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tal involvement is defined as the participation of parents in every facet of children’s education and development from birth to adulthood, recognizing that parents are the primary influence in children’s lives (retrieved March 3, 2013, http:www.paptaorg/parenting/parent involvement.htm). Parents in this context can be referred to as children’s closest caregivers or members of their extended families.

In their definition of parental involvement Hoover-Dempsey & Sandler (2005) refer to two types of parental involvement activities oftentimes used by parents. One type is home-based involvement which includes activities that takes place between the child and parent outside the school setting. This entails helping child with homework, revising for test, monitoring of child’s progress, providing enrichment activities pertinent to school success and corresponding with child’s teacher on a regular basis. The other type is school-base involvement which includes activities wherein parents focus on their individual child in the school setting. These activities include parent-teacher conference, in-class observation of child, informal discussions with teacher, attending school events and volunteering to assist on school field trips.

Although the purpose of school is to educate children, this cannot be done in isolation without parental involvement, so when parents are involved both the school and student benefits. Deslandes and Bertrand (2005) agreed with the findings of Christenson and Sheridan (2000) where they affirmed that parent’s involvement could take different forms, such as parent’s roles in educating their children at home by helping with their homework and by volunteering at school or attending Parents Teachers Association meetings (p.164). Another writer, Evans (2000) interchanges the term parental involvement with parental participation and states that this includes a wide range of participation by parents from being recipients of services through to being instigators and controllers of programmes. In comparing with others one can note that in this definition parents would have to be literate, confident and possess the necessary skills, having time and energy to be involved in the programmes of the school. This, I partially agree with.

From the literature being reviewed it is obvious that parental involvement as thought by many is not a new terminology but can be traced to the beginning of time when parents were responsible for passing on the culture of their society to the prospective generation. Berger documented that this transfer of knowledge was passive and mainly concerned with making children good citizens who could protect and maintain the culture and civilization rather than educating them. However, at the turn of the twentieth century there was a marked difference in the education of children and the role parents played was more proactive. This was as a result of scientific research on human development, early childhood educators studying developmental theorist and parents who developed an interest in participating in their children’s education (as cited in Isenberg & Jalongo, 1995, p. 59).

Moreover, it was not until the 1960s when parents were being blamed for the shortcomings and failure of their children that parental involvement was brought to the forefront to help parents not only in child development but in behaviour modification and school success