The first phase of ‘Growing up in Ireland’ has been published and the children will be followed up at age 13
PARENTS HAVE a higher estimate of their children’s abilities than their teachers, new research has found.
The results of a national study of 8,500 nine-year-old children, which involved surveying the children themselves as well as their parents, teachers and school principals, show that while 60 per cent of parents felt their nine-year-old child was above average at reading, teachers reported that just 39 per cent of these children actually were above average.
Likewise, while 52 per cent of parents felt their nine-year-old children were above average at maths, teachers rated just 33 per cent of them as above average at this subject.
The findings from the first phase of the Government-funded Growing up in Irelandstudy published yesterday, which will follow up the children again at age 13 years, also show that teachers were more likely to rate children as below average at maths and reading than parents.
Whereas teachers rated 17 per cent of nine-year-olds as below average at reading, only 9 per cent of parents did. Similarly, while 16 per cent of this age group were rated as below average at maths by teachers, only 8 per cent of parents felt their nine-year-olds were below average at this subject.
Not surprisingly then, children were more likely to be rated just average by teachers than by their parents. Teachers rated 51 per cent of the children as just average at maths and 44 per cent of them as just average at reading, compared to 40 per cent and 32 per cent of parents respectively.
The findings from the research also illustrate parents nowadays have very high expectations for their nine-year-old children.
Some 76 per cent of parents expect their child to achieve at least degree level. Less than 1 per cent expect their child to achieve only Junior Certificate.
The results of standard Drumcondra tests on the children carried out by the research team from the ESRI and Trinity College Dublin also show that even at this early age, boys are doing better at maths than girls.
In general, it was found that the higher the educational level of the child’s mother, the better the child performed on both maths and vocabulary tests.
The least preferred subject among all children in this age group is, despite changes in the curriculum, still what anecdotal report suggest it has been for years – Irish.
Looking at school days missed each year, the study established that while the main reason for the nine-year-olds not attending school was illness or injury, the second most common reason was to go on holiday with their family.
Just over 12 per cent of the nine-year-olds missed more than 11 days school in the year preceding the survey. Parents reported the main reason children missed school was due to illness or injury (80 per cent) followed by family vacation (16 per cent).
Only 27 per cent of the nine- year-olds said they always liked school, but a large majority said they liked school at least sometimes.
More than half the children in this age group also said they “always” liked their teacher. Just 6 per cent said they “never” liked their teacher.
The vast majority of nine-year-olds are taught by women teachers. Nearly half their teachers said they felt very or fairly stressed by their jobs.
Meanwhile, a substantial proportion of the children were in schools where facilities were reported by their principals to be poor.
Nearly one-quarter of nine-year-olds were in schools that the principal felt had an inadequate number of classrooms; 38 per cent in schools which the principal felt had poor library facilities; 39 per cent in schools which the principal felt had poor after-school facilities and 24 per cent were in schools which the principal felt had poor facilities for children with disabilities.