A systematic review of understanding parental involvement in children’s ESL learning: What the literature says?

Abstract

A systematic literature review (SLR) regarding parental involvement in children's ESL learning at the primary school level was carried out using electronic data searching. This review considered articles published in the last three years (2020–2022) from an electronic database, specifically SCOPUS. The paper summarizes previous research, examines the current literature, and suggests directions for future research. The results of this evaluation, which include the identification of ten relevant papers, show that the majority of the parental involvement studies were conducted qualitatively and focused more on home-based than school-based involvement. Besides that, reading activities were largely performed by parents to get involved in their children’s ESL learning followed by helping with homework. Several theories have been seen employed by studies shortlisted in this SLR namely Bronfenbrenner's Ecological Theory, Epstein Framework, Walker‘s Model of Parental Involvement, and Vygotsky's Sociocultural Theory. Bourdieu Social Classes Theory and Asset-based Framework. The findings of this review suggest that for children to benefit most from reading, parents should obtain a better understanding of effective reading strategies. Additionally, more studies are needed on school-based parental involvement to get more insights into implementing home-school partnerships for better student educational outcomes.