Home Visit; Bridging the Gap

Introduction

Students’ development has been the main concern of most educators in the world including in Indonesia. Teacher should always try to observe and find the best treatment in order to foster the students’ development. The problems occur when teachers do not really understand the real context of situation faced by their students. The limited access of interaction between teachers and students in a classroom usually creates the wrong presumption on teachers. When it comes to the multicultural countries like in America and Indonesia, getting to better know students and their families can make teachers powerful advocates in their children's education. Therefore the idea of home visit raises up. Home visits can give teachers the insight they need to help all students succeed (Nicolas, 2012). It means that understanding the condition of students is a cornerstone for teacher to create better teaching and learning.

            Home visit places teachers and other educators in their students’ homes of in order to improve the relationship and communication among teachers, parents/guardians/families, and students (Nicolas, 2012). Some teacher employs this home visit as the initial contact with the family of the students. Some other teachers use this home visit to gain information and home assessment for their students (Dantas & Coleman, 2010 ). Whatever the purpose is, the home visit is part of teachers’ responsibility for their students. This paper examines the beneficial functions of home visit for teachers. More specifically, I argue that home visit is beneficial because it can: (1) breakdown the frame clashes, (2) create stronger bond among teachers, students, and parents, (3) support the existence of partnership education.

Breaking the Frame Clash

In a classroom, teachers —usually the new one— often find the frame clashes during their home visit. Dantas & Coleman (2010) eloquently argue that “Frame clashes are a disruption of what one counts as the “normal” or taken-for-granted ways to participate in social interactions”. He also argues that in school contexts, they lead to misunderstanding, faulty assumptions, and negative stereotypes. It means that frame clashes mostly occur when teachers have the ideals toward particular situation which are not exactly happening in reality. I believe that teacher tend to have this preconceived perception because their cultural background or certain expectations toward particular situation. This perception will mislead teachers in treating their kids in the classroom. for example, if teachers has presumption that all students from rich family will always perform well in the classroom, they will think that it is fine to give less attention to them because they already have what they want. But sometime teachers forget to involve the students’ socialization with their friends and neighborhood to their concern. Therefore, teachers should find alternative to cope with this frame clashes.

Home visits serve the needs of teachers to cope with frame clashes. It has unique characteristics that other methods of approach do not have which is the intimate observation (Nicolas, 2012). It provides the better opportunity for teachers to understand their students’ family and environment which a classroom observation does not provide. This might open up the insight of teachers toward certain presumption. For example, during the home visit, teacher can ask several questions to the parents about the kid’s habit at home or what kids concern the most. By having this, the teacher will be able to construct the more sophisticated and comprehensive view about the real students’ ability.

In addition, by having full knowledge toward students’ socio-cultural complexity and understanding the frame clashes, teacher will be able to develop better strategy and approach for the students. It can be a good alternative of self-reflection for teacher as well. This notion is in accordance to what Nicoles (2012) believe that educators today are finding that showing up at students' doors -- establishing a positive relationship with students' families -- is an important tool in school reform, particularly in low-income, urban districts where educators traditionally struggle to build parent involvement. She also believes that successful family visit involve transformative shifts perception of others and “what counts” as knowledge. Therefore, After having home visit, teachers are expected to have better view and perception toward students’ ability and eradicate the frame clashes they might have.

Creating stronger bond between teachers, students, and parents

The home visit will create stronger bound between teachers, students, and parents. Why do I believe so? In democratic country, we need to redefine the concept of role of teachers and students, along with their family and environment. It should not be separated part anymore. According to Dantas and Coleman (2010) “learning and teaching need to be addressed within the socio-cultural contexts in which they occur rather than viewed as an individual act and accomplishment”. The education of students is not an exclusive responsibility of schools and teachers. Seeing that urgency, home visit could be one of the efforts from the teacher to try to involve the students’ parents and environment in student’s development. It appreciates the existence of society as part of student’s life and their role to the students’ development. 

            Most parents tend to think that their students’ education is the responsibility of school and teacher (Nicoles, 2012). She also thinks that they are reluctant to involve in their students learning. The parents are busy with their works, thus it creates less opportunity for creating stronger bonds between teacher and parents. Through home visit, the teacher well be able to manage and communicate with the parents of the students. Teachers will be able to tell the parents about the students’ improvement at school. I believe This communication will establish the intimate relationship between parents and teachers..

            Teachers have so many students to take care of in the classroom that makes them difficult to observe deeply each of them. Teachers should divide their attention to all students. I believe that the communication of students-teachers during the home visit is more intimate and meaningful. Teacher can ask and observe their students more personally such as: seeing their room, knowing their neighbourhood, etc. I believe that the students will be more motivated because children know how much teachers care. This message of close communication will create better understanding and trust from the children too.

Supporting the partnership education

Home visit is actually part of effort to establish the partnership education. According to Eisler (2009) the core configuration of the partnership model is a democratic and egalitarian family and social structure, partnership between women and men, and no institutionalization or idealization of violence (p.136). Why I believe that establishing the partnership education through home visit is very important? The partnership education enables every party to actively involve to the education of students, in this case, in teaching and learning process. Home visits show the partnership education characteristics in a way that it tries to advocate the equal role between school teachers, parents, and students.

There is no superiority in home visit. Teachers, parents, and students are working together to create holistic education environment. This program actually includes strong emotional components from all of them. Home visits can be viewed as a “magic bullet” or the third leg of a three-legged educational stool which includes parents, students, and teachers. Without parental involvement, most students will not succeed in their education. Home visits by teachers get parents involved in their child's education. Home visits give teachers the insights they need to help their students succeed academically and to help families feel connected so they can be a support to their children. These are all the very purpose of the partnership education; creating holistic education.

Conclusion

As teachers, do we really agree to implement the home visit to our students? The answer can be yes or can be no. It really depends on someone’s commitment. We all know that home visit is beneficial in three ways. Firstly, it breaks down the frame clashes of teacher. It is important because as a teacher we must work harder to eradicate the preconceived perception toward our students. Secondly, it creates stronger bond between parents, children, and teachers. Home visits provide the intimate relationship among teachers, parents, and students. The last, it supports the partnership education. It is very important because the partnership education will enable all parties to create holistic education for the students.  

In fact, I strongly suggest this home visit to be regularly implemented in Indonesia especially for the primary education. The huge socio-cultural diversity that Indonesia has needs a serious bridge to connect all the gaps, necessarily for students’ education. It should not only be implemented for the “troubled” students but also for all students. It is because the home visit can be a good alternative in bridging students, teachers, and parents to support holistic education. I know it is hard, but nothing is impossible, moreover when it comes to our young generation future.

Reference

Dantas, M. & Coleman, M. (2010). Home visits: Learning from students and families. In M. Dantas & P. Manyak (Eds.), Home-school connections in a multi-cultural society: learning from and with culturally and linguistically diverse families. (pp. 156-176). New York: Routledge

Eisler, R (2009). Education for a partnership world: Building cultures of piece. In H.S. Shapiro (Ed.), Education and hope in troubled times (259-271). New York, NY: Routledge

Nicolas, J. (2012). Conducting the Home Visit in Child Protection. Glasgow: McGraw-Hill Education

the opening, sanctity of multicultural education

While it has been a great challenge for educators to find out the best system to educate students as responsible individuals, educators should also prepare students to be part of multicultural society. According to (Pacino, 2008), teachers have a big responsibility to create teaching and learning environments that foster a democratic exchange of ideas based on mutual respect, reflection, and informed decision making. The students need to be taught about the sanctity of tolerance to others in multicultural community. I examine the importance of implementing multicultural and moral education at school. More specifically, I will argue that multicultural education is beneficial to (1), educate the students as the whole individuals, and (2) prepare students to become responsible member of society.

            First, multicultural education will educate students holistically. This means, teaching and learning aims to prepare students both academically and socially (Cunningham & Allington, 1999). Often as educators, we become focused on teaching and learning as processes solely concerned with the academic achievement of students. In Indonesia, for example, most schools employ the results of academic tests as the primary measurement of being a “good student”. This must be changed since it does not prepare students socially as citizens in a multicultural world.

Helping students to develop positive attitudes and become responsible individuals is strongly needed in our classrooms. We cannot rely on the traditional methods of teaching which put the teacher as the center of the classroom. The students should not be passive learners. According to (Pacino, 2008), teaching and learning must take place within a learning community where teachers and students are all learners. This means that we need to create an atmosphere of equality in our classrooms. To do this, teachers must encourage students to know each other as individuals, regard each other as equals, and be able to work together on common interest and goals in a safe and supportive classroom environment (Smardo and Schmidt, 1983, p.25). Creating such a classroom climate that promotes the internalization of these shared values through multicultural education will help students to actively develop as learners, as people, and as citizens.

Secondly, multicultural education can prepare students to be responsible member of society. We know that the students need to understand about how to be the part of society. As Pacino (2008) eloquently says, teaching and learning in the context of community is truly a moral, spiritual, and ethical journey. This means the concept of ethical and moral values and actions in society should be integrated in their classroom. According to Pacino, educators must acknowledge and address students’ need to have the real experience of being community, not only of individual academic achievement at school. Multicultural and moral knowledge should be the vital components in the learning process.

            In addition, in multicultural and democratic countries, teachers should educate students to actively participate and contribute in their society. By acquiring the moral and ethical values at school, students can develop their awareness of and ability to act for equality and social justice in participatory democracies. In order to achieve this, teachers should place themselves as the facilitators of information, not as dictators of information. Students have the wide access to information from the outside world. Teachers have a duty to put that wide and broad information into a coherent context in the classroom and actively involve the students in discussing and processing it. This kind of active engagement enables students to experience the feelings of respect and autonomy that they need to participate in a fully democratic society and a multicultural world.

            There are specific methods that teachers can implement to achieve more meaningful education for students. One example is implementing activities and discussions that focus on positive aspect of cultural identity, heritage and differences such as involving students in developing personally relevant multicultural stories, books, or even autobiographies. Teachers can ask students to actively present and discuss their own story. One of the purpose of inviting students to share their stories is to better understand how the students can use their background knowledge to gain access to curricular content (Campano, 2007). By combining the multicultural and moral components of learning, students will learn to respect the diversity in society too. This includes the understanding on cross-cultural differences and social challenges (Tilaar, 2004).

In addition, we can reinforce the importance of multicultural education by involving students with community service/learning activities. This gives students the opportunity to be more responsible, knowledgeable and sensitive to their communities. This sensitivity is good for the students’ personal moral development, their sense of community, and increased tolerance, acceptance, and respect to others.

It is not always easy to create meaningful education by implementing multicultural education in our classrooms. There are so many challenges such as complicated regulations, increased preparation, etc. Therefore this becomes huge duty to educators to build up classroom communities that extend into an awareness of students’ role in larger communities and responsibility on them. This can be done through introducing greater awareness of our communities through creating positive classroom environment that include community service and positive atmosphere of discussion. Hence, students are well-prepared as a whole individual and member of society.

Reference:

Campano, G.: Honoring student stories. Educational Leadership 65(2): 48-54.

Cunningham, P. M., & Allington, R. L. (1999). Classrooms that work. (2 ed.). New York: Addison-Wesley Educational Publisher Inc.

Pacino, M.A. 2008. Reflection on Equity, Diversity, and Schooling. Lanham, MD: Hamilton Books

Smardo, Frances A., & Schimdt, Velma. (1983). Developing multicultural awareness. Children Today, 12, 23-25.

Tilaar. (2004). Multikulturalisme. Lembaga Manajemen UNJ; Jakarta