Teachers’ Perspectives of Parent-school Communication Using Technology: A Systematic Review

Abstract

<p>Research demonstrated that parent-school communication using technology may be related to parental involvement and student learning outcomes, but research has not understood synthesized teachers’ perspectives on naturally occurring parent-school communication using technology, especially whether it is related to parental involvement and student learning outcomes, including during the COVID-19 pandemic.</p><p><br></p><p>This paper addresses the knowledge gap by presenting a systematic review on teachers’ perspectives of naturally occurring parent-school communication using technology with parents of preschool to high-school children (K-12). The review focuses on teachers’ perspectives of (1) their preferred use of technology, the benefits, concerns and enablers to using technology in parent-school communication, (2) the outcomes of parent-school communication using technology in terms of parental involvement and student learning, and (3) the parent-school communication using technology during COVID-19. The literature search from articles ever printed until September 2021, from databases and manual searches based on inclusion and exclusion criteria, resulted in 32 included studies. Thematic analysis was used to synthesize the results. This review extended the literature by offering valuable insights on synthesized teachers’ perspectives that parent-school communication using technology may be related to parental involvement and student learning outcomes. Key themes were generated which illuminated teachers’ views on their preferred use of technology, benefits, concerns, and enablers to using technology. The key themes also elucidated teachers’ perspectives that parent-school communication using technology kept parents updated, enhanced parental involvement and parent-school relationship, extended school agenda to homes, increased parents’ virtual classroom participation, made students’ learning visible, mostly enhanced students’ learning, and increased parent-school communication during COVID-19. This finding has important practical implications because teachers are typically the initiators of parent-school partnerships. The synthesized teachers’ perspectives in this review can prevent parent-teacher misunderstandings including during pandemics, which may occur due to misalignments in how technology in parent-school communication is used and perceived.<br></p>