Conceptualisations of Parent Involvement in Early Childhood Education in China

There is a growing attention for parent involvement in education in general and in early childhood education in particular. The vast majority of scholarly literature is published in English language and originates from Western countries. There is a risk that this may lead to the assumption that mainstream ideas in international literature are globally valid and come to dominate those of other countries, despite cultural differences. We conducted a systematic review of Chinese literature on parent involvement and analyzed underlying assumptions on rationales for parent involvement, on how parent involvement is configured, on guanxi and social inclusion, and eventually on the meaning of early childhood education. We found that while traditional important Chinese values are missing in dominant literature, there is also an increasing influence from U.S. literature on Chinese policy and practice.