs only to the family. There
are specific developmental stages such as infancy, early childhood,
middle childhood, and adolescence, for example, but each stage forms
the first step for the succeeding stage, which builds on what was
acquired in previous stages. The develOpmental stages are integrated
and cannot be separated. Parents lay the foundation of this develop-
ment, and because they know how this foundation has been laid, it is
necessary for them to continue along with the teacher in the process
of their child's development. In this connection, Gordon and Breivogel
said:

Language development begins with the first vocalization the
child makes and the first response the parent makes to that
vocalization. This comes along before formal schooling. We
know that the child's self-concept, his sense of confidence,
and his self-esteem are shaped very early. The concept of sex
role--what it means to be a boy, what it means to be a girl--
is pretty well organized by the age of three, if not before.

But the learning of sex role continues throughout the years,
coming to full flush in adolescence. Sex role is learned in the

home through modeling by the parents, the things they do or say,
the example of what is proper for a man or woman to do. Parents

 

1James B. McKee, Sociology: The Study of Society_(New York:
Holt, Rinehart and Winston,’l981), p. 78.

27

set the stage for children to learn what it is to be male or
female.

Basic values are formed in the home. A sense of responsi-
bility for others, the concept of being helpers or competitors
with others in the world, attitudes toward violence, handling
of aggression--all begin early in the home. The home continues
to play a major role, far more than does the school.1

In the same way, Reeves described the importance of the home

in children's development when he said:

The home is primarily an educational institution and the parents
are teachers. In the home the child learns to walk, talk,
demand, concede, co-operate, and many other means of making
adjustments to persons and conditions. What he learns in the
home is the foundation and starting point from which later
learning proceeds. It is usually the most permanent of all
learning because it is primary and basic. Of course the child
continually modifies what he has learned in the home as he modi-
fies all he ever learns with further experience, but what he
learns early becomes almost second nature to him and it requires
motives, sometimes powerful ones, to induce changes. For learn-
ing, his later experiences must be related to, and checked
against, what has been learned previously.2

To show how important parents are to their children during

the early stages of growth and their relevancy to the children's

future development, Schaefer, in reviewing research conducted in
“I“ m

w

 

-‘

early childhood education, made the following generalization:

Parent behavior and the cultural-pedagogical milieu of the home
significantly influence intellectual development and academic

achievement of the child. Rupp reported that the cultural
pedagogical atmosphere provided by parents is significantly
related to reading success in the first grade among lower

socioeconomic status children in Holland. Moore, in an English
longitudinal study, found that ratings of books, toys, experi-
ences, and languages stimulation from home visits when the

 

1Gordon and Breivogel, Building Effective Home-School Rela-

tionship , p. 9.

2Charles E. Reeves, Parents and the School: A Guide to

Cooperation in Child Development (Washington, D.C.: Public Affairs

 

Press, 1963), p. 14.

V"

28

child was 2-1/2 were significantly correlated with the child's
reading at 7 years and with mental test score at 8 years, even
after controlling for social class. . . . The amount of paren—
tal involvement in the child's education may explain up to
four times as much of the variance in the child's intelligence
and achievement test scores at age 11 as the quality of the

SC 00 .

Another finding of Schaefer's study was that verbal inter-
action between parents and their children influences the children's
IQ test results. Schaefer noted:

The major individual tests of intellectual development are

very highly correlated with vocabulary test scores. Miner
reports from a survey of research on the correlations of
vocabulary with IQ scores, that vocabulary correlates as highly
with Sanford-Binet and Wechsler-Bellevue mental tests as they
correlate with one another.2

Schaefer also found that even the positive or negative rela-
tionship that exists between the mother and the father, and between
the parents and their child, affects the child's adjustment at
school. "The quality of both husband-wife relationships and of
parent-child relationships is related to the child's competence and
adjustment at school."3

It is obvious from the research findings that parents'
involvement in teaching their children in the early stages of their
lives affects the children's progress. The environment in which the

child and his family live and the interaction between them affect

both the present and the future of the child, positively or

 

1Earl S. Schaefer, "Toward a Revolution in Education:
A Perspective From Child Development Research," The National Elemen-
tary Principal 51 (September 1971): 9.

3

 

 

21bid. Ibid., p. 20.

29

negatively, depending on the child's experience when the family is
the chief socializing agent in his life.::L "‘“x-
Besides, homes, schools and peer groups are considered the
major socializing agents in many societies. A mutually supportive
relationship between the first two socializing agents, homes and
schools, is essential. Schools must act in accordance with the
basic norms to which the children have been exposed at home. Any
modifications or changes in these norms that are made by the school
require the awareness and the consent of the children's families;
otherwise, the children are caught in the middle and suffer adjust-
ment problems. McKee depicted the situation by saying:
In some circumstances the agreement and mutual support of
family and school may not be sustained. Middle-class school
teachers, for one thing, may uphold models of behavior and
teach social values that are incongruent with those practiced
in the family and the neighborhood by lower-class and working-
class children. If the school succeeds, the socializing influ-
ence of the family is weakened. This, however, may be the very
process that "fits" a lower-class child for entrance into a
middle-class world. But if it does not succeed, the conflict
between two modes of socialization may unfit the child for
success in school. Here is where we find so many school drop-
outs; early in life they were socialized to a basic set of values
and a lifestyle that were incompatible with those of the school.1
Such problems can be prevented if teachers and parents communicate
with each other to discuss or find a solution to the matter in an
appropriate way that could help the student continue normally.
Concerning the importance of parents in their children's
education because of the parents' knowledge of their own offspring,

one can ask the following questions: Is it possible for teachers as

 

1McKee, Sociology: The Study of Society, p. 86.

30

members of the second socializing agency to make the right judgments
and to design an appropriate program for the child without knowing

the experience of the first socializing agency? If the answer is no,
are not the parents the persons who can help in this process? Another
question is what will be the value of the experience that the parents
acquired during their past and present interaction with the child if
it does not contribute to further development of the child? Indeed,
such experience is valuable and should not remain unused.

Children do not enter school with blank minds to enable the
teachers to implant whatever concepts they desire. Youngsters usually
come to school with six or seven years of experience. They come with
minds that have been exposed to different subjects and events of the
world around them. This process aids their growth, according to Dewey,
who considered education as growth and growth as education.‘l Experi-
ence is the major factor in the process of education and growth.

Dewey emphasized the educative experience. Simply put, the educative
experience is the one that interacts with the objective environment
and adds to the fund of experience an individual already has. The

new experience then promotes future experiences that eventually con-
tribute to the growth of that individual. The noneducative experi-
ence does not add to the fund of experience; it is static. Continuity
is another major aspect of the educative experience. In relation to

continuity, Dewey said: "Every experience enacted and undergone

 

1John Dewey, Eyperience and Education (New York: Collier
Books, 1963).

 

31

modifies the one who acts and undergoes, while this modification
affects, whether we wish or not, the quality of subsequent experi—
ence."1

If, as Dewey believed, continuity is important in experience,
the question is:e Is it appropriate to ignore the students' past
experiences to which they were exposed before entering school and to
start by providing them with brand-new experiences? It is assumed
that parent-teacher contact can assist the process of continuity in
experience when parents provide the teachers with a full picture of
what went on when their children were at home. Then the teachers
have the duty to build the school experiences on such information
about each child. On the other hand, provided with adequate informa-
tion and direction, parents can enrich and contribute to their

children's school experience. Then there will be greater assurance

of fewer contradictions in the students' lives.

How Important Are Parents in Their
Children's Schooling?_

 

 

Parents' attitudes regarding their children's education, as
well as their social background, play a significant role in their
children's achievement. TWO major studies that were conducted in
different societies can be considered as evidence in support of this
statement. One is the Plowden Report, which was done in Great Britain.
It covered more than 3,000 children from 173 schools. The main purpose

of the study was "to relate what we could learn about home and school

 

'Ibid., p. 35.

32

to the attainment of the children."1

One of the major findings of
the study was that parents' attitudes, interest, and encouragement
played a significant role in their children's achievement.

~_ .-.——..—-— ~

The National Survey pointed to the influence upon educational
performance of parental attitudes. It follows that one of
the essentials for educational advance is a closer partner-
ship between the two parties to every child's education.2
The report suggested several processes that can be used by
the schools to get in touch with parents. The parent-teacher asso-
ciation is a major means. As small-scale projects, the following
means can be used to achieve the same purpose: welcome to school,
parents' meetings with teachers, open houses, information for parents,
reports for parents, and home visits by school staff.
The other study, the Coleman Report, was conducted in the ‘<é¥ -----
United States. This report was requested by Congress and sponsored
by the United States Office of Education. The study covered about
57,000 students, 60,000 teachers, and some 4,000 schools to generate
the study findings. The major finding of the Coleman Report was that
students' achievement is only slightly affected by the school. Stu-
dents' social background is the major factor responsible for their
achievement. Specifically, students' homes can be considered as a

major influence on their progress at school. Although the Coleman

Report has received much positive and negative criticism, one major

 

1Department of Education and Science, Children and Their
Primary Schools: A Report of the Central Advisory Council for Educa-
tion, Vol. 1 (Great Britain: Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1967),
p. 32.

 

 

21bid., p. 37.

33

finding is important to the present study. In this regard, the
Report said:

0fthe many implications of this study of school effects
on achievement, one appears to be of overriding importance.

This is the implication that stems from the following results
taken together:

1. The great importance of family background for achieve-
ment.

2. The fact that the relation of family background to
achievement does not diminish over the years of school;

3. The relatively small amount of school-to-school varia-
tion that is not accounted for by differences in family back-
ground, indicating the small independent effect of variations in
school facilities, curriculum, and staff upon achievement;

4. The small amount of variance in achievement explicitly
accounted for by variations in facilities and curriculum;

5. Given the fact that no school factors account for much
variation in achievement, teachers' characteristics account for
more than any other--taken together with the results from 2.3,
which show that teachers tend to be socially and racially simi-
lar to the students they teach;

6. The fact that the social composition of the student
body is more highly related to achievement, independently of the
student's own social background, than is any school factor;

7. The fact that attitudes such as a sense of control of
the environment, or a belief in the responsiveness of the envi-
ronment, are extremely highly related to achievement, but appear
to be little influenced by variations in school characteristics.

Taking all these results together, one implication stands
out above all: that schools bring little influence to bear on
a child's achievement that is independent of his background and
general social context; and that this very lack of an independent
effect means that the inequalities imposed on children by their
home, neighborhood, and peer environment are carried along to
become the inequalities with which they confront adult life at
the end of school.1

Parents usually are not passive with their children at home.
Much interaction exists between them. Some of these interactions are
intentional and have objectives. Usually, parents on such occasions

seek to accomplish a specific objective. On the other hand, some of

 

1U.S. Office of Education, Equality of Educational Opportunity,
by James Coleman (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1966).

34

these interactions are accidental, but in both situations children
do learn, so their parents are considered their first teachers. In
this regard, Worley wrote:

Parents are the first and most important teachers of their
children. They come from all ranks, yet they all teach. Par-
ents are part of the child's personal, intimate world where
questions are real and answers must make sense.

Some of these "home teachers" have a positive effect. Their
children start school each year with a vast fund of information,
ideas, and values attributable to the "home-school." Other
parents have taught their children to neglect or to fear school
and learning. The "home-school" has failed their children.1

So, through the process of learning at home, children can

absorb their parents' attitudes toward many subjects, including
learning, and act in accordance with these attitudes. When the
students' attitudes toward learning are affected positively or nega-
tively by their parents' attitudes and behaviors, and the schools
conflict or present a problem with this, then the children alone are
accused of lacking the desire to learn. Although the main causes are
outside the children's realm, schools continue to find a solution
within the students' reality. Knowing the main cause of these and
other problems that exist in children's lives will help to a great
extent in finding a reasonable solution that will satisfy the students
and the teachers.

Parents' involvement in their children's teaching and educa-

tional process must continue when children are attending school.

This is one reason to achieve integration between the education being

provided at home and the education being provided at school. A

 

1Stinson E. Worley, “Parents Are Also Teachers," Childhood
Education 43 (February 1967): 341.

35

second reason for achieving integration is that parents have unlimited
responsibilities to their children until they accomplish their main
goal: that of seeing their youngsters become independent members of
society. Hattingh described this major goal:

It is definitely the desire of every parent that his child will
eventually be able to take his place in society as an independ-
ent and responsible adult, i.e., will lead a meaningful exis-
tence by giving substance to those values which man, in his
particular cultural milieu, considers extremely valuable and
worth striving for. In other words, the parent's wish is that
his child will identify himself completely with a specific way
of life and the demands of propriety arising from this. In
addition, the parents' task is to fulfill this wish by dint of
formative educational concern for the child.1

This desire of all parents necessitates that they look after
their children even after they start their schooling because the
parents' desire might be affected by teachers. Teachers are human
beings with their own strengths and weaknesses. They, too, make
'mistakes and are not always perfect with their students. This situa-
tion requires continuous help and observation from parents to prevent
teachers' mistakes or to correct those mistakes in such a way that
each party's dignity is preserved. In this regard, Kappleman and
Ackerman stated:

School is run by and for human beings. And human beings make
mistakes. We know that our children are susceptible to the
occasional misdemeanor, mistake, or inappropriate response.
But we are less prepared for such human failings in people
responsible for our children within the school environment.
They, too, have the same human potential for mistake and mis-
‘interpretation in dealing with our children. If;wemare not

.prepared to act when we discover these errors, these inap-
pr0priate responses, these actions which interfere with our

 

1D. L. Hattingh, The Place of the Parent Community in the
Education System, Report No. 0-32 (Republic of South Africa: Human
Science ResearEh Council, 1978), p. 7.

 

36

child's emotional and educational adjustment to school, then
we are seriously evading our responsibility as parents.

From the preceding discussion, it can be concluded that
. parents' involvement in their children's education and development
is a clear necessity during both the preschool and the in—school
periods. Parents' responsibility for their children's education does
not stop when youngsters start school because development is contin-
uous and because the parents' desire to see their children as useful
members of the society requires a continuous effort to take care of
their children inside and outside the schools. For this, sending
children to school is not enough. Knowing what is going on in the
school and how its activities are related to the general objective
and supporting these activities are important, too. As Tyler said,

The substitution of bureaucratic agency,whether it be school,

day-care centers, or some other one, for the family will rarely

furnish the physical, intellectual and emotional support and
encouragement essential to the full development of children.

Parents' Involvement in Their Children's
Schooling and Its Effect on StudentsT’
Achievement

 

 

 

Research done in the area of student achievement has indi-
cated that students' achievement improves when parents become involved
in their youngsters' schooling, provided with the necessary informa-
tion and instructions from teachers. On this t0pic, the Austin

Independent School District Report said:

 

1Murray M. Kappleman and Paul R. Ackerman, Between Parent and
School (New York: The Dial Press/James Wade, 1977), p. 2.

2Ralph W. Tyler, "Parent Involvement in Curriculum Decision-
Making: Critique and Comment" (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduc-
tion Service, ED 131 596, April 1980), p. 5.

 

37

Educational and social research suggests that parental
involvement in the educational process has a positive influence
on the child's academic achievement. Research has found the
following to be related to academic achievements (Ware, 1973;
Brophy, Good, and Neller, 1975):

.the amount of academic guidance and direct instruction

provided in the home;

. the cognitive level and style of the parents;

. the amount of reading and educational materials available
in the home;

. the frequency of verbal contact between parents and child;

. the attitude of the parents toward the school;

. the parents'willingness to devote time to their children.
[,z Observations that parents differ in their ability to teach
children effectively, and the lack of success of intervention
programs which do not involve parents, have led to efforts to
improve the academic achievement of low socio-economic status
(SES) and ethnic minority Children by increasihg the parents'

involvement in children's education.1 {Italics mine.]

 

Research has shown that with minimal involvement, such as
giving children positive or negative reinforcement depending on the
good or bad report card they bring home, parents can contribute to
their children's achievement.- Karraker proved that point when he
assigned 16 low-achieving students in arithmetic to their second-
grade classes:};A report card was designed to indicate whether a
student had made satisfactory progress during each class. Five
parents attended two one-hour conferences in which they were instructed
how to provide praise and encouragement when their children brought
home a satisfactory report card and how to make appropriate comments
when the children brought home unsatisfactory reports. In these two
conferences, parents were also provided with additional information
regarding their children's behavior and management. Six other parents

were informed about the report card instruction during a 15-minute

 

1Austin Independent School District, "Review of Research in
Parental Involvement in Education," p. 7.

38

conference and were not given any additional information. The report
card instruction alone was mailed to the remaining five parents.

A baseline was recorded for the study, which lasted for ten
consecutive days. After the completion of the study,

The baseline median percent for the two-hour conference stu-
dents was 47, and with daily report cards it was 52. The
15-minute conference students rose from 77 to 79%. Students
whose parents received a letter increased from 58 to 64%. [In
general], these data show that the median percent correct for
these 16 students actually rose above the class median during
the presentation of consequences in all three methods of pro-
gram presentation.1

This improvement in the students' achievement came when the students
started to realize that their progress at school would affect their
parents' behavior toward them and that their parents were becoming
aware of what their children were doing in school. er

However, the drastic change in performance occurred with
report cards plus contingent consequences from parents. This
change in performance would support the observation the S5
[subjects] did have the skills to perform the assignments were
at appropriate difficulty level.

The three teachers indicated that they planned to use this
home management technique in the future, not only because of
the increase in performance that was demonstrated, but also
because they could now give parents specific advice during
parent-teacher conferences. Parents in the two-hour condition 2
indicated they used these techniques on other children behavior.

This study indicated that even with a minimum effort from parents, _»,i~.
children's achievement can be improvedgyfi
In an experimental study designed to evaluate the effect of -e,

parental involvement on their children's reading improvement, six

 

1R. J. Karraker, "Increasing Academic Performance Through
Home-Managed Contingency Programs," Journal of School Psychology
10,2 (1972): 176.

2

 

Ibid., p. 177.

39

schools in Great Britain were selected to implement the study, which
lasted for two years (1976-1978). Three groups were defined in the
study. The experimental group received the intervention program
(parental involvement). The first control group received extra help
in reading from an experienced reading teacher. The second control
group received no extra help in particular, except the regular reading
program. Students were assigned to the three groups as follows:
One top infant class at each of the two parent involvement
schools (Schools 1 and 2) was chosen at random to receive the
research intervention, and the remaining classes at each school
formed the within-school control groups for that school. Simi-
larly, intervention and control roups were randomly chosen at
the two schools (Schools 3 and 43 where the extra teacher help
was to be given at school. . . . There were no interventions
at School 5 and 6 other than annual testing of reading attain-
ment:I

The reason for having the first control group was to find out
whether the improvement, if any, could be attributed to parents'
motivation and involvement or to the extra help and time that were
given by the teacher.

Parents in the experimental group were asked to listen to
their children while they read, to correct their children's mistakes
while they were reading, and to complete a report card summarizing
what had been practiced at home. The researchers arranged home

visits to observe the children while they were reading to their

parents.

 

1J. Tizard, W. N. Scholfield, and Jenny Hewison, "Collabora-
tion Between Teachers and Parents in Assisting Children's Reading,"
British Journal of Educational Psychology 52 February 1982): 2.

40

The major finding of the study was that parents' involvement
in their children's schooling contributed positively to the students'
achievement. The researchers concluded their findings with the fol-
lowing points:

Firstly, in inner city, multicultural schools it is both feasible
and practicable to involve nearly all parents in formal educa-
tional activities with infant and first-year junior school chil-
dren, even if the parents are nonliterate or largely non-English
speaking. Secondly, children who receive parental help are sig-
nificantly better in reading attainment than comparable children
who do not. Thirdly, most parents express great satisfaction in
being involved in this way by the schools, and teachers report
that the children show an increased keenness for learning at
school and are better behaved. Fourthly, the teachers involved
in the home collaboration also reported that they found the work
with parents worthwhile and they continued to involve parents with
subsequent classes after the experiment was conducted, as did
teachers who had taught parallel control classes during the inter-
vention years. Fifthly, small-group instruction in reading given
by a highly competent specialist teacher did not introduce
improvements in attainment comparable in magnitude with those
obtained from collaboration with parents. Sixthly, the collabo-
ration between teachers and parents was effective for children of
all initial levels of performance, including those who at the
beginning of the study were failing to learn to read. Finally,
the fact that some children read to parents who could not them-
selves read English, or in a few cases cannot read at all, did
not prevent improvement in the reading skills of those children,
or detract from the willingness of the parent to collaborate

with the school.1

In her study of 485 black children and 56 white children,
Willmon attempted to discover the effect of parents' involvement in
the Head Start program in Florida on children's achievement. She
used the Metropolitan Reading Readiness Test to test the following
hypotheses:

l. . . . that no statistically significant difference exists
between the mean reading readiness score of a group of

 

11bid., p. 14.

41

children whose parents participated actively in a Head Start

educational program and the mean reading readiness score of

a group of Head Start children whose parents did not partici-

pate in the program.

2. . . . that no statistically significant difference exists in
the mean reading readiness score of a group of Head Start
children whose parents participated in a highly active manner
and a group of Head Start children whose parents did not par-
ticipate in the program.1
The total group of students was divided into three groups

according to data collected by the program's teachers. The first
group comprised students whose parents were actively involved in the
program. The second group was students whose parents were highly
actively involved in the program, and the third group was students
whose parents were not involved.

After the students' reading achievement was measured using
the Metropolitan Reading Readiness Test, both of the hypotheses were
rejected. It was clear from the results that the students whose
parents were actively involved in the program and those whose parents
were highly actively involved achieved better scores on the test than
did the students whose parents were not involved. These differences
in achievement between the two main groups were attributed to the
motivation these students received by observing their parents engaged
in their education, thus getting the impression that their education
was important to their parents. In this regard, Willmon noted: "The

findings of the study indicate that for this population the influence

of highly active parental involvement in the Head Start program

 

'Betty Willmon, "Parent Participation as a Factor in the
Effectiveness of Head Start Programs," The Journal of Educational
Research 62 (May-June 1969): 406-407.

42

appeared to serve as an intervening variable which influenced academic
motivation."1

In her report, Fernandez stated that:

Hundreds of schools all over the country are discovering that a
positive factor for academic achievement is parental involvement.
Schools are finding out that parents "do care" and that given
the opportunity, they can influence and farther enhance the edu-
cational opportunities of their children.

Parental involvement was a component in the Bilingual Program
at the Education Service Center in Austin, Texas. As part of this
program, parents were invited to visit their children's schools,
and visits by the teachers were undertaken for the parents who did
not come to the school. Parents were given an orientation that
emphasized the importance of language, reading, and math skills.
Parents' importance in educating their children was also emphasized.
Parents were encouraged to visit their children in classrooms, as well.

Instruction sessions were then held to teach the volunteer
parents how they could help their children in reading at home. Other
aspects of the program are as follows:

Parents are taught to use a booklet containing general
instructions, follow up suggestions and some extra reading
activities. The booklet contains monthly calendars which
facilitate the parents' accounting of the days they have worked
with their children.

Weekly telephone calls and home visits are made to encour-
age parents to continue working with their children.

Monthly workshops also provide parents with an opportunity

to share their experiences with other parents and to learn new
ways of working with their children.3

 

'Ibid., p. 410.

2Fernandez, "Parental Involvement in Bilingual Education," p. 2.

31bid., p. 5.

43

Parents were also used as tutors for their children and for other
students at the school after attending an intensive training session.
That was also done on a voluntary basis.

Although the writer did not state directly the effectiveness
of this program, it was assumed that the teachers in the program were
satisfied with it because the Report stated:

I have tried to share with you some of the things that have
been successful for me in working with parents in our Bilin-
gual Program. I hope that this information will be of some
use to those of you working with parents.

In evaluating data collected about California's Early Educa-
tion Program regarding the importance of parental involvement and
its effect on students' achievement, Herman and Yeh found that
parental involvement was positively related to student achievement.

The results suggest that parent involvement in schools is
beneficial. The degree of parent interest and participation
in school activities is related to students' achievement.
The amount of school-home communication is also indirectly
related to achievement.2

In an experimental study designed to determine the effect
of parents' participation in educating their children on student
achievement, Shelton used the Family Involvement-Communication System
and trained parents as the links between the school and the other

w

parents. Using grade-point average to measure the students'

 

1Ibid., p. 7.

2Joan L. Herman and Jennie P. Yeh, "Some Effects of Parent
Involvement in Schools" (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction
Service, ED 206 963, February 1981), p. 9.

ll

44

achievement, she found that parents' participation in their children's

education at home ws a major factor in increasing children's achieve-

ment.1

Berlin and Berlin described how parental involvement was not

only a major factor in raising the students' achievement, but how it

was a positive factor in changing the schools' negative environment
to a lively one. In this regard, they said:

The achievement in reading and writing of these failing or
about to be expelled students increased from year to year.
Anecdotal records kept by the school mental health worker
indicated that both the children and their parents began to
feel more competent and effective. Their relationships at
home also changed as parents learned new ways of involving
themselves with their children and encouraging their learning.

Similar findings regarding the effect of parents' involvement

in their children's education have been reported by Seibert and
others; Rubin and others; Safran; Hawkins, Sluyter, and Smith; and

Morrow and Wilson.3 All of these investigators indicated that when

 

1Judith Shelton, "An Analysis of a Family Involvement-

Communication System in a Title I Elementary School," Final Report
(Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 082 019,
January 1974).

2Roxie Berlin and Irving N. Berlin, "School's Training of
Parents to Be Effective Teachers of Their Own and Other Nonlearning
Children" (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service,
ED 099 110, April 1975), p. 8.

Tjane B. Seibert and others, "Emerging Trends in Parent-
School Communication" (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction
Service, ED 182 734, July 1980);)Roberta Rubin and others, "Compre-
hensive Model for Child Service: Parent EdUcation Follow Through
Program" (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service,

ED 181 353, June 1980); Daniel Safran, "Evaluating Parent Involvement,"
Issue Paper No. 1 (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service,
ED 094 863, December 1974); Robert P. Hawkins, David J. Sluyter, and
Carroll 0. Smith, "Modification of Achievement by a Simple Technique

Involving Parents and Teacher," in Classroom Uses of Behavior

/

f.—

/"r

45

parents become involved in their children's education, they contribute
positively to their children's achievement.
Parents' Involvement in Their Children's

Schooling and Its Effect on Students'
Behavior and Social Adjustment

 

 

 

In many studies, parental involvement has been used as a
method to solve students' behavior problems at school. Sovling the
students' behavior problems consequently led to a better social
adjustment in the classroom.

In some studies, working with parents was accomplished in a
direct way-~that is, by educating parents to perform specific duties
at home or by trying to bring the family into close relation with the
school. In Offenberg et al.'s study, a summer program called "Parents
and Children Together" was designed to train Hispanic parents to
teach their children. The program stemmed from the following
philosophy:

In order to help these parents become resources for reinforce-

ment of their children's learning, academic, cultural, practical
and school curriculum content is to be imparted. The parents, 1
in turn, W111 help their children be more successful in school.

The primary goal of the program was to improve these students'

academic performance and their school attendance. Parents were

 

Modification, ed. Mary 8. Harris (Columbus, Ohio: Charles E. Merrill,
1972); William R. Morrow and Robert C. Wilson, "Family Relations of
Bright High-Achieving and Under-Achieving High School Boys," Child
Development 32,3 (1961): 501-509.

1Robert M. Offenberg, Carlos Rodriguez, and Bob Epstein,
"Project PACT. Parent and Children Together: Evaluation of the First
Year, 1977-1978" (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service,
ED 177 252, February 1980), p. 6.

 

 

46

involved in observing their children while they were being educated,
developing some of the school materials that were used in the teach-
ing process, and in many other school-related activities.
The results of the first year of the program were fruitful
and encouraging, as the authors stated:
At the end of the first program year, there was evidence that
parents' participation in the summer program was associated
with higher reading scores and improved attendance among their
children during the school term. . . . In conclusion, the sum-
mer program appears to have worked well as designed and was
associated with superior [nufil behavior.
Shelton, using the FICS model mentioned before, succeeded
in improving the students' attendance when parents were involved in
school affairs.2
Henderson and Swanson used parents to teach their children how
to ask questions because the school administrators of the Papago
Indian Reservation in South Arizona were "interested in the possi-
bility of facilitating the development of question-asking skills in

"3 Question asking is

Papago children through parent intervention.
considered a good skill to use in obtaining information. Therefore,
the problem in this study was that children lacked a desired behavior:
asking questions. Selected parents attended training sessions on

developing question-asking skills, and they agreed to work as

 

lIbid., p. 4.

2Shelton, "An Analysis of a Family Involvement-Communication
System."

3Ronald W. Henderson and Rosemary Swanson, "Parent Training
and Utilization of Knowledge From Research on Cognitive Socialization
(Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 097 113,
February 1975), p. 4.

47

paraprofessionals with the schools that participated in the project.
These parents trained the other parents how to teach and to encourage
their children to ask questions.

The results of the study were as follows:

Clearly the most important finding of this investigation was
that when parents [became] involved by practicing, with their
own children, socialization skills which they learned in a
training program conducted by Papago paraprofessionals, the
children's performance on the question-asking tasks increased
significantly over performance attributable to direct modeling
instruction by experimenter. . . . In brief, the results of this
experiment provide evidence that if a particular skill or set of
skills is seen as a desirable objective, then that skill may be
learned more effectively if parents learn to provide specific
support for it, than if the responsibility for teaching the
skill is left solely to the school.1

Writing of different home-school programs that are underway
in the United States, Moles and Collins described a Home-School
Community Agents program that has been implemented by a Columbus,
Ohio, school district. In this program, a behavior specialist works
with a group of 30 students who have been referred by teachers, prin-
cipals, and social workers as misbehaved students. The specialist's
duty is to

work intensely with the students, almost on a daily basis, on
such problems as school attendance, academic improvement, moti-
vation, student-teacher relationships, and even outside prob-
lems dealing with the law and other social agencies. It is

the aim of the specialisEs to make the families a close partner
in all of their efforts.

The program has worked effectively in solving the students' problems,

as the report indicated: "Evaluations done by the school's R & D

 

'Ibid.. pp. 17-18.

2Oliver Moles and Carter Collins, "Home-School Programs of
Urban School Districts" (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Reproduction
Service, ED 210 358, April 1982), p. 12.

48

division indicate that the Home-School Community Agent program has
been effective in achieving the above goals and in reducing the drop-
out rate."1

In other studies with less effort and indirect involvement
from parents, parental involvement has been used to solve some student
behavior problems. The problem students in these studies usually
bring home with them at the end of the school day a report card or a
note showing how well or how poorly they behaved during the school
day. Depending on the report, parents present reinforcement in the
form of verbal praise or material reward, or they show their dis-
satisfaction in a verbal or material manner.

In several studies, parent cooperation with the schools
was a major factor in solving many of the students' behavior prob-
lems. Dougherty and Doughtery reported that using the report card
system as a method of communication between schools and homes resulted
in solving the problems of not completing homework and "talking out"
for 15 fourth-grade students.2 The teacher recorded a baseline for
ten days for these two problems. A daily report card with instruc-
tions was sent home one week before starting the intervention. Imme—
diate changes in these two behaviors were recorded. The investigators

reported the effectiveness of the method as follows:

 

1

2Edward H. Dougherty and Ann Dougherty, "The Daily Report
Card: A Simplified and Flexible Package for Classroom Behavior Man-
agement," Psychology in the Schools 14 (April 1977): 193-94.

Ibid.

 

49

Homework completion was recorded during a baseline period
of 10 days. The mean percentage of children not completing
their homework was 34.7% during this period. Following the
Daily Report Card for homework, the percentage of noncompleted
assignments dropped to 17% for the next 12 days, and continued
slightly below this amount for the remainder of the study. No
differential effect was observed when the card was taken home
on a weekly basis.

Following stabilization of the homework rates, talk-outs
were scored on individual report cards. During the baseline
observation of 22 days, the mean talk-out rate was 13.5 per
hour, and decreased to a mean of 2.3 per hour for the next
11 days. The talk-out rate stayed at or near zero for the
remainder of the study, and did not change after the weekly
system was in effect.

It is clear from the study description and the results that:

l. The method was easy for both the teacher and parents to

use because it did not require much training on their parts.

2. The method had an immediate effect on changing the

students' behavior problems.

3. Parents' awareness of what goes on in the school is

important.

4. Informing parents wasa continuous process; the report

was sent home whether the students were doing well or poorly.

Different studies have shown satisfactory results from using

parent involvement in solving many behavior problems such as fighting,

leaving the classroom without permission, making noise, being out

of seats, and aggressive behavior.2 The results of these studies

 

1Ibid.

2Teodoro Ayllon, Stephen Garber and Kim Pisor, "The Elimina-
tion of Discipline Problems Through a Combined School-Home Motivational
System," Behavior Thera 6 (1975): 616-26; Benjamin B. Lahey et al.,
"An Evaluation of Daily Report Cards With Minimal Teacher and Parent
Contact as an Efficient Method of Classroom Intervention," Behavior
Modification 1 (July 1977): 381-94; Jon S. Baily, Montrose M. Wolf,

50

indicated that parental involvement was a great help by making
parents aware of their children's behavior at school and by provid-
ing a reward and punishment system at home.

Parents' Involvement in Their Children's
Schooling and Its Effect on Teachers

 

 

By showing how parents' involvement in their children's
schooling can help motivate the children to be better achievers and
to behave better in the classroom, it can be assumed that these
factors must have a positive influence on the teachers, as well.

One can imagine, for example, how effective, happy, and positively
involved in teaching an instructor will be who has a group of students
doing their assignments on time, showing interest in learning, and
behaving in such a way as not to disturb the classroom or to divert
the teacher's attention from the main objective of teaching. Having
such a class will serve as a motivating factor for the teacher to
work harder with his students, which in the long run will positively
affect the students' learning environment.

Teachers can also be affected by parental involvement in

their children's schooling by being relieved of "unnecessary work"

 

and Elery L. Phillips, "Home-Based Reinforcement and the Modifica-
tion of Pre-delinquents' Classroom Behavior," Journal of Applied
Behavior Analysis 3 (Fall 1970): 223-33; Richard G. Coleman, "A
ProceHUre forTFEding From Experimenter-School-Based to Parent-
Home-Based Control of Classroom Behavior," Journal of School Psy:
chology 11,1 (1973): 71-79; Thomas N. Fairchild, "Home-school Token
Economics: Bridging the Communication Gap," Psychology in the Schools
13 (October 1976): 403-67; Jean B. Schumaker, Melbourne F. Hovell,
and James A. Sherman, "An Analysis of Daily Report Cards and Parent-
Managed Privileges in the Improvement of Adolescents' Classroom Per-
formance," Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis 10 (Fall 1977): 449-64.

 

 

 

 

 

51

and effort that usually consumes much of their time at school--time
that needs to be devoted to educating the children. Rich, Mattox,
and Van Dien made the following statements about parents' involvement
in their children's education:

Parent involvement with school is successful only when its
goal is increased student motivation and achievement. The over-
whelming majority of parents, regardless of their socioeconomic
and educational backgrounds, possess the basic strengths and
abilities to help their children achieve. . . . Our belief is
based on research of the past decade and on our own experiences
in working with schools and families nationally.

If we make these beliefs the basis for policy and action,
we educators can save ourselves unnecessary work and much grief.

We can capitalize on the family--any family--as the critically
important resource it is to ensure that children achieve.1

What things can parents do that will help relieve teachers of
the unnecessary tasks, and thus pay more attention to educating the
children? The following are some possibilities.

1. Parents can participate in preparing classroom instruc-
tional materials for the teachers to use.

2. Parents can help in taking attendance at school and
reporting children's absenteeism to their parents.

3. Parents can help in planning and arranging field trips,
parties, and Special occasions.

4. Parents can work with the teacher as organizers of group

studies within the classroom. Parents also can serve as tutors in

these groups.

 

1Dorothy Rich, Beverly Mattox, and James Van Dien, "Building
on Family Strengths: The 'Nondeficit' Involvement Model for Teaming
Home and School," Educational Leadership 36 (April 1979): 506.

 

52

5. Parents can share their experience in certain subjects
like art and music if they have special interests in such areas.

6. As paraprofessionals, parents can serve as links between
homes and the school by talking to the other parents about the impor-
tance of the school. They can also visit the students' homes and
report the families' condition to the teachers, which will help in
understanding the students more fully.

7. Parents can help perform some of the school duties, such
as serving lunch and keeping student records.

8. Parents can help in raising funds for school activities,
either by making donations or by collecting donations.

If the schools show their interest in parents' help and if
they plan properly, all of these roles, as well as others that emerge
from particular school needs, could be filled by parents.

Breslin and Marina presented the results of a project in which
about 20 parents were involved in a woodworking program in one of
New York's primary schools. The authors described the teachers'
assessment of the project:

[The teachers] felt the children had a productive, safe wood-
working experience. felt the sustained relationship with other
adults in a learning situation contributed to viewing the school
as a mini-community. felt problem—solving opportunities were
provided and basic mathematic skills were developed as a result
of working with the three dimensions of wood. felt reading
readiness was aided since often children made signs, wrote or
dictated stories, and looked for books about their woodworking
project. felt language development was encouraged since the

different wood textures offered new and unique opportunities
for descriptive activities.

 

1Deirdre Breslin and Eileen Marino, "Parents as Partners,"
Young Children 30 (January 1975): 126-27.

53

Much of the teacher's satisfaction is evident from the preceding
quotation, and many tasks that the teacher usually does were done
by the parents.

Using conferences as one of many methods to link homes and
schools, teachers can learn more about the students' environment,
their study habits at home, and the availability of help from other
family members. Teachers can also come to know what parents' expec-
tations are for their children's education and their attitudes toward
education. Such conferences can provide much help for both teachers
and parents. The teacher can share what he has learned about the
child during the teaching process. Parents can learn how a good
environment will help their children to be more effective learners,
which will help in altering their environment.

After using parent conferences to help children overcome
their reading difficulties, Hagburg wrote:

The conference offers a val uable opportunity for the therapist
to learn about the child in his total environment. It is impor-
tant for him to know about the child's home and neighborhood
and to understand conditions which may be preventing him from
achieving in reading. The therapist can also become aware of
positive conditions which exist and give special emphasis to
them in providing reading therapy for his student. . . .

During the course of the conference, the therapist may learn
about the general feeling of the family, what they expect of
the child, his place in the family, their aspirations for him
or their lack of concern. The reading teacher will become
aware of modifications to be made in his therapy sessions and
may also suggest changes to be made in the home as the parents
strive to help with their child's reading problems.

In addition, the teacher will have the opportunity to
counsel and help his student make adjustment to those circum-
stances which cannot be changed. As the reading teacher learns

54
to know the child in both his home and school situations, he
can plan more effective ways in which to work with the child.

Dougherty and Dougherty and Ayllon et al. stated that, by
using school-home-based reinforcement as a cooperative method to
solve students' behavior problems, teachers are rtflieved of spending
much of their time thinking of, or looking for, elements for the
reward and punishment system they would use because reinforcers are
not usually as abundant at school as they are at home.2 Also,
inequality in distributing the reinforcers is greater at school than
it is at home.

Thus, as students are affected by their parents' involvement
in their schooling, teachers also reap some of the benefits. To
receive these benefits, however, teachers must work hard to get
parents involved in the school program.

Parents' Involvement in Their Children's

Schooling and Its Effect on the
Parents Themselves

 

 

 

When parents are involved in their children's schooling,
they are expected not only to give, but also to benefit, because the
process is a reciprocal one. The most important benefit for parents
in this regard is the improvement of their children's education at
school. This happens when parents work as their children's teachers.

The teaching process for parents occurs in direct and indirect ways.

 

1Betty L. Hagberg, "The Reading Therapist and Parent Confer-
ence," Reading Horizons 10 (Spring 1970): 108-109.

2Dougherty and Daugherty, "The Daily Report Card"; Ayllon
et al., "Elimination of Descipline Problems."

55

Parents work directly as teachers at home when they review with their
children what they have learned at school and when they help them
do their homework. At school, parents can work directly as teachers
when they act as tutors and when they lead group discussions under
the teacher's direction. These situations, as discussed earlier,
indicate parents as teachers.

On other occasions, parents can work as their children's
teachers indirectly--for instance, when they follow the school's
direction regarding specific projects, as was the case with the
report cards. Another way parents can be involved indirectly is by
controlling and improving their children's environment. In discus-
sing how parents can work to control their children's environment
and thus contribute to their improvement, Seibert and others
described Jessie Jackson's project:

Specifically relating to parent participation in learning,
Jackson states that no matter how dedicated or expert the
educator, children cannot be educated without the cooperation
of parents. The Jackson program, which he calls PUSH, asks
parents to sign pledges to enforce a minimum study period of
two hours every school night without interruptions from a
record player, television or telephone.1
Working to improve the students' environment after learning how the
present environment is contributing negatively to the children's
achievement, parents can then work indirectly as instructors of their
children.

Parents' involvement in their children's schooling not only

makes them work as their children's educators, but also makes them

 

1Jame B. Seibert, Barbara Mathews, Carol Calvin, and Ann
Simpson, "Emerging Trends in Parent-School Communication" (Bethesda, Md.:
ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 182 734, July 1980), pp. 5-6.

56

teachers for other parents. It has been seen how parents working as
paraprofessionals have taught other parents how important they are in
their children's schooling. When they have learned at school new
methods regarding child development or any other subject, parents
will share this experience with other parents in informal or nonfor-
mal ways. "They [parents] can lead study-discussion groups for other
parents to learn more about how children grow, about how parent-child
relationships can be bettered, about how they can guide their chil-
dren's growth more effectively."1
Another benefit a parent derives from being involved in his

child's schooling is becoming better educated himself. That is, "You
are never too old to learn." In every phase of involvement, a parent
learns something about the school his child attends, about the teacher
who deals with his child, about the child himself, about his community
as he communicates with other parents, and about himself. Whether
intending to be taught by the schools in these areas or not, parents
do learn. In this regard, Safran said:

In every kind of involvement, parents "get an education." It

may or may not be the kind of parent education intended by the

program planners. Involved parents usually find themselves

learning something about self-awareness, child development, 1

health and nutrition, curriculum development, family planning,

group dynamics, instructional methodology, policy planning,

program management, institutional reform, how not to conduct
a meeting, etc. . . .

 

1Margaret M. Conant, "Teachers and Parents: Changing Roles
and Goals," Childhood Education 48 (December 1971): 116.

 

2Safran, "Evaluating Parent Involvement," p. 5.

57

Pinch described this learning process:

When parents participate in the classroom with a teacher experi-
enced in early childhood education, they learn by doing and
following the teacher model. They learn also by talking with
the teacher after each session about the occurrences of the
school day and by conference, orientation meetings and parent
discussion groups.

These learning situations are expected to improve and to contribute
to the parents' knowledge. They can be considered as personal gains,
but their effects on the children cannot be forgotten.
The idea of parents benefiting from involvement can be sensed

from Breslin and Marino's description of parent participation in a
school woodworking program, which was discussed earlier.

[Parents] felt they contributed to the program since the need

for close and constant supervision with the tools was obvious.

felt they learned a great deal about how children function since

they saw how differently children approach problems. gained

more satisfaction from having helped a child plan and produce

a project. gained a better understanding of the functioning of

the school's total program by being an integral part of it.

learned the necessity of allowing chidlren to do things on their

own, even when it would have been far easier and faster to

"hammer that nail myself." saw that academic learning does

evolve from such things as making a wooden boat.

In some programs, parents were encouraged to improve their

educational credentials by being referred to some adult-education
programs.3 Parents were also encouraged to improve their own skills

by being directed to related programs.

 

lJess-Elizabeth Hartsough Pinch, "Parent Involvement With
Curriculum Change in a Public School" (Ph.D. dissertation, Michigan
State University, 1975), p. 23.

2Breslin and Marine, "Parents as Partners," pp. 125-26.
3Fernandez, "Parental Involvement in Bilingual Education";

Ira J. Gordon, Patricia P. Olmsted, Roberta I. Rubin, and Joan H.
True, "Continuity Between Home and School: Aspects of Parental

58

Being able to teach their own children and other parents, as
well as being able to learn many things from different events, will
contribute to the parents' awareness and self-esteem. Describing
their program's outcome, Gordon and others wrote:

Many parents registered to vote and voted for the first time

in a school board election. Parents became aware of the edu-
cational issues and of the positions of the various candidates.
Finally, Follow Through parents became more aware of the role
and function of the school board as it relates to the schools
in general and to Follow Through in particular.‘

Stearns and others had this to say about parent self-esteem:
"There is evidence that involving parents in decision-making or as
employees can have positive effects on their self-esteem and can lead

. . . . . 2
to change in institution or in classroom procedures."

Parents' Involvement in Their Children's
Schooling_and Its Effect on the Schodls

 

 

Taking into account how parents' involvement in their
children's education positively affects the students, the teachers,
and the parents, one can imagine how the schools that succeed in
enlisting parental involvement will be stabilized. Let us consider
the following statement about students misbehaving at schools on a
normal day with no previous parental involvement:

While this group [misbehaving students] represent only 3% of

the total junior high enrollment, they frequently exhibit
such severe school misbehavior as to disrupt the educational

 

Involvement in Follow Through" (Bethesda, Md.: ERIC Document Repro-
duction Service, ED 154 931, September 1978).

1Gordon et al., “Continuity Between Home and School," p. 15.

2Stearns and others, "Parental Involvement," p. vi.

59

process for all those present in their classroom. Furthermore,
attempts to regulate their behavior require an inordinate amount
of administrative time and energy and are largely unsuccessful.1

Since the literature previously presented has shown how
parental involvement works effectively to a great extent in solving
behavior problems, the school's climate will be affected positively
and directly by such involvement. Unsuccessful efforts by the school
administration can become successful with a moderate effort if par-
ents are asked for help and cooperation.

Through parental involvement in the schools, the adult
ratio within the school will increase. No matter how busy the teacher-
is, students can find some adult who can help them and who can teach,
too. Teachers can find some adults other than their colleagues whom
they can talk with and ask for help, and whose ideas and opinions
they can use as resources to help overcome their daily problems.

These adults can work to help the schools as resource people
or to support publicly the school issues. One major benefit of parent
involvement is that schools incur less criticism on accountability
issues because both sides are accountable for the students' progress.
Herman and Yeh noted in this regard:

With the escalation of the accountability movement, parent
involvement may be used as a method to define parental criticism
and mollify public concern. From a more positive perspective,
however, parent involvement may contribute to increased support
for the school, providing ammunition for possible battles with

other bureaucracies and in the ever-present and important matter
of bond issues. Parent involvement at schools can also provide

 

lRonald C. Heaton and others, "A Motivational Environment for
Behaviorally Deviant Junior High School Students," Journal of Abnormal
Child Psychology 4,3 (1976): 264.

 

 

6O

valuable additional resources for school operation in terms,
for example1 of volunteer time and other "free" services they
may render.

Support for the schools and mutual responsibility can be
considered as a direct effect of parental involvement in the schools,
as stated by Stearns and others:

It is presumed that parent participation will insure community
understanding and support of the project. While it is likely
that most of the active parents will be the same ones that are
involved in the PTA or Home and School Association, the guide-
lines are at the least intended to foster mutuality of influence
and to insure that the project is the most appropriate for the
children involved. There is evidence in the literature (Fantini,
1970) to reinforce the OE position that if parents participate

in planning the program, they--at least those directly involved--
will share responsibility for its success. In this respect the
program staff seem to feel that involved parents will naturally
tend to act in a sanctions role, by telling others about their
program and thereby encouraging a broad base of community sup-
port.

Hence, positive effects on schools as a whole can be expected if
parental involvement is successful.
Parents' Involvement in Their Children's

Schooligg and Its Effect on
the Community_

 

 

The community will be affected by parental involvement, both
for the present and in the long run. For the present, parental
involvement, if implemented properly, will bring many of the commu-
nity members together. They will come to know each other better,

and the common need of their children will strengthen this relationship.

 

1Herman and Yeh, "Some Effects of Parent Involvement in
Schools," p. 4.

2Stearns and others, "Parental Involvement," p. 14.

61

The schools will become theirs and not the state's or the govern-
ment's. Community members can use the schools as gathering places
for special occasions and for identifying problems and discussing
them. School personnel can be consulted in such events because they
are considered members of the community. Being together in the
school will be the starting point for working together on many dif-
ferent issues concerning the community. Cooperation is the major
aspect of being together. In this regard, Berlin and Berlin wrote:

Many of the parents became active in helping other parents

to recognize their importance to their kids' learning as

manifested by their attendance in school, and learning to

work with their own and other children.1

The major objective of parents' involvement in their children's

schools is the betterment of the children. In the long run, if these
children grow in a good way and develop perfectly, they will, when
they become adults, perform normally, and that will be for the com-
munity's benefit.

In a society where children enter school at ever younger ages

and remain after until adulthood, it is imperative to under-

stand the school's role in the life of the child and the family,

since it ultimately affects the child as a member of the com-

munity.

Therefore, the final quality of the children is reflected by

the community, which will be improved by these youngsters as they

become well educated and well developed.

 

1Berlin and Berlin, "School's Training of Parents," pp. 8-9.

2Renee Queen, "Family Communications With Schools and the Com-
munity," Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (Bethesda, Md.:
ERIC Document Reproduction Service, ED 166 291, June 1979), p. 9.

62

In summary, although parental involvement in their children's
schooling process cannot be considered a panacea for all the students'
educational problems, it can help alleviate the problems faced by
both students and school personnel. Parents themselves can also
benefit from such involvement, either inside or outside the schools.
Parents' involvement in their children's schooling can take different
forms. It ranges from being less active, as in receiving information
from the school regarding the child's progress or problems or what is
going on in the school, to being more active, such as participating in
teaching the students, preparing teaching materials, or making deci-
sions. Careful planning to include parents in the schools' activi-
ties is necessary in order to benefit from the notion. Parents are

also a requisite part of the planning process.

CHAPTER III

REVIEW OF ISLAMIC EDUCATION LITERATURE AND PARENTS'
RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR CHILDREN'S EDUCATION

In the preceding chapter, the importance of parental involve-
ment in their children's schooling, from the Western point of view,
was discussed and elucidated. Because the present study is about the
place of this issue in the policies of the Ministry of Education in
Saudi Arabia, because every aSpect of social life in that country is
based on Islam, and because the country's education is also based
on Islamic laws, it is imperative to determine what Islamic education
is and what it says about parents' responsibility for their children's
education.

_/,,—- Islam, in general, prescribes a complete way of life for all P///
human beings and guides them in every aspect of their lives toward a
specific end. That end is a permanent existence in Paradise, attained

through worshiping God on earth in the most perfect way.

[:I created the jinn and humankind only to worship me. 51:56]:1

:gNow hath come unto you light from Allah and a plain Scripture,

Whereby Allah guideth him who seeketh his good pleasure unto
paths of peace. He bringeth them out of darkness unto light
by His decree, and guideth them unto straight paths. 5:15-16

 

1Quotations from the Qur'én are from The Meaning of the Glorious
u'ran, Text and Explanatory Translation by Muhammad Marmaduke Pickthall
iNew York: The Muslim World League, 1977). The number before the

colon refers to the surah (chapter) and the number after the colon,
the verse.

63

64

In this regard, Aulwan wrote:

Islam deserves all the credit for it brought forth to mankind '
so true a comprehensive system that it educates the soul,

builds generations, forms nations, and establishes doctrines

and organizations that include the principles of civilization

and glory. The reason for this is that Islam came to liberate
people who were lost by the darkness of polytheism, ignorance,
falsehood, and anarchy, and to guide them toward monotheism,
knowledge, true faith and stability.

 

The first five verses in the Qur'En, which were revealed to the
Prophet Mohammad when he was worshiping God in Makkah, contain the two
major components of schooling: reading and writing. The words "read"
and "pen" are mentioned as the major facilities for gaining knowledge:

1Read: in the name of your Lord who created

Created man from a clot.
Read: And thy Lord is the most Bounteous,
Who taught by the pen,
Taught man that which he knew not. 96:1-5
Islam came at a time when people had deviated from the right
way of living that God had designed for them. Education, according
to the Islamic laws, was and is the major tool for bringing people
back to the path of Allah. God himself is considered to be the
Prophet Mohammad's educator. As the Prophet put it: "My Lord has
educated me best."2
With the Qur'5n as the major source, and with his own life as
a secondary source, the Prophet Mohammad succeeded in educating the
first generation of the Muslim Nation, as it is described in the

Qur'Sn:

 

_]Abdullah N. Aulwan, Tarbiyatal Awiad Filislam, vol. 1 (Halab:
Darusalam Littbaah Wannshr Wattawzeea, 1981), p. 5. (In Arabic.)

2Syed Mohammad al-Naquib al-Attass, ed., Aims and Objectives
of Islamic Education (Great Britain: Hodder and Stoughton, 1979),

p. l.

 

 

65

Muhammad is the messenger of Allah. And those with him are
hard against the disbelievers and merciful among themselves.
Thou [O Muhammad] seest them bowing and falling prostrate

[in worship]. seeking bounty from Allah and [His] acceptance.
The mark of them is on their foreheads from the traces of
prostration. 48:29

Also:
igThey used to sleep but little of the night,

19And ere the dawning of each day would seek forgiveness,
And in their wealth the beggar and the outcast had due
share. 51:17-19

Foundations of Islamic Education ¢//

 

Islamic education can be simply and basically described as

him

the process of raising children according to the Islamic teachings
that are revealed in the Qur'an, and according to the Sunnah, which
is the sayings of the Prophet Mohammad, his interpretation of the
Qur'an, and a description of the qualities of his character.

In relation to the Qur'Sn as the primary basis for this educa-
tion, God says:

Lo! this Qur'an guideth unto that which is straightest, and
giveth tidings unto the believers who do good works that
theirs will be a great reward. 17:9

Al-NahlSwi stated,

The Qur'an educates mankind in such a way that is conformable
to morality and straitness in life. This is due to the fact
that the Qur'an includes precepts, lessons, maxims as well as
divine legislation. It is the best Holy Book that was ever
revealed by God, who is the wisest and most knowledgeable of
mankind's nature and soul; and consequently knowledgeable of
what_fits perfectly with their nature. Believing that the
Qur'an came from God who is the ultimate perfection verily I
confirms the fact that it advances mankind's life and society.

Also, in this regard, Ali asserted:

 

'Abdurrhman al-Nahléwi, Ussulutarbiyyah WaasEleibuha Filbait
Walmadrasah Walmujtamaa (Damascus: Darulfikr, 1979), p. 38. (In
Arabic.)’

 

66

The Holy Qur'an was revealed by God for guiding people toward
the realization of their welfare. Its verses are replete with
this purpose. Addressing the Prophet Mohammad, God says:
And we have revealed the Scripture unto thee only that
thou mayst explain unto them that wherein they differ,
and [as] a guidance and a mercy for a people who
believe. 16:64
God also says,
[This is] a Scripture that we have revealed unto thee,
full of blessing, that they may ponder its revelations,
and that men of understanding may reflect. 38:29

Ali continued: "Hence we are not going beyond the truth when we make
the Holy Qur'an the main source from which we should derive our
Islamic education."1
Muslims view the Holy Qur'an as a constitution for the life
of mankind--to teach them what to do, how to behave, and how to deal
with each other. Hence it is the major source for Muslims' education.
The content of the Qur'an is divided into five major areas.
One of these areas deals with the main articles of faith in
Islam, in which every true Muslim believes and every Muslim child
must be taught during the early years of life. These articles are
the belief in Allah (God), his angels, all of his prophets, and his
messengers. This also necessitates believing in the Holy Books of
those prophets in the original forms of their revelation and believ-
ing in the Day of Judgment. Ali wrote:
In the Qur'an there are articles of faith that must be believed
in, such as believing in Allah, His angels, His Holy Books, His
messengers, and the Last Day. This belief draws a decisive line
for being a believer or a nonbeliever. I think that the main

idea here centers on the fact that a Supreme Creator to whom
the ultimate perfection is ascribed has created everything in

 

_ 1Saaid I. Ali. Ussulutarbiyah al-Islamiyah (Cairo: Darutha-
gafah Littibaah Wannashr, 1978), pp. 26-27. (In Arabic.)

 

67

the universe and has fully subjected it to his_authority.
This fact is the cornerstone by which the Qur'an instills
conviction in the human mind so as to believe in God. God
says:

The messenger believeth in that which hath been revealed
unto him from his Lord and [so do] the believers. Each
one believeth in Allah and His angels and His scriptures
and His messengers--We make no distinction between any of
His messengers. 2:285]

The second area deals with morality: how to behave properly

toward God, toward one's self, and toward other people. In general,

such moral behavior will have a positive effect on the society. In

this regard, Ali said:

The Holy Qur'an also includes noble manners by which souls are
refined, the worldly affairs of individuals as well as communi-
ties are promoted, and one is put on his guard against any cause
of degeneration that destroys humanity and causes misery in life.
Foremost among these noble manners are:

1.

7Purification of soul. The Qur'an states:

8And a Soul and Him who perfected it

And inspired it [with conscience of] what is wrong for it
and [what is] right for it. 91:7-8

Chastity, decency, and lowering one's gaze.

ZSuccessful indeed are the believers

Who are humble in their prayers,

iAnd who shun vain conversation,

5And who are payers of the poor-due,

And who guard their modesty,

6Save from their wives or the [slaves] that their right hands
possess, for then they are not blameworthy. 23:1-6

Truthfulness.
0 ye who believe! Guard your duty to Allah, and speak words
straight to the point. 33:70

Humility.
Be modest in thy bearing and subdue thy voice. Lo! T e
harshest of all voices is the voice of the ass. 31:19

In the third area, the Qur'an involves the direction of every

human being's attention to the present world, which is in itself a

 

1 2

Ibid., p. 19. Ibid., p. 20.

68

a manifestation of the power and perfect planning of God, the
Almighty, and to analyzing the function of His creation, realizing
and acknowledging the greatness of God, which will in turn enhance
the degree and the quality of believing. In this regard, Ali wrote:

The Qur'an invites meditation on all aspects of creation, which
are always in front of man wherever he is. When he considers
the roles of their creations, they suggest to him something of
what lies beyond and the incomparability of the work of God.

By virtue of meditation and evidence, man's heart would become
full of true faith and appreciation of the greatness and crea-
tivity of God, but not full of uncritical faith. It is worth
indicating that the Qur'an denounces those who follow blindly
others' beliefs, religion, or even adopt bad conventions. In
addition_to critical faith established by virtue of meditation,
the Qur'an aims at carrying man's mind into the visible sphere
of existence with the signs God has spread in all the creatures
in this world. That is to consi er their roles and use them
for his advancement and welfare.

God says,

1gWill they not regard the camels how they are created?

19And the heaven, how it is raised?
ZOAnd the hills, how they are set up?
And the earth, how it 15 spread? 88:17-20
In the fourth area, the Qur'an presents through narration the

stories and the conditions of the Prophets and their people, and how
God dealt with them. This is to emphasize for people of the present
the consequences of believing in God or refusing to believe. The
stories of the Prophets Noah, Moses, Salih, and Lit with their people
and the end of their lives can be considered a source of learning
that can be used to teach Muslim children.

The fifth area of the Qur'an concerns the role of application;

that is, Islam does not advocate theory alone, but considers practice

 

1Ibid., p. 20.

69

a major aspect of worship. Believing in God without practicing and

applying the religious and secular rules that the Qur'an prescribes

and that the Prophet Mohammad requested is not considered a complete
act of faith.

And say [unto them]: Act! Allah will behold your actions,
and [so will] His messenger and the believers. 9:105

Regarding this point, Ali noted that the Qur'an includes

practical precepts regarding what man does or says. This type
of precept deals with the prescription of how to practice the
regular Islamic teachings in respect to prayer, fasting, regu-
lar charity, pilgrimage, or anything of this sort such as:

Regarding prayers
Worship at fixed hours hath been enjoined on the
believers. 4:103

Regarding pilgrimage
And pilgrimage to the House is a duty unto Allah for
mankind, for him who can find a way thither. 3:97

Regarding fasting _ _
The month of Ramadan in which was revealed the Qur'an,
a guidance for mankind, and clear proofs of the guidance
and the Criterion [of right and wrong]. And whosoever of
you is present, let him fast the month, and whosoever of
you is sick or on a journey, [let him fast the same] number
of other days. Allah desireth for you ease, He desireth
not hardship for you. 2:185

Also included in this area are principles laid down that have
permanently governed Muslim Law and social practices, such
as the recognition of women's rights in marriage, property,
and inheritance.
But consort with them [women] in kindness, for if ye hate
them it may happen that ye hate a thing wherein Allah hath
placed much good. 4:191

Because of the completeness and the wholeness of the Qur'an
in considering every aspect of the practical daily life of the human
being, it is held as the major guide for Islamic education. The

Prophet Mohammad said of the Qur'an, "The best of you are those who

 

1Ibid., p. 21.

7O

1

come to learn the Qur'an and teach it." He also said, "I left among

you the things to which if you cling, you will never stray away

after my death; the Book of God and my Sunnah."2
The Prophet Mohammad's sayings, his interpretation of

the Qur'an and his conduct (the Sunnah) is the second major source

for Islamic education. The Sunnah is a major guide for believing

and practicing the contents of the Qur'an. Of the Pr0phet Mohammad

the Qur'an says:

And whatsoever the messenger giveth you, take it. And what-
soever he forbiddeth, abstain [from it]. 59:7

3Nor doth he speak of [his own] desire.
It is naught save an inspiration that is inspired. 53:3-4

The importance of the Sunnah in Muslims' lives stems from the follow-
ing points:

1. The Sunnah interprets the Qur'an in such a way as to
provide more detailed explanations for some of the laws contained in
the Qur'an. For example, in the Qur'an, prayers are enjoined by God
without mentioning how to pray, how many times to pray each day, and
how many times to kneel each time one prays. The Prophet Mohammad
provided these details, so the Sunnah is considered to complement
the Qur'an on many occasions.

2. The Prophet Mohammad is considered to be the Muslim

people's educator. His life in general--that is, his sayings, his

 

1Abuzakariyya Annawawi, Ryadhussélhin (Damascus: Darul
Maamun Litturath, 1976), p. 415. *(In Arabic.)

2Mohammad Al-Ghazaly, Figh Assirah (Cairo: Darul Kutub
Al-Hadithah, 1976), p. 89. (In Arabicflhi

 

 

71

conduct in public with other people and in private with his family,
his stand in times of war and peace, and his practice of Islam--is
considered by Muslims as the highest ideal, after the Qur'5n, to
follow and emulate.

As the second major source for Islamic education, the Sunnah V/

can benefit education in two ways:

1. By exemplifying the Islamic approach to life in general
and to education in particular, which is given in the
Qur'an, and by stating details of things that were not
mentioned in the Qur'an.

2. By extracting an educational approach based on the
Prophet Mohammad's behavior and conduct as he dealt with
his companions and children and as he implanted faith in
their hearts.1

~‘—.—----——

Based on these two major points, Islamic education can be ,
defined as providing for the individual's physical, mental, spiritual, l
and psychological development in a way that will put him in the path {
of Allah. Husain and Ashraf wrote: A

Education should aim at the balanced growth of the total per-
sonality of man through the training of man's Spirit, intellect,
the rational self, feeling and bodily senses. Education Should
therefore cater to the growth of man in all its aspects:
spiritual, intellectual, imaginative, physical, scientific,
linguistic, both individually and collectively, and motivate

all these aspects towards goodness and the attainment of per-
fection. The ultimate aim of Muslim education lies in the
realizations of complete submission to Allah on the level of

the individual, the community, and humanity at large.2

 

'Ai-Nahiawi, Ussulutarbiyyah, pp. 23-24.

 

2Syed Sajjad Husain and Sayed Ali Ashraf, Crisis in
Muslim Education (Great Britain: Hodder and Stoughton, 1979),
p. 44.

 

72

The education of the Muslim individual must be in accordance
with the primary objective of God: creating human beings to worship
him and to please him. God says,

I have created Jinn and mankind only to worship me. 51:56
"Ibadah," which means worshiping, is not restricted in meaning to the
five prayers or other religious observations that belong to the later
life. In a broader sense, it means observing God's pleasure and
seeking His acceptance in every deed and action. Rafi-Ud-Din commented
on this subject as follows:

It is a frequent mistake to interpret the word "ibadah" [devo-
tion] narrowly as prayer or worship. Prayer, worship or the
contemplation of the attributes of the Creator is no doubt a
very important part of "ibadah," but the meaning of the word
extends far beyond it. It means the dedication of the whole of
one's life to the Creator so that one lives or dies for Him and
seeks His pleasure in every action, may it be open or secret.
It means in other words to give full expression to one's own
nature in all one's activities. For the real, uncorrupted and
rightly-guided nature of man is to submit himself totally to the
will of the Creator. In this alone can be found, ultimately,
the greatest amount of satisfaction. This is, moreover, the
real nature not only of human beings, but also of everything
else in the world. The sun, the moon, and the stars, every
particle of matter and every living organism in nature, in fact
the whole universe, follows the path of devotion and submission
to the Creator of the worlds.

All that is in the heavens and all that is in the earth glori-
fieth Allah, the Sovereign Lord, the Holy one, the Mighty,
the Wise. 62:1
Therefore, just saying one's prayers and believing in God are
not enough to be a true Muslim. Observing the Islamic laws of the

present and the future life in every movement, with the intention of

 

1Mohammad Rafi-Ud-Din, "Islamic Education," Islamic Education:
Journal of the All-Pakistan Islamic Education Congress 5, no. 2 & 3
(1972): 12.

 

73

practicing them in the way God and His Pr0phet Mohammad asked us to
practice them will create the true Muslims. Neglecting these precepts can
lead to having "defected" Muslims who believe in the laws of Islam but
practice the undesired behaviors that Islam asks us not to be involved
in. A true Muslim is one who worships God and who sees Him present with
him. As the Prophet said, "It is to worship Allah as though you are
seeing Him, and while you see Him not yet truly He sees you."1
Defining Islamic education in terms of the Muslim religion,
Al-Ahwini said:
Islamic education is a spiritual and social system that leads
to the embracement of Islam and a full application of its teach-
ings both in the life of the individual as well as community.
It is an inevitable necessity for the realization of Islamic
religion to conform to the will of God. In this sense, Islamic
education prepares mankind to carry out this responsibility.
This_implies that the sources of Islam, most importantly the
Qur'an and the Sunnah, are necessarily the same as those of
Islamic education.
The concern of Islamic education, then, is to raise the
children of a society in accordance with the demands of the Qur'En
and the Sunnah. These works are considered the two main sources of

guidance for children's education.

Components of Islamic Education

 

In Aulwan's opinion, Islamic education has seven major com-
ponents. One of these components is orthodox education. Its main

concern is the indoctrination of children into the process of

 

'Imam Yehya Sharaf Al-Din An-Nawawi, Forty Hadith: An Anthology,
of the Sayings of the Prophet Mohammad, trans. Ezzeddin Ibrahim and
Denys Johnson-Davies (Saudi ArabianPrinting Co., Ltd., 1979), p. 30.

_ 2Ahmad F. Al-Ahwani, Attarbjyah Filislam (Egypt: Darul
Maarif, n.d.), p. 20.

 

 

74

believing in God as the Creator of one's self and the universe and
as the controller of our lives, believing in the Prophet Mohammad as
His messenger, believing in God's angels, believing in the Qur'an as
the Holy Book, and believing in the Judgment Day and that this life is
a temporary one designed to examine us} These are considered the
major components of the orthodox part of Islamic education. Muslim
parents and educators are responsible for making their children
believe in these basic tenets as a major step for the children to
become Muslims. It would be impossible to accomplish this objective
before the child reaches puberty, which is considered to be the age
of responsibility, but it is recommended that these beliefs be
introduced to the youngster as soon as he begins to realize his sur-
roundings. When verbal interaction begins between parents and the
youngster, these religious beliefs must be included within the inter-
action process. --
The Prophet Mohammad asked his companions to begin this inter-
action process by teaching the child, "There is no God but Allah,"
and by introducing and practicing the five pillars of Islam, which
are:

- testifying that there is no God but Allah and that
Mohammad is His messenger

- performing prayers regularly

- practicing regular charity (zakSt)

 

'Auiwan, Tarbiyatal Awlad Filislam.

 

75

- fasting the month of Ramadan

- making a pilgrimage to the sacred sanctuary of Allah for
those who are capable of performing it

At the beginning of their lives, children must be taught that
there are certain duties they must perform and that certain actions
must be avoided. In relation to the latter point, the Prophet
Mohammad said, "Obey God, avoid committing sins He has forbidden, and
command your children to submit to His order and avoid His prohibitions,
for that will protect you and them from being put in Hell."1

The Prophet Mohammad recommended practicing prayers at the
age of seven; this is required and enforced at the age of ten. The
reason for this, said Aulwan, is that

children would learn while they are young the significance and
the principle of prayer, get used to performing it, and grow
[while] obeying God. They will grow in performing God's com-
mands, thanking Him, resorting to Him in every matter of life,
relying on Him, and submitting to Him in every crisis. More-
over, practicing prayer at such an early age would purify their
soul, provide them with intellectual meditation, spiritual
devotion, moral elevation and physical exercise.

Reading the Qur'an and the record of the Prophet Mohammad's
life is also recommended when children begin to read. The Qur'an
itself was the main source of reading and writing instruction during
the foundation and the Golden Age of Islam. The Prophet Mohammad
said, "The best of you are those who come to learn the Qur'Sn and

teach it.“3

 

1 2

Ibid., p. 149. Ibid.

3Annawawi, Ryadhussfilhin, p. 415.

 

76

The second component of Islamic education, according to Aulwan,
is moral education. This topic was mentioned earlier when the second
division of the Qur'an was discussed. Applying the Islamic laws and
following the Prophet's instructions are the major aspects of this
component: how to behave toward one's self and toward others,
starting with the family, and toward the society as a whole. This
entails action and behavior that take into account the presence of
God, as well as following the moral rules. For example, raising chil-'
dren to tell the truth is an important part of Islamic education
because a true Muslim is not a liar. In the Qur'an, God says,

Only they invent falsehood who believe not Allah's revelations,
and [only] they are liars. 16:105

The Prophet Mohammad said in this regard, "It is obligatory for you
to tell the truth, for truth leads to virtue and virtue leads to
Paradise. The man who continues to tell the truth and endeavors to
tell the truth is eventually recorded as truthful with Allah."

This is the Islamic view of one's telling the truth, and the
foundation of honesty has to be laid in the children's experience
from the beginning. Parents hold the largest responsibility in teach-
ing their children this moral attitude in the following ways:

1. By explaining to them the benefits and the virtue of
telling the truth and the consequences of dishonesty.

2. By practicing truth-telling with their children and in
their presence.

3. By observing their children when they deal with other

children in and outside of their school.

77

Among the morals related to truth-telling that children must learn
are not to steal and not to say anything untruthful to others.

One of the Prophet Mohammad's companions asked him what good
conduct was. The Prophet, in answering him, recited the following
verse: "Hold to forgiveness; command what is right, but turn away
from the ignorant." And then the Prophet added: "It is to keep ties
with him who has broken up with you, to be charitable to him who has
deprived you, and to forgive him who has oppressed you."1

Third, physical education-~that is, being in good physical
condition--is desired by Islam. Being healthy is an asset to the
Muslim in carrying out his duties toward God, himself, his family,
and other people in the society. Thus, parents have the responsi-
bility of bringing up healthy children by providing them with such
necessities as a nutritious diet; by encouraging any useful habit
that contributes to their health, like exercising; and by discouraging
debilitating habits that afflict their health, such as smoking and
drinking alcoholic beverages.

The fourth component of Islamic education is cognitive
_learning--that is, seeking knowledge. The Qur'an says:

Say [unto them, 0 Mohammad]: Are those who know equal with
those who know not? 39:9

Allah will exalt those who believe among you, and those who
have knowledge, to high ranks. 58:11

Looking specifically at the words and deeds of the Prophet

Mohammad, the great Muslim teacher and educator, we find that

 

'Auiwan, Tarbjyatal Awlad Filislam, p. 200.

78

knowledge to him was a categorical imperative. He said, "Education
is mandatory for every Muslim male and female.“1 According to the
Prophet, no obstacle, however difficult and insurmountable it might
seem, should deter or discourage a Muslim from the pursuit of knowl-
edge. He admonished his followers to seek knowledge even if it was
to be found in such a distant place as China. He said, "Seek knowl-
edge even if it were in China." He also said, "Whosoever follows a
path to seek knowledge therein, Allah will make a path for Paradise
easy for him."2

The Qur'an must be the first source of knowledge to which
children are introduced, as it was for the first generation of the
Muslim nation. The alphabet can be derived from this book, and some
of its verses can be used to teach reading and writing. The purpose
of this process is to raise the children with a love for the Qur'En.
Seeking "elm? (knowledge and education) is not limited to a particu-
lar age or time. It should proceed as the individual lives.

. and say: My Lord! Increase me in knowledge. 20:114
Again, the home is the first place the youngsters are initially
exposed to the acquisition of knowledge, with the parents as the
initiators. Thus, parents' efforts must be continuous because they
are the ones responsible for the youngsters' lives.

The fifth component of Islamic education is the development

of psycho-emotional stability, the process of raising Muslim children

 

1Ali, Ussulutarbiyah al-Islamiyah, p. 75.
2Annawawi, RyadhussSlhin, p. 525.

 

79

in such a way that they will be able to control themselves in criti-
cal situations. The Qur'Sn says:
Those who spend [of that which Allah hath given them] in ease
and in adversity, those who control their wrath and are forgiv-
ing toward mankind, Allah loveth the good. 3:134
The goal is to raise individuals who will realize what is right and
what is wrong and act accordingly.

gAnd the soul and Him who perfected it

And inspired it [with conscience of] what is wrong for it and
[what is] right for it. 91:7-8
Islam seeks to develop individuals who can allay material
desires or gratify them in a lawful way. For example, in Islam the
right way to gratify the sexual instinct is to marry because Islam
prohibits adultery. The Prophet said in this regard: "0 young men:
Those among you who can support a wife should marry, for it restrains
eyes from casting [evil glances] and preserves one from immorality.
And those who can not [support a wife] should fast, for it protects
him from aduitery."1
The sixth component of Islamic education is social education.
Islam recognizes the importance of social solidarity in creating a
good society. Parents and educators have the responsibility of teach-
ing children the meaning of brotherhood and of practicing it in their
presence. Allah says:
The believers are naught else than brothers. Therefore, make

peace between your brethren and observe your duty to Allah
that haply ye may obtain mercy. 49:10

 

_ 1Al-Bukhary, Sahihul Bukhary, vol. 1 (Lebanon: Daru
Ihyaauttrathul Araby, 1958), p. 3.

80

Godliness is considered an important aspect of solidarity.
This means keeping the presence of God in one's self, every moment
of life, and acting in the way God and His Prophet prescribed. In
this way, it is assured that an individual will act properly and will
not harm himself or any other individual, but rather will benefit
them.
Islam demands brotherhood. The Qur'an says:
And remember Allah's favor unto you: how ye were enemies
and He made friendship between your hearts so that ye became
as brothers by His grace. 3:103
To live a good life we must love one another, as the Prophet Mohammad
put it: "None of you becomes [truly] a believer until he wishes for
his brother what he wishes for himself."1
Kindness--that is, taking care of other members of the
society to reinforce being together--is also requisite. Allah says:
And serve Allah. Ascribe nothing as partner unto Him. [Show]
kindness unto parents, and unto near kindred, and orphans, and
the needy, and unto the neighbour whois of kin [unto you] and
the neighbour who is not of kin. 4:36
The Prophet Mohammad said, "Whoever relieves a Muslim from a grief of
this world, God will relieve him from one of the Day of Judgement's
grief."2
Being unselfish is another important quality of the Muslim. In
the Qur'an, God praised those who acted in this way when the Prophet
Mohammad and his companions migrated from Makkah to Madina:

Those who entered the city [Madina] and the faith before them
love those who flee unto them for refuge, and find in their

 

1Annawawi, Ryadhussfilhin, p. 99.

2Ai-Bukhary, Sahihul Bukhary, vol. 3, p. 98.

 

81

breasts no need for that which hath been given them, but prefer
[the fugitives] above themselves though poverty become their
lot. And who is saved from his own avarice--such are they who
are successful. 59:9

All of these moral qualities must be practiced by children
when they begin to interact with others, to ensure their application
of such morals when they mature.

Seventh, Islam does not forget the reality of the sexual
instinct in human beings. The Qur'an and the Sunnah pay detailed

\attention to this subject in guiding orderly behavior in the satis-
faction of this instinct. Marriage is recommended for those who can
afford it, and the marital relationship is also described in the
Qur'an and the Sunnah. Fasting and productive use of leisure time,
i.e., promoting the benefit of one's self and of other people, which
will serve to divert one's attention from sexual desire, are recom-
mended for those individuals who cannot afford marriage. Many other
aspects of sexual education are also discussed in these two main
sources of Islamic education.

Basically, this section contained only a brief description of
the areas with which Islamic education is concerned. The writer's
intention was not to give detailed information, but rather to show
that Islamic education takes into account every aspect of one's life,

using the Qur'an and the Sunnah to guide the Muslim child's develop-

ment.

The Nature of Saudi Arabian Educational Policies

 

In general, Saudi Arabia's educatibnal policies are very

closely related to the concept of Islamic education. The Qur'an

82

and the Sunnah were the main sources used in the development of

these policies. The introduction of The Educational Policy in the

Saudi Arabian Kingdom states:

1.

12.

The educational policy is the broad base on which rests

the educational process in fulfilling the duty of acquaint-
ing the individual with his God and religion and adjusting
his conduct in accordance with the teaching of religion,

in fulfillment of the needs of society, and in achievement
of the nation's objectives. It covers the various fields
and stages of education, the programs and the curricula,
the means of education, the administrative systems, the
organs in charge of education, and all other related sub-
jects.

The Mohammedan message is the soundest program for ideal
life, and it ensures happiness to man and rescues humanity
from all the corruption and misery it has plunged into.

Steering sciences and knowledge in all their forms, items,
curricula, writing, and teaching in an Islamic orientation
in treating their problems, judging their theories and means
of their exploitation so that they spring out of Islam and
fall in harmony with sound Islamic thinking.1

The objectives of education in Saudi Arabia have emerged from

the Qur'an and the Sunnah's instructions. The Educational Policy

bears this out:

28.

29.

The purpose of education is to have the student understand
Islam in a correct comprehensive manner; to plant and spread
the Islamic creed; to furnish the student with the values,
teachings, and ideals of Islam; to equip him with the various
skills and knowledge; to develop his conduct in a construc-
tive direction; to develop the society economically, socially,
and culturally; and to prepare the individual to become a
useful member in the building of his community.

Promoting the spirit of loyalty to Islamic law by denounc-
ing any system or theory that conflicts with this law and by
honest action and behavior in conformity with the general
provisions of this law.

 

1Ministry of Higher Education, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, 1113

Educational Policyyin the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (Ministry of

 

Education, 1978), pp. 6-7.

83

30. Supplying the individual with the necessary ideas, feelings,
and powers that will enable him to carry the message of
Islam.

31. Preaching the Book of God [Qur'an] and the law of His Prophet
by safeguarding them, abiding by their teachings, and acting
in accordance with their commands.

32. Enforcing Qur'Snic morality in the Muslim and emphasizing
moral restraints for the use of knowledge ("I was sent to
complete moral values.").

51. Training students in sound sanitary customs and spreading
sanitary consciousness.

53. Keeping pace with the characteristics of each phase of the
psychological growth of young people; helping the individual
to grow spiritually, mentally, emotionally, and socially in
a well-rounded way; and emphasizing the spiritual Islamic
aspect so that it will be the main guideline of priyate and
public behavior for the individual and the society.

The above-quoted Saudi educational policies and objectives
demand application and practice, which is very difficult to achieve
in school alone because the children spend a very limited amount of
time there and teachers have little chance to observe the students'
application of these practices. If it is truly desired that these
objectives be achieved, parents (especially fathers, in regard to
boys) must be asked to cooperate. As mentioned earlier, Islam is not
a collection of rituals to be memorized and to be said in prayers.

It is considered a complete life style for both the present and the
future life, and practice and application are vital aspects of this
philosophy. Life is not limited to school only, as school constitutes
only a small aspect of life. The schools provide children with the

Islamic principles of life, but the practicing arenas are outside

the school because that is where the children reveal themselves as

 

1Ibid., p. 13.

84

they really are. Mursi wrote,

Islamic education admonishes practical application as apparent
evidence of conviction. As mentioned already, all Islamic
obligations as well as principles require true practice on the
part of the worshiper. This encompasses all the five pillars
of Islam, for the behavior of a true Muslim must conform to what
he believes in (and rests in his heart). The Propher Mohammad
says: "Deeds are weighed by the intention behind them, and
every human's deeds will be counted according to his intention."
That is why God will hold us accountable for our deeds as true
as our intentions are. God says in this regard,
He knoweth the traitor of the eyes, and that which the
bosoms hide. 40:191

Many of the behaviors desired of Muslim children are mentioned

in the Qur'an, in which God says:
110 ye who believe! Let not a folk deride a folk who may be
better than they [are], nor let women [deride] women who may
be better than they are; neither defame one another, nor insult
one another by nicknames. Bad is the name of lewdness after
faith. And whoso turneth not in repentance, such are evil-
doers.
120 ye who believe! Shun much suspicion; for 10! some suspicion
is a sin. And spy not, neither backbite one another. Would one
of you love to eat the flesh of his dead brother? Ye abhor that
[so abhor the other]! And keep your duty [to Allah]. Lo!
Allah is Relenting, Merciful. 49:11-12

The question then emerges: Will the school be able to
accomplish alone the desired behaviors that God demands? There must
be mutual consultation and cooperation between schools and fathers in
Saudi Arabia if the Qur'Snic laws and instructions are to be carried
out properly. Loading children's schedules with religious subjects
and asking them to memorize passages and to recite them at examination
times will not have a practical effect on their lives. Qutb raised

this point when he stated:

 

_lMohammad M. Mursi, Attarbiyah Al-Islamiyah Usuluh§ Wata-
tawwruha Fil Biladil Arabiyah (Cairo: Alamul Kutub, 1982),
pp. 128-29.

 

85

The impact of the genuine Islamic spirit on our school
curricula is hardly noticeable. We ought to consider, however,
that a formal and traditional lesson on religion will not be
sufficient to meet the desired human requirements, particularly
in contemporary life. An overdose of a religious speech or ser-
mon would, instead of rendering religion pleasant, interesting,
and likeable, create a repellent and damaging effect. We our-
selves must be frank and state openly and unequivocally the fact
that religion is now utterly isolated and alienated from our
lives and feelings because we do not practice it in reality.

. Earlier Muslim generations built their communities on
religious education, which was the core and the essence. The
Sharia was the life-governing law. Islamic morals and modes of
behavior were predominant. To put it in a nutshell, Islam dis-
ciplined and governed the lives of people in those earlier Muslim
communities. Religious education was carried out both at home
and at school, in the mosque and in the street, and through all
the communications media. Formal lessons on religion became
relevant in this context since they were entirely devoted to
giving every individual Muslim instructions about his belief,
duties of worship, dealings, and impositions whether at home or
in the mosque. The formal lesson or religion, in that sense,
did not have to reinforce religious education; that role was
undertaken by other media, particularly the home and the family
at uninterrupted times and not during the limited periods alloted
to formal lessons.

Parents' Educational Responsibilities in Islam

 

If the schools fail to provide children with a sound Islamic
curriculum to produce a true Muslim individual, can we consider the
schools the party primarily responsible for that defect? Or should
the parents also be held responsible for this failure?< In Islam,
parents have the greatest responsibility for raising their children
according to Islamic dictates. The Qur'an says in this regard:

0 ye who believe: Ward off from yourselves and your families
a fire whereof the fuel is men and stones. 66:6

And enjoin upon thy people worship, and be constant therein. 20:132

 

'Muhammad Qutb, "The Role of Religion in Education," in Aims
and Objectives of Islamic Education, ed. Syed Mohammad al-Naquib
al-Attas (Great Britain: Hodder and Stoughton, 1979), pp. 48-49.

 

86

The Prophet Mohammad himself was fond of children, and he
ranked parents' attendance to their children's spiritual welfare,
educational needs, and general well being above charity, which is
best recommended for its role in keeping Muslims together. Islam
is strongly sensitive to the crucial dependence of the child on his
parents. Their decisive role in forming the child's personality is
clearly recognized in Islam. In a strongly suggestive statement,
the Prophet declared that "Every child is born with the true malleable
nature of Fitrah [i.e., the pure natural state of Islam]. [It is]
his parents who make him into a Jew, Christian, or a pagan."1
Regarding responsibility in general and parental responsibility in
particular, he said: "Every one of you is a ruler and everyone shall
be questioned [on the Day of Judgment] about his subjects--the amir is
a ruler [over his subjects], and the man is a ruler over the people of
his house, and the woman is a ruler over the house of her husband and
his children. So every one of you is a ruler and every one shall be
questioned about his subjects."2

Therefore, if a Muslim child grows up deviating from the path
of Allah, his parents will share with him the responsibility for not
maturing according to the Qur'Snic laws at the Day of Judgment. In
the Sunnah, the Prophet said: "Any man who died and left behind him a
good breed, God will reward him as much as He rewards his children for

their good deeds, and reduces them nothing of their rewards."3

 

1Ai-Bukhary, Sahihul Bukhary, vol. 8, p. 390.
3

 

2Ibid., vol. 9, p. 77. Ibid., vol. 2, p. 283.

87

That is, according to Islam, if a Muslim dies and leaves a well-
developed and well-educated offspring, whenever the offspring does a
good deed, this Muslim will share the spiritual benefit of that deed.
Thus, the process of earning "gig? (benefit) does not cease at death,
but continues because of the education of one's children.

Moreover, the Qur'an guarantees that the true believers will
be reunited with their families in the future life, if their families
also become true believers. This reunion cannot be attained if one's -
children have not been raised according to Islam's prescriptions.
Allah says:

And they who believe and whose seed follow them in faith, We
cause their seed to join them [there], and We deprive them
of naught of their [life's] work. 52:21

According to Islam, these are the aspects of parental respon- '
sibility for raising and educating their children, as well as the
consequences for both the parents and the children in the present and
the future life. In general, Islam asks for cooperation in every
matter that will please God and will affect the Muslim's life.

Allah says:

. . . But help ye one another unto righteousness and pious
duty. Help not one another unto sin and transgression. 5:2

Education is one of the major goals of Islam because it
enables the Muslim to read and write, which in turn enables him to
read the Qur'an and the Sunnah, to interpret them, and to practice
their teachings. Therefore, the Qur'Sn recommends cooperation between
schools and parents to accomplish the desired Islamic objectives

through education.

CHAPTER IV

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

Background

 

Saudi Arabia was officially integrated by King Abd Alaziz

Ibn Saud on September 18, 1932. In 1926, during the process of
establishing the country, the General Direcorate of Education came
into existence after King Abd Alaziz conquered Al-Hijaz province.
At that time there were only four private schools in that province:
Assawlatiyyah, Al-Fakhariyyah, Al-Authmaniyyah, and Al-Falah schools
in Jeddah and in Makkah.1 These schools were placed under the control
of the General Directorate of Education from the moment of its estab-
lishment, and it became the agency primarily responsible for educa-
tion in the country. At first, the emphasis of the General Directorate
was concentrated on Al-Hijaz province, where it succeeded in opening
several elementary schools. The process of opening schools in other
provinces was very slow and consequently unbalanced. On this subject
Zaid said:

The activities of the new department were limited to the open-

ing of a few elementary schools inside Hijaz. Twelve years
later, in 1938, the first elementary schools were opened in the

 

1Ministry of Education, Elementary Education Development in
Saudi Arabia During the Last EightyyYears (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia:
Center for StatiStiChl Data and Educational Documentation, 1980),
p. 8.

 

 

88

89

provinces of Najd and Al-Hasa, while in the fourth province of
Aseer, elementary school openings were delayed until the early
1950's.
This demonstrates that the Ministry of Education was not the first
organization in Saudi Arabia to be responsible for educating the
country's youths.
One might ask, then, why the present study did not include the
time from the General Directorate's establishment until 1953, when
it became the Ministry of Education. One answer to this question is
that, although the Educational Council for the General Directorate
was formed by the king in 1928 and stated that the general director
would be the head of that council (which consisted of eight members,
four of whom would be government employees and the other four non-
government officials),2 it was not until 1938 that the regulations
of this organization were made clear. Hammad wrote:
On March 18, 1938, the Regulations of the General Directorate
of Education were announced. These provided that the General
Directorate of Education would have complete supervision over
all the educational affairs in the Kingdom except for mili-
tary education.

This means that before the 19505, the entire country was in the

process of laying the foundations of organization, and the main

duties of the General Directorate were opening and regulating schools.

 

1Abdullah M. Zaid, "A Pragmatic Critique of Contemporary
Arabian Civilization” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Oklahoma,
972 , p. 48.

2Abdul-Rahman S. Abdullah, Tarikh Al-Talim Fi Makkah (Beirut:
Darul-Fikr, 1973), p. 89. (In Arabic.)

3Abdulla M. Hammad, "The Educational System and Planning for
Manpower Development in Saudi Arabia" (Ph.D. dissertation, Indiana
University, 1973), p. 83.

 

90

Specifically, the subject of this study--fathers' involvement in
their sons' schooling--had no place in the initial stages of the
organization.

Another reason this study did not include the period before
the Ministry of Education was established is that even when the
General Directorate was somewhat better organized, it did not work
independently, even though separate ministries were established later,
such as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on December 19, 1930; the
Ministry of Finance on September 30, 1932; and the Ministry of Defense
on July 16, 1944.'

In 1951, the Ministry of the Interior was established, and
the General Directorate was put under this ministry's supervision.
(See Figure 2.) This was mainly because of the inexperience of the
people who originally managed and directed that organization. Educa-
tion at that time was predominantly traditional, and a lack of fund-
ing kept the system stagnant. Unqualified teachers were responsible
for teaching the children; they often used corporal punishment and
abode by the saying, "Take the meat and give back the bone," which
gave the teachers of those days more strength to teach as they chose,
using whatever haphazard method they wished. Hammad stated regarding
this condition:

The important point worth mentioning here is that the Saudi
Arabian educational system before the 1950's was so imitative

and narrow that even those most able to afford education would
send their sons to study abroad. The majority of the population

 

'Ibid., p. 75.

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92

was deprived of education by its complex administrative struc-
ture as well as a lack of public expenditure to support it.1

Real progress toward building an effective educational system
that would assist the growth of a nation was initiated when the Gen-
eral Directorate of Education was promoted to the ministerial level
by Royal Decree 513-126-14950 in 1953.2 The present King Fahad was
appointed as the first Minister of Education, giving the organization
strength to grow more rapidly, as well as access to adequate funds.

The Ministry of Education's Polioy Regarding
Fathers' Involvement in the Schools

 

The Period From 1953 to 1969 ‘

 

The notion of father-teacher cooperation was a goal of the
Ministry of Education from the beginning, but experience in achieving
this goal was lacking. In addition, the established priority of build-
ing the Saudi educational system included tremendous tasks that were
more important than comparatively minor ones such as achieving father-
teacher cooperation. The educational system has new advanced suf-
ficiently to allow Ministry officials to turn their attention to the
relationship between fathers and teachers.3

During the first year of its establishment, the Ministry of

Education created many departments within its structure; among them

 

'Ioid., p. 88.

2Abdulwahab A. Zafar, "An Evaluation of Mathematics Cur-
riculum Given at the College of Education, Mecca, From the Perspective
of the Teachers Who Graduated From the College in the Years 1976-1980"
(Ph.D. dissertation, Michigan State University, 1982), p. 13.

3In 1981 the Ministry of Education formulated a rationale in
which the imperative of Islamic culture appears as the conceptual foun-
dation of father-teacher cooperation. See pp. 143-46.

93

was the Department of Education and Social Activities. The main
function of that department was the supervision of the schools'
social and physical-education activities.1
At that time, the Ministry of Education first included physi-
cal education as a major subject in its curriculum. Much attention
was given to this area of departmental duty because the majority of
both students and personnel throughout the country were interested
in this topic. Social activities received less attention from this
department and were left to the schools. The department had no
definite policy for or direct statement concerning father-teacher
cooperation. Consequently, initiating contact with fathers was left
to the schools' principals and teachers. A report issued by the
Ministry of Education stated that "Among his [the principal's] duties
is to tie the fathers' relationships with the school's society
because the schools' and homes' cooperation is an important element in
bringing the students up in a proper manner."2
Also, among the duties this department demanded of the schools
was to establish a School's Council,3 composed of selected teachers,
to oversee the students and to attempt to solve their problems by
contacting their fathers. To reinforce the latter goal, the Depart-
ment of Education and Social Activities began appointing a social

worker to every school to help solve the schools' and the students'

problems.

 

1Ministry of Education, The Ministry of Education in Five
Years, From 1953-1957 (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: Ministry of Edbcatibn,
n.d.), p. 27.

2

 

3

Ibid., p. 60. Ibid., p. 70.

94

In 1959, Makkah school district led other school districts
in the Kingdom in practicing father-teacher cooperation, as was indi-
cated by the district's superintendent. As Abdullah reported, "He was
trying to convince the fathers that the schools are considered as
small undetached parts of the society and so Makkah's school distirct
was leading in organizing fathers' boards."1

However, because of the absence of a clear policy and regula-
tions to guide the inexperienced staff in these relations, most of the'
schools used the fathers' board meetings to solicit donations for
building maintenance or for school activities. Some of the Ministry
employees who were interviewed for this study said that this practice
led to the fathers' losing interest in contacting the schools because
they resented being asked to give money. This resentment stemmed from
the belief that public education is free and that it is the govern-
ment's responsibility. Also, fathers were embarrassed when some of
them could afford to donate and others could not. Thus the notion
of a fathers' board meeting conveyed the idea that the schools would
ask for money and nothing else.

Further development for the Department of Education and
Social Activities came about in 1961, when it was promoted to the
status of Directorate General of Youth Welfare.2 That change was
made because the expansion of schooling throughout the country made

it very difficult for a small department to organize the athletic

 

1Abduiiah, p. 182.

2Ministry of Education, A Brief Report on the Ministry of
Education for the Years 1963-1964 (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: Ministry
of Education, n.d.), p. 81.

 

95

and social activities of the schools. Another reason for the change
was to give every aspect of the department definite duties and respon-
sibilities.

Four major departments were created under the General Direc-
torate of Youth Welfare: (1) the Department of Athletic Activities,
(2) the Department of Art Activities, (3) the Department of Scouting
Activities, and (4) the Department of Social Activities. Three dif-
ferent school activities came under the control of the last depart-
ment: (1) cultural activities, which included school radio broadcasting,
libraries, and lectures; (2) social activities, consisting of field
trips, general services, and fathers' boards; and (3) school art
activities, which included theater. It is clear from the Ministry
of Education's documents that for the first time the notion of the
fathers' board and fathers' involvement had found a place and was
recognized by Ministry officials. Even though the function of
fathers' boards was recognized in 1961, the process of conducting
the meetings of these boards and the frequency of the meetings were not
specified by the Ministry of Education until 1969. The practice
of getting in touch with the fathers was followed as every school
desired, despite the lack of clearly stated objectives and procedures.

Between 1962 and 1969, no major development took place
regarding fathers' involvement in the schools, except that the
Ministry of Education's Department of Social Activities encouraged

the schools to form fathers'-teachers' boards.

96

The Period FrOm 1970 to 1982

In mid-1970, an official act was signed by the Minister of
Education and sent to school districts throughout the country; this
act concerned the regulation of the fathers' boards.1 The act stated
that for the first time Riyadh school district would regulate the
project in its schools. Other school districts were also encouraged
to follow this practice, but they were not obliged to. The Minister
also asked the districts planning to apply the project in their
schools to send the Ministry their reactions and feedback.

The fathers' board is considered a main factor in linking
the students' homes with the schools; it has the following objectives:

1. To establish a firm relationship between school and home.

2. To arrange the school environment to conform to the total
Islamic standards of the society.

3. To increase purposeful awareness in the home of the
instruction and objectives of the school so as to maintain harmony.

4. To bring about the social as well as the psychological
adjustment of the students by establishing mutual security and trust
between the school and the home.

5. To make students aware that fathers have a role to play
in their schooling, and to make fathers feel that their participation
is influential in maximizing their son's positive behavior and per-

fggmance.

 

1Ministry of Education, Act No. 32/19/11/562/39, dated
8-24-1390 H.J. (1970).,

97

6. To realize the potential social, cultural, and educational
contribution of fathers in clarifying and reinforcing the school's
duties and objectives, and to overcome whatever problems schools and
homes might confront in this regard.

7. To participate in solving a student's problems and to
assist him in overcoming difficulties that might impede his studies
or performance.

8. To work toward propagating an awareness of school goals
and demands and toward pursuing the schooling process by following
up these demands to help students resist negative influences in the
community and to help keep them from adapting undesirable habits
that do not conform to societal values.

9. To foster mutual understanding between home and school
of desirable health habits, to avoid any kind of conflict in the
students' experience.

10. To use parents' experiences in terms of different types of
activities conducive to the students' learning.

11. To consolidate productive supervision of students'
behavior and regular attendance through mutual cooperation between
school and home.1

By carefully analyzing these objectives, it is clear that the
activities of the fathers' board can be divided into two main cate-

/

gories:

 

1Ibid., p. i.

98

l. The fathers' board will help to eliminate any kind of
present or future conflict and contradiction between the two social
institutions.

. 2. It will give the students some relief from home/school
conflict by attempting to solve any problems that hinder their prog-
ress. The causes of their problems can usually be discovered by
examining them from many angles, facilitating an effective solution.

,The objectives also make it clear that the enrichment of the
students' experience is a desirable goal, even if the resources used
to achieve that goal come from outside the prescribed textbooks.
Finally, it can be noticed that some objectives were designed to,
help the schools' staff members with such problems as inappropriate
behavior, school/home conflict, and student absenteeism.‘

In regard to the board members, the aforementioned act stated
that the fathers or guardians of all the students have a voice in
electing the individuals who will represent them on the board and
who will work as a link between them and the school.

Every school in each district has its own fathers' and
teachers' board, which consists of

1. Seven fathers
The school principal

3. The school social worker (who works as the board sec-
retary)

4. Every classroom supervisor (Every classroom in each
school has one supervisor who, in addition to his own
teaching duties, is responsible for contacting the
teacherscfi'that class to find out every student's

99

progress and problems. He is also responsible for
keeping student records.)

5. Three outstanding students.1

In a general assembly meeting held at the beginning of each
school year, all fathers or guardians and teachers are invited to
take part in the following tasks:

1. Choosing the members of the board.

2. Reviewing the general proposal and projects of the school
for that year.

3. Proposing general policy of the administrative board by
which fixed goals are accomplished.

After members of the fathers' and teachers' board are chosen,
the board is given a flexible meeting schedule, which will depend on
the urgency of the matters to be discussed and on the availability of
the board members. The board is also given the following tasks:

1. Carrying out the policy presented by the general assembly.

2. Forming committees that are necessary for the achievement
of the board's objectives.

3. Setting up, proposing, and carrying out projects agreed
on by the board or proposed by fathers, as well as following up on
these projects.

4. Representing the school at occasional events and at
general social gatherings.2

As presented above, a degree of central control is involved

in applying the notion of fathers' involvement in the schools. This

 

l 2

Ibid., p. 2. Ibid., p. 4.

100

can be considered a natural phenomenon in the Ministry of Education.
Almost every educational aspect must be controlled either by the
Ministry itself or by other authorities linked with it. This makes
it difficult when a teacher wishes to ask a father to share with the
class his experience in a specific field related to the curriculum
content. The difficulty lies in the route this process must take
before it can be approved by the board. It can be done, but it has
to be planned well ahead of time.

In 1971, another act was adopted and sent out by the General
Director of Youth Welfare to the school districts regarding the
duties of the school social worker.1 One of his responsibilities was
to coordinate the board of fathers and teachers. This was a follow-up
to the previous act (1970), in which the school social worker was
appointed as the board secretary. In the 1971 act, the notion of a
fathers' and teachers' board received wider attention at the district
level. The supervisor of social and educational services at the
district level had the duty "to invite the school principals and their
social workers who are applying the notion of the fathers' and

teachers' boards to a general meeting of these boards."2

The purpose
of these general meetings was to discuss the fathers' role in their
sons' education and the importance of these boards in providing the
schools with the necessary help and cooperation that would enable the

schools to achieve their objectives.

 

1Ministry of Education, Act No. 3/3/12/26016, dated
8-22-1391 H.J. (1971).

2Ibid., p. 2.

101

Other duties of the school social worker were to facilitate
the process of contacting fathers and to organize different gather-
ings and events that would help fathers participate in the school
environment.1

Nothing was found in the Ministry files for the years 1972
through 1978 to indicate that either a nonsystematic or a systematic
follow-up had been done concerning fathers' involvement in their sons'
schooling, as the Ministry is doing now. It was totally left to the
schools to understand and apply the policies regarding such involve-
ment. In 1979, the Deputy Minister of Education signed another act
as an improved plan for the fathers' and teachers' board.2 Although
this act contained many of the same items that were included in the
1970 and 1971 acts, it included more details in addition to some
changes. Among the objectives of the improved plan was to strengthen
the relationship between fathers and teachers so that schools and
homes could work together in educating the students according to
Islamic values.

In the 1970 act, nothing was mentioned regarding the improve-
ment iyf the two sides of the relationship: fathers and teachers.

It was probably assumed that this contact and relationship would
exist naturally. But experience proved the opposite, as will be

indicated later, when the Ministry tried to convince fathers to

 

1

2Ministry of Education, Act No. 36/4/6/76/39, dated
2-1-1399 H.J. (1979).

Ibid., p. 3.

102

get in contact with the schools; the fathers had not been attending
the board meetings and were not involved in the schools.

In the improved plan, more Specifications regarding timing
were clarified. The plan stated that the general assembly meeting
must be held during the fourth or fifth week of the beginning of
the school year. Also, it stated that the boards must meet monthly
in addition to holding special meetings if and when a need arises.

Regarding the composition of the board, the school principal
still acts as the board's chairman, the number of fathers is limited
to four instead of seven, the number of supervisors is limited to
three, and the school social worker still acts as the board's coor-
dinator. Three outstanding students were initially included on the
board, but the improved plan abolished this. It is up to the board to
invite students when necessary. In the writer's opinion, the last
change was a mistake because almost every decision regarding the
schools affects the students in some way. In Saudi Arabia, school
buildings are constructed or rented because of the students, teachers
are appointed to teach because of the students, and curriculum and
instructional materials are designed because of the students. Yet in
these and other aspects of their schooling, the students have no
input. Everything is planned for them "from the ivory tower" by
experts who assume that they know every desirable detail of the
students' lives. 50, the first opportunity students were given to
participate in the planning and decision-making process in matters

related to their schooling did not last long. Yet since students

103

are the major reason for having contact between fathers and teachers,
they should be included in the fathers' and teachers' board meetings.

Also in the improved plan, a social committee was created out
of the board, which must be available in the school most of the time
to carry out the following tasks:

1. Discuss plans set up for the extracurricular activities
in terms of carrying them out and providing any needed assistance.

2. Study general problems that students might have and
work to solve them.

3. Design and execute projects for the students' leisure
time and community service.1

To demonstrate the importance of the creation of these boards
in the schools, every school superintendent is involved in this
matter by forming a committee each school year, headed by himself and
consisting of selected school principals and fathers. This committee
has the same purpose as that discussed earlier under the 1970 act,
but the authority has been shifted from the supervisors of the social
and educational services to the superintendents themselves.

In 1981, the Department of Social Activities was removed
from the General Directorate of Youth Welfare and elevated to the
status of General Department for Students' Guidance and Counseling.2
The main concern of this department is to solve the students' educa-

tional, social, and psychological problems and to provide them with a

 

1Ibid., p. 3.

2Ministry of Education, Act No. 42/5/10/362/8, dated
11-1-1401 H.J. (1981).

104

suitable environment in which to progress. The duty of supervising
fathers' involvement in the Ministry schools was transferred to the
new department, so the idea began to takeiinew direction in terms of
emphasizing the importance of such involvement in the students'
education.

By the end of 1981, another act was issued by the new General
Department regarding fathers' involvement in their sons' schooling.1
The following items were added to the regulations concerning the
fathers' and teachers' board:

1. The relationship between home and school should be con-
firmed by creating the following:

a. An appropriate visitation program must be planned so
that a sufficient number of fathers is invited to school every month.
Such visits enable the fathers to visit the classrooms, to observe
their sons' performance, and to become acquainted with the school's
activities. A timetable should be drawn up to give every father a
chance to visit the school during the school day periodically through-
out the year.

b. On other occasions, fathers are to be invited to visit
the school to discuss their sons' progress and problems with teachers
and to contribute to their sons' progress.

2. To increase the people's awareness of the importance of
fathers in their sons' education, the following procedures can be

implemented:

 

1Ministry of Education, Act No. 36/4/6/159/46, dated
2-11-1402 H.J. (1981).

105

a. Hanging posters distributed by the Ministry in places
accessible to the public, and distributing pamphlets designed for
the same purpose. (See Appendix.)

b. Announcing the board's agenda at social gatherings and
during school and community events to encourage fathers to participate
more. This would help eradicate any negative attitudes the schools
created when they abused the real purpose of father-teacher meetings
by asking for monetary donations to support school activities and
would raise the fathers' awareness of the vital role they play in
the schools.

Also, according to the most recent act, the schools should
encourage fathers every week to participate in school morning activi-
ties. Fathers should also be encouraged to give lectures on different
subjects at the students' daily assembly and at other school events.

The supervisor of social and educational services in every
school district continuously evaluate the fathers' and teachers'
boards to insure their existence and to select the board displaying
outstanding involvement. The various districts submit their reports
to the General Department of Student Guidance and Counseling.

The 1981 act makes it mandatory for every school in the
country to open its doors to the fathers and to establish fathers'
and teachers' boards. As the act states:

It should be mentioned that the establishment of fathers' and
teachers' boards is coherent to the educational process and
it is required by the schools' regulation policy. Hence, the

school superintendent should urge every school to establish
and support the board's existence.' There should not be any

106

excuse for not establishing them, and all superintendents
should follow this up professionally as well as personally.

Regarding fathers' involvement in education, the last act
requires every school in the country to submit a complete report of
fathers' involvement in school activities and events. A report is
to be prepared by the schools each semester, according to the form
provided by the General Department of Student Guidance and Counseling.
The content of the form is shown on the following pages. The Depart-
ment pays close attention to obtaining these forms from the school
districts; it maintains separate files for each district, to observe
their activities in this regard.

The General Department of Student Guidance and Counseling
recently sent 79 teachers to the United States to obtain master's
degrees in guidance and counseling.2 It seems that this department is
devoting itself to helping students adjust to school by using modern
methods of guidance and counseling. Since a large portion of a
student's daily life is spent outside the school, it is hard to insure
the success of solutions executed solely within the school. There-
fore, the department is also reinforcing the idea of fathers' involve-
ment and cooperation as an important tool in diagnosing students'
problems and in solving them practically. This enables the schools
continuously to follow through in the students' lives. In this way,
cooperation within the students' homes is greatly enhanced, which is

one objective of the new department in the Ministry of Education.

 

'Ibid., p. 3.

2Al-Jazeerah (daiTynewspaper),December 20, 1982, p. 32.

 

107

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION

General Department of Student
Guidance and Counseling

Report Form for Fathers' and Teachers' Boards

at the School Level

1. Name of School School Principal
No. of Classrooms No. of Students

No. of Teachers

2. General Assembly Meetings

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No. of No. of
Mggtihfs Diggino: Fathers Teachers Notes
9 9 Attending Attending
3. Fathers' and Teachers' Board Meetings
No. of No. of
Mggtigfs gigginoz Fathers Teachers Notes
9 9 Attending Attending

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4.

10.

11.

108

Fathers' Visits to the School

 

No. of Date of No. of No. of Visit's
Visits Visit Fathers Teachers &uEVghE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Problems faced in conducting the general assembly meeting and how
they were resolved.

Problems faced in forming the board and how they were resolved.

Subjects that were presented to the general assembly meeting.
a. Recommendations made in the general assembly meeting.

b. Were these recommendations taken into account? Why or why not?

Subjects and projects that were presented to the board.

Means the school used to invite and to attract fathers to become
involved in the school's activities.

General ideas concerning the board's operation and its present
objectives.

Suggestions to reinforce the home-school relationship.

 

109

Discussion

 

In the preceding section, it was Shown that for a number of
years the Ministry of Education has had the objective of involving
fathers in the schools through the use of fathers' and teachers'
boards. By creating the Department of Education and Social Activi-
ties, the Ministry's intention was to put that objective into practice,
but the lack of experience in this area, as well as the excessive
attention to physical education and athletic events, distracted the
department's attention from applying the notion in the schools. The
department's responsibility toward fathers' involvement was mentioned
only abstractly in its plan for school social activities, without
explaining or specifying developmental strategies; this was left to
the schools and their staffs to deal with. As mentioned before,
this led to the schools using the fathers'-teachers' meeting events
to collect donations to cover activities and maintenance needs, which
was another major factor hindering the notion from being applied
properly because later it was discovered that when fathers were invited
to attend such meetings, many of them failed to respond. Changing
fathers' attitudes regarding their involvement is necessary; hence
written posters were distributed by the Ministry of Education through-
out each community, urging fathers to get involved in school activi-
ties and to attend the board meetings. Among the statements written
is the following one:

Father: The school does not intend, by inviting you to

visit, to collect any donation; its main concern is to
share ideas and consultation that will benefit your son.

110

To insure that fathers are not asked for money, the Ministry of Edu-
cation is abundantly funding school activities.

Thus, it can be seen that the Ministry of Education has had
the intention of involving fathers in the schools since its establish-
ment in 1953. It was not possible to find a specific motive behind
this intention, either from the documents of the Ministry or from
the interviewees. Most of the interviewees stated that the notion
of fathers' involvement in the schools was not a priority for the
Ministry of Education. They felt it could be done later. Rather,
the main concern of the Ministry was to open schools to recruit as
many students as possible, necessitating teacher training and provi-
sion of school facilities, which will be explained later. Some
interviewees implied that because the notion did not work effectively,
this meant that the idea was there with no motivation to apply it.
Therefore, although the Ministry intended to involve fathers in the
schools, the idea did not work well because of many obstacles.

Obstacles Preventing Fathers' Planned
Involvement in the Schools

 

 

From the moment it was promoted to a ministerial level outside
the control of another ministry, the Ministry of Education began to
reorganize itself internally and to expand externally in terms of
building schools. Regarding the internal reorganization, a big change
was brought about within the structure of the Ministry. New offices
and departments were created for both appearance and efficiency. By
comparing Figure 2 and Figure 3, one can observe that change. Inde-

pendent departments for elementary and secondary education were created

111

 

Minister of Education

 

 

 

 

I

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

—___l__.
The Supreme Council of Education Office |
Deputy Minister L——————-—
l .____l___
Advisors Office ’
r ‘ __—=T_

General Director of Financial General Director Director of General
Affairs of Education Administration

+ i

 

 

Personnel Department
+

 

 

 

Accounting Department

 

+

 

Budgeting Department

 

 

 

+

 

Performance

 

 

 

+

 

Missions Abroad Performance

 

 

+

 

Warehouse Accounting

 

 

+

 

Educational Districts'
Administration for
Financial Affairs

 

 

 

+

 

 

Payroll Cashier

 

i

 

Office of Foreign
Teacher Contracts

 

 

 

 

 

Department of Elementary Ed.,
Adult Ed., and Teacher Training
Institutions for First Phase

4»

 

 

Archives Department

 

 

iv

 

Department of Secondary Ed.
& Teacher-Training Institutions
for Secondary Level

ir

 

 

Administrative
Inspection Dept.

 

 

 

 

+

 

 

Department of Social and
Educational Activities

 

 

i

 

Translation Department

 

 

t

 

 

Educational Districts' Admin.
for Technical Affairs

 

 

ir

 

Dept. of School Health

 

+

 

Examination Department

 

 

i

 

Missions Abroad Department

 

 

+

 

Department of Cultural
Relations

 

 

+

 

 

Industrial Education

 

 

if

 

Warehouses

 

 

 

t

 

 

Educational
Districts'
Administration
for Adminis-
trative Affairs

 

 

Figure 3.—-Organizational chart of the Ministry of Education between 1953 and 1957.
{From Ministry of Education, Ministry of Education in Five Years, 1953-1957

Riyadh. Saudi Arabia:

 

Ministry of’Education, n.dTJ).

 

 

112

to give more attention to this aspect of education by providing these
two departments with specialists in each area. The Supreme Council
for Education was created to plan and to execute the educational
policy of the country. To benefit from the experience of other
countries, especially the Arab countries, the consultants' office
was established to aid in the planning process. As shown in Figure 3,
the financial and administrative affairs were also organized. It
was not easy to implement this type of change, especially when the
desirable manpower was lacking. Nevertheless, the Ministry of Edu-
cation continued the process of reorganization. It did not confine
itself to the use of its own experience and the experience of sur-
rounding Arab countries in building and extending the departments
within its structure but engaged international agencies to aid in
that process. Among them was the Ford Foundation, which assisted in
another organizational reform undertaken in fiscal year 1958-59.
(See Figure 4.) The greatest organizational reform implemented
recently is shown in Figure 5, which shows the extent to which the
Ministry of Education has grown in about 30 years. Thus, if organi-
zational development took precedence over the notion of fathers'
involvement in the schools, the administrative reform succeeded in
lodging the notion in its rightful place by creating the General
Department of Student Guidance and Counseling.

As the interviewees mentioned, external expansion played a
major role in diverting the Ministry of Education's attention from
involving fathers in the schools to building schools and filling them

with students. Zaid also indicated this when he wrote:

113

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115

Arabia has expanded educational facilities very rapidly over

the past few years in an attempt to educate more and more

people. Ministry of Education figures indicate that one new

school is opened in Saudi Arabia every three days.1

The increase in the number of elementary and secondary schools

and in student enrollment in the five years from 1953 to 1957 is
shown in Table 1. In 1963, ten years after the Ministry of Education
was established, 137,946 students were enrolled at the elementary level
and 10,636 at the intermediate and high school levels. The total
number of students who were enrolled that year in all types of

schools, including the ones mentioned above, reached 160,404 students.

In 1963 alone, 86 new schools were opened.2

Table 1.--Growth in number of schools and student enrollment, 1953-1957.

 

 

 

 

 

Year
1953 1954 1955 1956 1957

Elementary Schools

No. of schools 306 326 466 505 518
No. of students 39,920 43,734 49,740 57,841 79,274
No. of teachers 1,472 1,652 1,998 2,236 3,085
Secondary Schools

No. of schools 10 12 13 23 32
No. of students 1,315 1,697 1,405 2,394 4,811
No. of teachers 133 150 176 226 357

 

Source: Ministry of Education, The Ministry_of Education in Five Years,

 

From 1953-1957 (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: Ministry of Education,
n.d.), pp. 68167.

 

 

IZaid, p. 140.

2Ministry of Education, A Brief Report on the Ministry of
Education for the Years l963-1964.

 

116

This acceleration in school openings and student recruitment
in every part of the country forced the Ministry of Education to
establish school districts to oversee these schools. This was one of
the factors that led people at the Ministry level to think in a broad
sense instead of concentrating fully on such details as involving
fathers in the schools. Between l953 and 1956, l2 school districts
were established in different parts of the country,1 which meant more
spending to provide those districts with the necessary manpower and
facilities.

Most of the interviewees considered the inadequate educational
background and inexperience of the people who originally directed the
Ministry of Education to have been factors discouraging careful plan-
ning for fathers' involvement in the schools. The intensive interest
of the Ministry in growing and expanding internally and externally
forced the Ministry to accept unqualified workers because experienced
manpower was unavailable. Al-Ajroush supported this point when he
wrote:

There was a great need for civil servants (teachers, adminis-
trators, and skilled workers); there were problems with obsolete
curricula and instructional materials; inadequate administrative
structure; and there was the absence of higher education, as
well as girls' education. The fundamental resistance to change
and retrogressive social trends were particularly difficult to
combat. Concurrently, with limited efficiency and know-how,

the educational authorities began their move toward reorganizing
the Ministry's administrative structure, reorganizing the struc-

ture of the educational system, opening new schools at all levels,
and developing the school curricula.

 

1Hamad, p. 108.

2Hamad A. Al-Ajroush, "A Historical Development of the Public
Secondary School Curriculum in Saudi Arabia From 1930 to the Present"
(Ph.D. dissertation, The University of Oklahoma, l980), p. 50.

117

Thus, it is understandable that the notion of fathers'
involvement in the schools remained as one of the Ministry's objec-
tives and was included in the notification letters of the Department
of Educational and Social Activities to the school districts for
almost 17 yearsfwithout definite policies and regulations to guide
lfifie:éghgo1§~toward putting the idea into practice.

'Teachers, whose cooperation is essential in involving fathers
in the Sshools’ were snother-9b§teFle-t°AiUSFrUmentiegfiéush 19Y91Y9t

ment. Alt is the teacher who must bemencouraged to get in.tQUCh with

,.. rd

vhtheufathfirS. Thus it is necessary for teachers to realize how impor-
tant the homes of the students are to their teaching. In this way,
it is assumed that they will meet the fathers in a cooperative way,
which will enable them to benefit the students. But the Ministry of
Education did not emphasize this point in teachers-college curricula
during the time it supervised the universities in the country (until
l975, when the Ministry of Higher Education was established). It
only emphasized the basic teacher-preparation subjects and the
specialization subjects. To provide the schools with teachers,
especially at the elementary level, the Ministry of Education accepted
elementary-school graduates into the elementary-teacher-preparation
institutions, trained them for three years, and sent them back to
teach at the elementary level. In 1965, student teachers began to be

accepted after completing intermediate school.1

 

1Harrmad, p. 102.

A//’

118

In 1976-77, the Ministry of Education started to replace
these teacher-training institutions with junior colleges for teachers,
to provide the elementary schools with better-qualified teachers.
Student teachers are accepted in these teacher-training institutions
after they have completed high school; they are trained to be
elementary-school teachers within a period of two years and obtain a
teaching certificate upon completing the program. After serving the
Ministry for a certain period of time, the graduates of this institu-
tion may complete a regular four-year college of education, which
trains teachers for the intermediate- and secondary-school levels,
in just two years. In this way, an elementary-school teacher is
given a good chance to be promoted and to improve himself.

The emphasis is on training indigenous teachers to carry the
responsibility of teaching the students as they are the ones who know
the culture, traditions, and behavior of the Saudi people. Before,
the Ministry of Education depended heavily on teachers recruited from
other Arab countries to teach at the elementary level.1 There is
still a teacher shortage at the secondary and intermediate levels,
according to the Ministry reports. Non-Saudi teachers were recruited
primarily from such countries as Egypt, Jordan, Sudan, Syria, and
Lebanon. Naturally, each one of these teachers had his own ways of
behaving, believing, and verbally communicating, which differed to
some extent from those of the native people. Besides cultural dif-

ferences, each nationality group had a different educational background.

 

1Al-Ajroush, p. 158.

119

Such differences would have an effect on the student-teacher rela-
tionship and consequently would affect the father-teacher relation-
ship. On this subject Al-Ajroush noted:
Saudi education cannot be regarded as truly national so long
as it is imparted by a teacher coming from an environment dif-
ferent from that of the indigenous learner. The student is
likely to meet in his daily school routine teachers from several
different countries. For example, the first class may be taught
by an Egyptian, the second by an Englishman, the third by a
Sudanese etc. Thus the school is a very "cosmopolitan insti-
tution."1

'Thus, the shortage of qualified teachers necessitated the
presence of large numbers of non-Saudi teachers, who were considered
"intrusive individuals" in the society. The existence of this feel-
ing among the Saudi people can be cited as a tangible reason for
fathers not cooperating with the schools or contacting their sons'
teachers.

Although the parents' illiteracy did not hinder them from
complementing the schooling through some projects designed in the
United States, such as Jessie Jackson's PUSH project and the Bilingual
Program at the Education Service Center in Austin, both of which were
discussed in Chapter II, the interviewees considerediparental illite‘

m o O o
eracylto be another major obstacle in ach1ev1ng parent-school coopera-
tion. When the Ministry of Education was established in l953, the
illiteracy rate was estimated to be between 95 and 99 percent for a
population of four million people.2 The interviewees thought that

since most of the fathers were illiterate, it would be impossible to

seek their cooperation with the schools.

 

1Ibid.. pp. 156-57. 21bid., p. 49.

People's attitudes toward the government at the time of the
country's unification would be considered another barrier to establish-
ing the idea of fathers' involvement in the schools because "tribesmen
and villagers in Saudi Arabia are generally suspicious of the central
government, never having experienced a strong central government before,
and afraid of the challenge it presents to the authority of their chiefs
and local leaders."1 As mentioned earlier, the General Directorate of
Education began with four private schools that people had established
for their sons. Since that time, building schools and educating chil-
dren have become the government's responsibility, so more people have
received this service. (Private schools can be established, but they
must be under the supervision of the Ministry of Education or another
educational authority.) The centralized nature of the General Direc-
torate of Education in 1926, followed by the establishment of the Min-
istry of Education in 1953, revealed to the public that the schools
were to educate their sons but that the schools were not theirs because
they did not have a say in the school functions. Thus schools were con-
sidered government property. The public was not given a chance to par-
ticipate in planning and managing the institutions that had been designed
to serve them. "Therefore the need for grassroots participation--
especially in planning of education and manpower development--has never
been satisfied. An educational system is deficient vfithout the par-
ticipation of the people it serves."2 Consequently, the people stayed
outside of the decision-making groups and accepted whatever was designed

and recommended for them by the "experts."

 

2

1Hammad, p. 55. Ibid., p. 56.

121

One profound example can provide more clarification to this
point. A major conflict in education arose when the Director General
started to include among the religious subjects of the schools such
courses as science, foreign language, and geography. The religious
leaders opposed the idea and complained to the authorities, who were
not satisfied with the Director General's justification for including
these courses in the curriculum. In this regard Al-Ajroush noted:

The first was opposition from the conservative clergy, who viewed
the Director General's effort to develop the curriculum not

only as a threat in the form of transplanted Western ideas,
values and techniques within their own traditional Islamic social
milieu, but also in their belief that instruction in modern
science and its branches is against the teaching of Islam and
should be resisted. This matter disturbed the educational
leaders and they took their case to the King for resolution.

The matter, however, was settled by the King when he rejected
their opinion on the ground that they did not have any religious
proof which could be relied on. The impact of such conservative
belief not only hampered the development of the educational
system, but its influence has lingered in the 19505, 605, and
705, creating a wide gulf between Hesternized and non-Westernized
educated Saudi officials and the conservative element of the
society.

Such situations are considered major causes of an uncoopera-
tive environment between the public and the school officials. It was
hard to find a middle ground in such disputes as a compromise for
settlement. Almost always, authoritative power was the means through
which to establish a policy. The idea that changing beliefs would
necessitate patience and effort was not taken into consideration.

In some interviewees' opinions, not only did the existence
of unqualified and "foreign" teachers discourage the fathers from

lcooperating with the teachers and contacting the schools, but some

 

1Al-Ajroush, pp. 42-43.

122

negative aspects of the culture itself caused fathers to remain aloof
from the schools. Because of the high percentage of illiteracy and
the ignorance that dominated the society for a long period of time,
people came to believe in the teachers. Everyone who had some knowl-
edge to teach by that time was considered a knowledgeable person, no
matter how intelligent he really was. He was the one who knew, and
because the others did not know, it was imperative for them to respect
him and consequently not to interfere in his profession. In some
situations, the teacher came to be considered a messenger or prophet,
and such sayings as "I will be a slave to whoever teaches me the
alphabet" were widely believed. This kind of belief was held not
only in the society outside of the schools, but in the schools as
well. Sayings like the one quoted were included in the textbooks,
and the teachers used these adages to reinforce their positions. It
was forgotten that teachers are human beings who make mistakes and
have their own strengths and deficiencies like everyone else does.
Such factors can be considered as major obstacles delaying
the creation of a definite policy regarding fathers' involvement in
the schools during the period from 1953 to l969. The Ministry of
Education did not attempt to define such a policy because building
the educational system of the country was its major priority. Nor
did the people demand such involvement, but rather were satisfied
with being observers and considering their sons' education as the

government's responsibility.

123

Factors Reinforcing the Idea of Fathers'
Involvement in the Schools

 

 

When the Ministry of Education started building the educa-
tional system of the country, two major objectives were on its agenda:
the internal building of the Ministry's structure and the external
building of the educational system. As mentioned earlier, the
Ministry succeeded to a great extent in attaining the first objective.
Today, the Ministry of Education's internal organization comprises
58 departments and offices that manage the schools throughout the
country. In relation to the second objective, the Ministry of Edu-
cation provides Saudi students with and controls the following kinds

of schooling.

Kindergarten

 

Kindergarten is considered the first step on the educational
ladder of the Saudi Arabian schools. It is a transitional stage
between the easy life at home and the formal and organized life at
school. Kindergarten is the only stage in which schooling is coeduca-
tional. A child can be accepted at the age of four to attend the
nursery grade and proceed to the preliminary grade at the age of
five, but it is not considered a prerequisite for the elementary
stage of schooling, as is the case with the other types of schools.
In l969. there were only three kindergarten schools managed by the
Ministry of Education, with only 913 students enrolled in 35 classes.
In 1981, there were still three schools with 1,262 students enrolled
in 42 classes. The reason for such slow development in kindergarten

education managed by the Ministry of Education is that the General

124

Presidency of Girls' Education and the private sector, under the super-
vision of the Ministry of Education and the General Presidency of Girls'
Education, have begun to provide this type of education. In 1981 there were
lBl schools with 12,375 students enrolled in 968 classes, including

those in kindergartens managed by the Ministry of Education.1

Elementary Education

 

This stage is considered the basic one for the succeeding
stages of schooling. Students enter elementary school at the age of
six and receive a yearly promotion after passing two examinations at
the end of each semester. After completing six grades, they attain
the elementary-education completion certificate. In 1969, under the
Ministry of Education's control, there were 1,383 schools with
enrollments of 267,529 students in l0,972 classes. In l98l, there
were 3,783 schools with a total enrollment of 549,945 students in
28,435 ciasses.2

Intermediate Education

 

Upon attaining the elementary-education certificate, students
are eligible to attend intermediate school for three years, ending
with the attainment of the intermediate-education completion certifi-
cate. There are three types of intermediate schools: (1) the general

intermediate, which prepares its students to attend secondary school;

 

1Ministry of Education, Educational Statistics in the Kingdom
of Saudi Arabia (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: Al-Nasser Printing Co., 1981).

2These statistics do not represent the total number of
schools, students, and classes at the elementary level for boys.
They only illustrate the Ministry of Education's growth.

 

125

(2) the modern intermediate, which provides its students with voca-
tional and technical types of education and prepares them to attend
other vocational/technical high schools, or at least equips them with
some vocational skills if they decide to drop out of school; and

(3) schools with a religious emphasis in the curriculum, which prepare
students to attend other religious institutions in the country. In
1969, there were 217 intermediate schools of all three types, with a
total enrollment of 38,028 students in 1,356 classes under the
Ministry of Education's control. In 1981, the number of intermediate
schools under the Ministry's control jumped to 968, with enrollments

of 145,002 students in 5,935 classes.

Secondary Education

 

Students who have completed the general intermediate stage of
schooling have priority in attending general secondary school for
three years to obtain the general secondary-education completion
certificate. Study at these schools is divided into two major areas:
The first-year curriculum is composed of subject matter in the arts
and sciences. The second and third years are divided into a science
emphasis and an arts emphasis, and students may choose to attend
either one, depending on their achievement the first year. This
stage is considered the preparatory step for a college education.
Students who complete the religious intermediate education attend
other secondary schools, which put more emphasis on religion along

with arts-oriented subjects.

126

In 1975, the comprehensive high school system was introduced
to the Saudi society, with more emphasis on specialization. The
students who receive this type of secondary education are given the
chance to progress according to their ability since these schools
are based on the credit-hour system. So, active students do not have
to wait for three years to complete their secondary education but
can finish school in less time.

Like the other types of education, secondary education has
shown much progress in terms of student enrollment, number of schools,
and number of classes. In 1969-70 there were 37 secondary schools with
a total enrollment of 8,243 students in 316 classes. In 1980-81, there
were 279 schools with a total enrollment of 55,134 students in 2,097
classes.

Besides these types of secondary education, there are indus-
trial, commercial, and agricultural education, which prepare students
either for work or to attend other higher-education institutions in
their areas of specialization.

Other Types of Institutions
Under the Ministry's Control

 

Besides the types of education and institutions described
above, the Ministry of Education controls or supervises the following
types of institutions:

Private institutions

Qur'anic intermediate schools

Qur'anic secondary schools

Elementary teacher-training institutes for men
Physical education institutes for men teachers

mth-J
0.000

127

Art education institutes for men teachers

Junior colleges for men teachers

Teacher-upgrading centers

Science and mathematics centers

Special-education institutions for handicapped students

OSOCDNOS

Student Problems Faced by
The Ministry of Education

 

 

The preceding discussion indicated that the objective of
external expansion has been achieved to a great extent. The purpose
of comparing the total student enrollments, number of schools, and
number of classes for the years 1969-70 and 1980-81 is to show the
rapid increase that the elementary, intermediate, and secondary
schools have been experiencing. (More detail is given for the period
from 1969 to 1981 in Table 2.) This development in student enrollment
began in 1970, the date of the first regulation concerning fathers'
involvement in the schools.

The growth in student enrollment has been accompanied by
various problems that are very closely related to the students' lives.
Such problems as inappropriate behavior, absenteeism, excessive failure,
dropouts, poor motivation, and not doing the homework are being
experienced by almost every school in the country and consequently
are causing some perplexing situations for the Ministry's officials.
This was reported by the interviewees and is also mentioned in reports
of the General Department of Student Guidance and Counseling.

Such problems have not developed overnight; they originated

with the Ministry's development. The Ministry was using a different

128

Table 2.—-Growth in number of schools, classes, and student enrollment
of Ministry of Education schools from 1969-70 to 1980-81.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Saudi Arabia (Riyadh:

 

Year Number of Number of Student
Schools Classes Enrollment
Elementary Level
1969-70 1,383 10,972 267,529
1970-7] 1,456 11,690 284,612
1971-72 1,596 12,633 308,598
1972-73 1,806 13,905 330,955
1973-74 1,913 15,508 363,258
1974-75 2,067 16,891 391,677
1975-75 2,414 18,886 420,001
1975-77 2,661 20,570 439,839
1977-73 3,103 22,943 456,090
1973-79 3,438 24,804 484,804
1979-80 3,636 26,607 517,069
1980-81 3,783 28,435 549,945
Intermediate Level
1969-70 217 1,356 38,028
1970-71 281 1,665 48,448
1971-72 320 1,905 56,664
1972-73 357 2,233 63,225
1973-74 387 2,473 69,455
1974-75 421 2,973 80,618
1975-76 476 3,314 91,037
1976-77 553 3,986 104,979
1977-78 687 4,709 117,469
1978-79 826 5,366 130,493
1979-80 906 5,873 143,725
l980-81 968 5,935 145,002
Secondary Level
1969-70 37 316 8.243
1970-71 57 439 12,757
1971-72 64 510 13,966
1972-73 67 570 15,675
1973-74 72 651 18,749
1974-75 84 780 22,606
1975-76 103 924 25,717
1976-77 235 1.163 32.944
1977-78 201 1,513 42,070
1978-79 247 1,885 40,790
1979-80 259 2,092 54,841
1980-81 279 2,097 55,134
Source: Ministry of Education, Educational Statistics in the Kingdom of

 

Ministry of Education, various years).

129

approach from the one it is using today. School principals and
teachers had the authority to solve these problems. School officials
depended on their own ability and educational background to solve
them in different ways, from using corporal punishment to expelling

a problem student until he regulated his own behavior and brought his
father to the school principal to sign a note guaranteeing that the
son would not continue behaving negatively.

Unfortunately, nothing has been done to investigate such
problems in order to prescribe proper solutions for them. Therefore,
research in these areas is not available in Saudi Arabia.

Ghamdi conducted a study regarding the high-school-dropout
problem to determine its causes. Regarding this problem he wrote:

Among the most serious problems facing Saudi Arabian secondary
education today is the waste of human resources in the form of
students dropping out of school. Indeed, the average yearly
rate of high school students labeled as dropouts is over 24
percent, while almost 32 percent of the students failed to
achieve a passing grade average, which in one way or another
causes them to drop out of school.1

For the years between 1969-70 and 1974-75, about 40 percent
of the elementary students dropped out of school. At the intermediate
level, about 29.3 percent of the students dropped out between 1969-70
and 1972-73.2

Five of 13 findings in Ghamdi's study were directly related

to the students' homes.3 One was the illiteracy of the parents. The

 

1Mohammad A. Ghamdi, "A Study of Selected Factors Related to
Student Dropouts in the Secondary Schools of Saudi Arabia" (Ph.D.
dissertation, Michigan State University, 1977), P. 4.

2151a. 31bid., pp. 132-35.

130

second was the problem of low family income, which forces many students
to seek jobs in order to earn money. The third was family problems
and broken homes. Fifty percent of the dropouts came from broken
homes. The fourth finding was that parental encouragement was lacking
for the dropouts, whereas the nondropouts received such encouragement.
The fifth finding concerned the dropouts' loss of interest in attend-
ing school.

The creation of the General Department of Student Guidance
and Counseling and this department's emphasis on the concept of
fathers' involvement in the schools indicate the extent to which the
Ministry of Education is concerned with such problems. Such diffi-
culties should be the concern not only of the Ministry of Education,
but of the country as a whole. In December 1982, the Ministry of
Planning, with the c00peration of the Ministry of Education, held
a national convention that was attended by university presidents and
by the general directors of education to discuss planning for more
efficient types of schooling that correspond to the changing society.1
The convention lasted for three days and ended with a group of recom-
mendations, among them the need to find solutions to the problems of

dropouts and examination failures.2

 

1Al-tlazcaerah (daily newspaper), December 21, 1982.

 

2Al-Jazeerah (daily newspaper), December 23, 1982.

CHAPTER V

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Conclusions

 

0n the ensuing pages, each research question posed in this
study is restated, followed by the conclusions pertinent to that
question.

1. Is there any evidence to show that in 1953 the Ministry
of Education expressed any interest in having fathers'
involvement in the Saudi schools?

The study confirmed one major point--that when the Ministry
of Education in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was created in 1953, it
intended to include fathers in school activities for the benefit of
the students. The Ministry has worked and is still working to improve
the concept of fathers' involvement in their sons' schooling.

This is an important point regarding the centralized nature of the
organization. Although the method of creating the fathers' and
teachers' boards is centralized, this indicates that the Ministry
of Education is inclined ix: accept the presence of nonprofessionals
from outside the schools in the school society.

2. If yes, what was the motivation behind this intention?

It was difficult to pinpoint a specific motivation behind
the notion of encouraging fathers to become involved in the Saudi

schools because the idea of fathers' involvement in the schools

131

132

was just a vague and unplanned notion at that time. No motivation
was evident in the Ministry's realization and practice of the idea.

3. If the answer to the first question is positive, what
were the obstacles that prevented such involvement?

The following points are considered as major factors that
diverted the Ministry's attention from the practical application of
fathers' involvement in the schools:

a. The internal reorganization and the external expansion
of the Ministry of Education.

b. The lack of experienced personnel to work at the Ministry
level.

c. The lack of indigenous teachers and the resulting depend-
ence on non-Saudi teachers, who were considered "intrusive individuals."

d. The high illiteracy rate among the people at the time
of the Ministry's establishment.

e. The profound belief among the Saudi fathers that teachers
know best and are best qualified to teach because of their profession-
alism.

f. The belief among Saudi fathers that school matters are
the government's responsibility.

4. If the answer to the first question is negative, what

was the philosophy of the Ministry for not involving
fathers in school matters?

Because the first question was answered affirmatively, this

question was not applicable to the study.

133

5. What is the nature of the present policy in regard to

father involvement?

It appears that by creating the General Department of Student
Guidance and Counseling, the Ministry is paying more attention to the
idea of fathers' involvement in the schools. Schools are required
to encourage fathers to visit the schools and to participate in their
activities. The Ministry is distributing posters and pamphlets to
encourage fathers to visit the schools and to become involved in
school activities. A more definite policy has been developed regard-
ing the scheduling and procedures of the fathers' and teachers' boards.
Schools are held responsible for planning the board meetings and
agendas and must report these plans to the Ministry twice a year.

For the first time, separate files for every school district are
being designed to organize their reports and to facilitate follow-up.

6. What are the motivations behind the present policy?

Two major factors motivated the Ministry of Education to
adopt the present policy. One is that the Ministry has been growing
in its internal organization, and it has been successful in building
schools throughout the country and in recruiting a good number of
students, indicating that this priority has been fulfilled to a great
extent.

Second, increases in the number of schools and in student
enrollments have led to the development of problems that are closely
related to the students' homes. Seeking solutions to such problems
forced the Ministry of Education to ask fathers to cooperate with the

schools in helping their sons solve their problems.

134

7. Has the Ministry's past attitude about this point

continued to the present?

It can be said that the Ministry's attitude and intentions
regarding the idea of involving fathers in the schools have evolved
from nebulous ones to more clearly defined ones. More development
is expected because of the creation of the General Department of
Student Guidance and Counseling.

8. Will the future of father involvement in Saudi schools
improve as a result of the findings of this study?

As mentioned earlier, this study confirmed that it is
the current policy of the Ministry of Education to move toward
involving fathers in the schools. This will give momentum to further
research and studies in this area to attain efficient and beneficial
involvement. Such studies would prove fruitless if the Ministry of
Education were to reject the idea of fathers' involvement in the
schools and to confine its schools to the idea of professionalism
alone. In this way, the present study can aid in the improvement of

fathers' involvement in Saudi schools.

Recommendations

 

Recommendations for Further Research

 

Because the Ministry of Education is accepting fathers'
involvement in the schools, the following research efforts are
recommended.

1. A study measuring the attitudes of fathers toward the
idea of their involvement in the schools. How do they perceive their

involvement in the schools? What are the factors that prevent them

135

from becoming involved? What are their suggestions and ideas regard-
ing the improvement of their involvement in the schools?

2. A study measuring the attitudes of the teachers and
school principals toward fathers' participation in the schools.
Do they favor the idea or reject it? What are the major obstacles
that prevent them from exploring the possibilities to the greatest
extent? What are their suggestions regarding improvement, possibili-
ties for, and execution of the idea?

Knowing the attitudes of the involved parties and striving
to solve the discrepancies will help greatly in applying fathers'
involvement in an effective and beneficial way.
Recommendations for the General
Improvement of the Concept of

Fathers' Involvement in Théir
SonsT'SchOOTing

 

 

 

 

On the fathers' part.--

 

1. Use the mass media to increase fathers' awareness that
tth are important in their children's schooling. The use of local
mosques, newspapers, radio, and television can help in this regard.

2. Organize a father-education program in each school dis-
trict to discuss with fathers the methods they can use to help their
children inside and outside the schools, as well as ways they can
cooperate with the schools. This can be done before the fathers
become involved in the schools. Fathers' schedules and location
preferences should be taken into consideration when these programs

are organized.

136

,3. Have school staff or paraprofessionals conduct home visits
with fathers who do not attend the father-education program or partici-
pate in the school activities. This is to show these fathers how
important they are to the schools and how they can participate.
Because the teachers' schedules do not usually permit them to make
such visits to the students' homes, the use of paraprofessionals will
help greatly in this process. Also, such home visits should be
planned carefully to avoid the absence of the fathers or the students'
guardians at the time of the visit.

4. Work to keep the fathers in continuous contact with the
school. Holding an open house at the beginning of the school year
will enable the fathers to know their sons' teachers and to discuss
the curriculum with them. The use of monthly or weekly newsletters
will also help in this process.

5. Inform and invite the fathers for conferences whenever
their sons make outstanding improvement and/or progress, instead of
confining such events to reporting negative behavior. This will
make the fathers understand that they are considered a factor contribut-
to such progress.

On the teachers' part.--

 

l. Convince the teachers and the school principals that
fathers are important in their sons' schooling and that they can and
do make a difference.

2. Instruct teachers in how to deal with fathers, ways to
contact them, how to visit them at home, and how to accept them as

partners in the schools. These subjects must be included in the

137

programs of teacher-preparation institutions to enable newly graduat-
ing teachers to work effectively with fathers. Also, training in
these practices should be included in teacher in-service programs.
For practicing teachers, a workshop can be designed and teachers be
encouraged to attend it.

3. Adjust the teachers' schedules in terms of the weekly
hours they teach, to enable them to work with the fathers.

4. The high level of bureaucracy involved in the creation
of the fathers' and teachers' boards makes it difficult for teachers
and fathers to achieve cooperation. For example, a teacher must
follow a detailed process to gain board approval to invite a
father to share his experience during a class meeting. This process
may discourage teachers from seeking such approval. Therefore,

regulation of such matters must be made more flexible.

APPENDIX

138

139

Poster Distributed by the Ministry of Education to Encourage
Fathers' Cooperation With the Schools (1981)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Translation of Poster Distributed by the Ministry of Education
to Encourage Fathers' Cooperation With the Schools

 
    
  

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Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
Ministry of Education

Gen. Dept. for Youth Helfar
Dept. of Social Education

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143

Translation of Pamphlet Distributed by the Ministry of
Education Encouraging Fathers to Cooperate
With the Schools

 

 

 

Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
Ministry of Education

General Department for Youth Welfare
Department of Social Education

COOPERATION
BETWEEN
HOMES
AND

SCHOOL

In the Name of Allah the Merciful the Compassionate
God says:

"But help ye one another unto righteousness and pious
duty." 5:2

He also says:

". . . , and whose affairs are a matter of counsel." 42:38

The Messenger of Allah (may the blessing and peace of Allah be
upon him) said:

"Every one of you is a ruler and everyone shall be ques-
tioned [on the Day of Judgment] about his subjects. . . .
The amir is a ruler [over his subjects], and the man is a ruler
over the people of his house, and the woman is a ruler over the
house of her husband and his children. So every one of you is
a ruler and every one shall be questioned about his subjects."

144

Father:

Your sons are the future adults...

If you bring them up according to the Islamic education's
views, that will be a great help in building the basis of
this country.

Father:

Educating the children is a shared responsibility between
fathers and teachers...

30 it is necessary that the relationship between them be
a tight and continuous one.

Father:

The school does not intend, byinviting you to visit, to
collect any donations; its main concern is to share ideas
and consultations that will benefit your son.

Father:

It is necessary that you follow up your son's matters at
the school, and this requires your visiting the school
frequently and accepting its invitation whenever you are
invited.

Father:

It is fundamental that the educational attitudes of both
the fathers and the teachers coincide with each other.
This requires you to visit your son's school on a regular
basis.

Father:

The fathers' and teachers’ board is a vital aspect for
home and school cooperation to raise the sons according
to that which Islam states, to enable them (fathers and
teachers) to create the foundations that this genera-
tion's future can be built on.

145

The objectives of fathers' and teachers' boards:

1. To strengthen the relationship between fathers and teachers
so that schools and homes can cooperate in educating the students
according to Islamic values.

2. To support fathers' and teachers' observation of students'
behavior, performance, activities, and health habits. To prevent
harmful effects and the spread of bad habits among the students.

3. To analyze the students' needs and difficulties and to
provide them with proper solutions.

4. To gain advantage from the fathers' varied potentials to
reinforce the mission of the school as well as the service of the
society.

5. To increase productive awareness in the home and the society
so as to coincide with the appropriate educational trends that are in

accordance with the Islamic teachings.

The objectives of social education:

To help the school to fulfill its duty regarding educating and
teaching the students by:

Serving the students as individuals by protecting them from
deviation and by helping them to create their own personalities.

Helping to solve the students' problems and curing the problems'
causes.

Helping the students to foster their abilities and to gratify

their needs and desires to expand their experiences.

146

Finally, serving the students as members of the society by
tightening the relationship between schools and homes, and serving
the society by regulating and exchanging the general services accord-

ing to Islamic teachings.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

147

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