Determinants of Paternal Involvement in Pupils’ Education and Academic Achievement among Primary School Pupils in Nairobi County, Kenya

Abstract

Many studies have been done on the importance of parental involvement in children’s education, yet few studies have examined the individual contribution that fathers and mothers make to their children’s academic achievement. Fathers’ role in children’s education is of a great deal of interest to many people. This interest comes from the fact that traditionally in Africa, fathers were the hidden parents. They were taught to be breadwinners of their families but of limited importance in non-financial aspects of children’s development. The purpose of this study was to investigate; the relationship between paternal involvement in children’s education and pupils’ academic achievement. The study was guided by Parental Involvement Model by Palkovitz (1997), Role Identity Theory by Stryker (1987) and Cognitive Development Theory by Piaget (1970).The research design of this study was ex post facto. The study was carried out in Nairobi County because of its diversity of the population in general and its metropolitan nature. One school was selected from each of the four districts through simple random sampling. Forty standard six pupils were purposively sampled from each selected school due to their performance from the teachers’ assessment record. This gave rise to a sample size of 160 pupils. Fathers of the selected children were automatically part of the sample, giving a total of 320 participants in the study. Data were collected through a questionnaire which each participant filled concerning paternal involvement. Pilot study was carried to establish content validity and reliability. Reliability was established using Cronbach’s alpha coefficient and both likert scales used had reliability of above 0.7. The Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) was utilized to prepare and organize data for analysis and to test for significance. Descriptive statistics and inferential statistics were used to analyze data. The results showed that there was a relationship between paternal involvement and pupils’ academic achievement. Pearson Correlation had revealed that there was a relationship between fathers’ involvement in pupils’ education and pupils’ academic achievement. The t-test revealed that there was no significant mean difference in the average scores of fathers’ involvement in the education of boys and girls. ANOVA revealed that paternal involvement in pupils’ education did not differ significantly by levels of education of the fathers. The results from (ANOVA) also revealed that paternal involvement in pupils’ education did not differ significantly by the occupation of the fathers. Fathers were involved in activities like paying school fees, buying books and checking whether the children completed their homework. However, fathers were found to leave some duties like attending meetings and talking to teachers to their wives. It was concluded that fathers’ involvement in their children’s education influence their children’s performance. It was recommended that there was need for school managers to encourage fathers to closely monitor and participate in their children’s education