Parenting education is a process of providing information to parents on the
challenges of parenting, services available for families, and ideas on how to interact with
children. The federal Even Start family literacy program, designed to increase the
educational opportunities of parents and children, has a strong parenting education
component. Parenting information is offered through formal classes, support groups, home
visits and by involving parents in their child's classroom. Using the life course and family
system's perspective, this study examined the impact of participation in the Even Start
program on parents' knowledge of parenting and their parenting practices. The study
employed a pretest-posttest design and utilized quantitative and qualitative methods of
data collection. In all, 74 Even Start and 26 comparison group parents participated. Four
hypotheses were tested: (a) Even Start parents would make greater gains in parenting
knowledge and practices than would comparison group parents; (b) parents who made
gains in parenting knowledge and practices would have different demographic
characteristics than those who did not make gains; (c) parents with lower depression,
higher self-esteem, and greater social support would make greater gains in parenting
knowledge and practices; and (d) programs offering more hours of parenting education
would have parents making greater gains in parenting knowledge and practices.
Quantitative results indicate that there are demographic differences at pretest and posttest
in parents' scores on parenting knowledge and practices although there is no significant
difference in score gains as the result of program participation. More positive parenting
practices were associated at pretest and posttest with lower levels of depression.
Qualitative results found increases in parenting knowledge, parenting practices, and self-esteem.
No differences were found in programs who offered greater number of hours of
parenting education than those that did not. / Graduation date: 1997
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ORGSU/oai:ir.library.oregonstate.edu:1957/34121 |
| Date | 15 October 1996 |
| Creators | Bailey, Sandra J. |
| Contributors | Richards, Leslie N. |
| Source Sets | Oregon State University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
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