Examining the Effects of Parent Engagement on Early Childhood Development in Migrant-Seasonal Head Start

Several factors impact developmental outcomes in early childhood with implications that may last throughout the lifespan. Studies indicate that across most populations, parental engagement has a significant impact on relative success in early childhood development, such as higher literacy and language scores and socio-emotional skills. Identifying specific positive influences on early childhood development for caretakers to integrate in both the home and in the classroom is essential to creating policies and standards that support the healthy development of children. Knowledge concerning minority groups in this area remains particularly limited. This study investigated the influence of parental engagement on specific areas of development in children enrolled in a migrant-seasonal Head Start program. The hypothesis investigated conjectured a stronger positive correlation in Seasonal families than in migrant with a higher frequency of parent engagement being associated with higher benchmark scores. A binary logistic regression model was used to compare the level of documented parent engagement with the two family types’ composite engagement and benchmark achievement across five areas measured in Head Start: cognitive, social-emotional, physical, language and literacy, and mathematics. Findings are expected to enhance the migrant-seasonal program’s understanding of the parent-child relationship in two uniquely vulnerable minority groups, and to indicate that parent engagement is a critical component in healthy early childhood development, prompting further questions about the differences in lifestyle that may influence the relationship studied in this project.