EXPLORING PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT AND ITS IMPACT ON STUDENTS’ LEARNING MOTIVATION IN SWAT, PAKISTAN

Abstract

In the twenty-first century, the outcomes of student learning are dependent on the classroom instruction, and aspects like parental involvement have become a determining factor that dictates motivation and academic performance. The Study explores how parental involvement influences the learning motivation amongst the students of Government Higher Secondary School Kabal, Swat, Pakistan, in terms of learning support at home, emotional support, and school-home communication. The qualitative phenomenological research design was followed, guided by three aims that is, finding out what the forms of parental involvement are, investigating the perception of students on parental support, and what the teacher's opinion about parental engagement is. The participants included students, parents, and teachers who were sampled using purposive sampling. The information was collected by semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions, along with the analysis of documents, and was analyzed using the thematic framework (Braun and Clarke). The results indicated that parental engagement plays a strong role in the intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, and there is an increase in student engagement, discipline, and academic achievement. Nevertheless, the involvement of the parents is hampered by several obstacles, which include time, knowledge of the subject, and cultural norms. Among the elements that may be identified as important in the study, one can draw the importance of active home-school partnerships, culturally competent practices, and parental training programs since they provide useful information to educators, policy-makers, and curriculum developers interested in fostering student motivation and academic success.