Keeping the Parents outside the School Gate—A Critical Review

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The article “Keeping the Parents outside the School Gate – A Critical Review” addresses a relevant topic: parental engagement in children education. In this sense, I congratulate the authors. Nonetheless, I consider that there is a need to improve the paper in some aspects. 

Besides the relevance of the topic, one of the strongest aspects of this paper is the debate around parent’s involvement and parent’s engagement, as well as the importance, highlighted by the authors, of bringing parents, qualified teachers and pedagogical experts to work alongside. Also, the way authors organize the results by themes – “The evidence from the students’ perspective”, “The evidence from the parents’ perspective” and “The evidence from the schools’ perspective” – seems very interesting. References are up-to-date. However, I have some concerns regarding methodological aspects.

This paper aims to be a review paper focusing “on the British mainstream, state educational system” (p.1). Authors highlight the diversity of the UK schooling system, opting to “focus on comprehensive schools in the UK, to which the majority of today’s children go; hence, publicly funded mainstream schools which take on a wide range of pupils” (p.1). To accomplish this, authors aim to “to refresh the discourse about parents’ engagement with children’s learning, and to challenge the existing design of the mainstream western schooling system in which parents are not considered an integral part of students’ learning experience […] we bring a non-systematic critical overview of the topic's current state of understanding. We do that in an attempt to re-evaluate the existing evidence in light of two major recent developments that, we believe, are dramatically challenging the design principles of our education systems and provide opportunities for radical changes in schooling systems“ (p.3). Taking this into account, I have some suggestions:

-        Although authors refer that this paper is a non-systematic critical overview it would enrich the paper to have information on how the authors selected the literature that is mentioned. For example, what were the databases used? What was the criteria for selection? Information about methodological aspects is vital.

-        “This perspective originates in the work of Vygotsky [15] who considered social interactions with able adults and parents” (p.4), it would be important to have a definition on what "able adults and parents” means.

-        The authors refer they “attempt to re-evaluate the existing evidence in light of two major recent developments”, however these two major developments are not made clear until chapter 2 - Reality check: Rethinking this design choice. The authors could write one sentence explaining which developments are these.

-        It is crucial that schools and families work alongside, as partners, in order to better promote children's development and learning. However, sentences such as “At home reside those people who understand where the children are coming from, what they have gone through, whether they slept tight at night, and whether they had a nutritious breakfast in the morning” (p.12) may be a dangerous generalisation, as not all families and/or parents are a support to their children.

-        In the concluding remarks, the authors also refer that “Unfortunately, the vast majority of mainstream schools, in particular in the UK today, which is the focus of this paper, are at best, investing in ‘parental involvement’ rather than in a partnership” (p.12). How can you prove this statement? Once again, information on how the literature was selected and a better correlation between those studies and results and what happen in schools in the UK is crucial.

In conclusion, I recommend the publication of this article after major revision.

Author Response

Please see our response to all the reviewers in the attached file.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

I liked the research topic and enjoyed it while I read it. Overall, the manuscript is well structured and its integrity is perfect. Only, I criticized the authors about the method section because I couldn't see the section. They can check other opinions about your manuscript below. 

There are many sentences that do not have any citations in the Introduction. This is not suitable for scientific rules.

"Many aspects of the British modern schooling systems have been criticized over the 47 years" Who does criticize? You should use references for these opinions. 

I could not see the method section. You should explain how to collect your data and where you access the data. Those are important details. 

Concluding remarks contain proper suggestions and ideas for future applications. Congratulations! 

Author Response

Please see our response to all the reviewers in the attached file.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

1. It is need more clarity in relation to the articles analyzed. What is the focus of them? What are the  research objectives? The concept (row 222) it is to generalized.

2. The age criterion of parents and children is important. There are many scientific articles  that talks about their different implications, especially from the perspective of the necessary support (different ages-different needs). Global comparisons must be nuanced on this criteria.

3. What are the final recommendation? What are the research originality?

Author Response

Please see our response to all the reviewers in the attached file.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors have taken into consideration all the comments and suggestions provided which have improved the quality of the manuscript. Congratulations.