parents &apos; expectations of the junior school . F Musgrove . purpose and scope of the survey . in May and June 1960 a survey was made of attitudes to and expectations of the school among parents of children in the last two years of two junior schools in a midland city . children of this age ( 10 and 11 years ) were chosen on the assumption that parental interest and curiosity would be at their height , and views on education most fully developed , in this period immediately preceding secondary selection . one junior school ( A ) is situated on a large municipal housing estate of subsidised houses ; the children in the top two years numbered 310 . the school has a progressive headmaster ; teaching and school organisation are informal and there is no excessive concentration on the three R&apos;s . the other junior school is smaller and there were 104 children in the last two years . it serves an expensive residential area of owner-occupied houses . it is a Church of England school favoured by well-to-do Anglican parents of the district . it is far more formal in its teaching and organisation , and places more emphasis on the three R&apos;s , than school A . the two schools were chosen because of the marked social contrast in the areas they serve . a random sample of one in four names was taken from the school registers with a view to interviewing the parents of these children . the homes of 26 children in school B were approached and interviews were carried out in 22 ; the homes of 62 children in school A were approached and interviews were carried out in 50 . an important feature of the survey was the separate interviewing of husbands and wives . on the estate ( area A ) 42 couples were interviewed , five wives whose husbands were either unavailable or refused interview ; and three husbands whose wives were either unavailable or refused interview . thus one or both parents of 50 children ( 22 boys and 28 girls ) were interviewed - 47 mothers and 45 fathers , a total of 92 parents . in the middle-class district ( area B ) 18 couples were interviewed and , in addition , four wives whose husbands were not available . thus one or both parents of 22 children ( 14 boys and 8 girls ) were interviewed : 18 fathers and 22 mothers , a total of 40 parents . altogether 132 parents in the two areas were interviewed , representing 72 children ( 36 boys and 36 girls ) . the parents in area A were predominantly working class : 47 of the 50 children came from homes where the head of household was in the Registrar-General &apos;s occupational classes 3-5 . in area B the parents were predominantly white-collar , professional middle class : 19 of the 22 children were from households where the head was in occupational classes 1 and 2 . the following table gives the percentage distribution of occupational classes in the two groups , in the city ( 1951 census report ) and in the country . the overlap between the two groups within the city is very small . parents in area A were on average younger than parents in area B : the average size of family was larger in area A than in area B : 3.2 and 2.5 children respectively . the author was assisted in the interviewing by 14 local teachers who were known to him for their interest in problems of educational sociology and who had , in a number of cases , previous interviewing experience and training in field work . the team worked throughout under the direction of the author who designed and directed the project . six families were randomly allocated to each member of the team . preliminary meetings were held to discuss the content of the interviewing schedule , to clear up any possible ambiguities in the wording and purpose of each item , and to standardize procedure at the interviews and in the recording of interviewees &apos; responses . all members of the team were clear that they should record as fully as possible all answers that were given and any additional information or opinion that was volunteered : that although some questions might simply be answered yes or no or do n&apos;t know , any elaboration , qualifying comment or reasons given should also be noted . all interviewers were to emphasize to the parents that the interviews were unofficial and that answers were not only entirely confidential but anonymous . a copy of the schedule used in the interviews ( excluding classificatory questions regarding age , number of children , occupation , etc ) will be found in appendix A . the interviews provided evidence of parents &apos; expectations on three scores : ( a ) relating to children &apos;s behaviour , ( b ) relating to academic and scholastic training , and ( c ) relating to the curriculum . parents &apos; expectations of the school in the sphere of behaviour training . emphasis on the responsibility of school or home . parents were asked whether they expected the school to guide their child &apos;s behaviour as well as teach school subjects , and those who answered yes were asked to state what kinds of behaviour they expected the school to encourage . interviewers were asked to make a full recording of elaborations and qualifications to answers to the first part of the question ( 5a ) so that responses could be classified and placed on a five-point scale ranging from strong emphasis on the home &apos;s responsibility at one extreme to strong emphasis on the school &apos;s at the other . the following are the five groups into which all answers were sorted : 1 . answers which gave the school an emphatic responsibility for children &apos;s behaviour , e.g , certainly the school should teach children how to behave - that &apos;s what school &apos;s for ; definitely yes - it &apos;s the school &apos;s job to teach manners , etc . 2 . answers which emphasized the school &apos;s importance but also mentioned the need for parental assistance , e.g , the school is responsible for behaviour to a great extent , but not entirely and the school has a big responsibility , as well as the parents . 3 . answers which stressed the equal partnership between home and school , e.g , fifty-fifty partnership ; home and school should share the responsibility equally ; home and school complementary and school &apos;s job in school hours , parents &apos; job otherwise . 4 . answers which emphasized the home &apos;s responsibility but also mentioned the need for some support from the school , e.g , it &apos;s mainly the parents &apos; responsibility but the school should help and , to some extent - but this is mainly the responsibility of the home and parents . 5 . answers which placed the responsibility for behaviour emphatically on the parents ( requiring of the school no more than that it should not undermine parental influence ) , e.g it is definitely the parents &apos; job to guide behaviour ; definitely no : the school can n&apos;t do everything and should stick to its job , which is teaching subjects ; and teachers should teach - behaviour is the parents &apos; responsibility . the two areas were sharply distinguished in their answers : in area A , 27.7 per cent gave answers which fell into categories 3 , 4 or 5 , whereas 57.5 per cent in area B did so : there was no tendency for parents in either area who stressed the home &apos;s responsibility for behaviour to have fewer children than the average : in area A , 20 parents stressed the home &apos;s responsibility as against the school &apos;s and their average number of children was 3.1 , while the average for the area was 3.2 ; in area B , 23 parents stressed the home and their average number of children was 2.5 , the same as for all the families in the area . there was no tendency for working wives in either area to stress the school &apos;s responsibility more than non-working wives . in area A , 75 per cent of the mothers were in full-time or part-time work , in area B , 14 per cent were at work . twenty-five per cent of the mothers in area A who were not at work ( 4 out of 12 ) stressed the home &apos;s responsibility ( categories 3 , 4 or 5 ) , but so did 22.8 per cent ( 8 out of 35 ) of mothers who went out to work . in area B , all three working mothers stressed the responsibility of the home as against the school , and 58 per cent ( 11 out of 19 ) of the non-working mothers . the difference in expectations between the two areas reflects their different social class composition . when the same social levels in the two areas are compared the differences disappear . in order to obtain social groups large enough for comparison , occupational classes 1 and 2 are combined to form the middle class and occupational classes 3 , 4 and 5 to form the working class . in area A , three out of five middle-class parents placed emphasis on the home , in area B , 22 out of 34 . there was no significant difference between the two areas within the middle class . on the estate , 17 working-class parents emphasized the home and 70 emphasized the school ; in the contrasted area one working-class parent emphasized the home , and five the school . there was no significant difference between the two areas within the working class . on the other hand , there was a highly significant difference between the two areas when social class was not held constant . on the estate , 20 parents emphasized the home and 72 the school , in area B , 23 emphasized the home and 17 the school . although in working-class area A a far higher proportion of parents than in middle-class area B emphasized the school &apos;s responsibility for behaviour-training , a far higher proportion claimed explicitly to direct or influence their children &apos;s behaviour in three main directions : towards their teachers , towards their friends , and in their choice of friends and associates : claims to give explicit direction and guidance on behaviour were significantly greater in working-class area A than in middle-class area B : in the former area 188 claims ( out of a possible 276 ) were made on three criteria ; in the latter only 53 ( out of a possible 120 ) . the difference between the areas is significant at the 0.001 level . the reasons for this marked difference between the areas was apparent in the answers given by the respondents : parents in the middle-class area were sufficiently confident of their children &apos;s behaviour that they felt no need to instruct them on their relationship with teachers and friends , and they felt sufficient confidence in the social composition of the school and the locality that they saw no need to guide their children in the choice of friends . this was clear from many of the answers given to questions 7a and 7c . the interviewees were not asked why they did or did not advise their children about whom to play with or whom to avoid : the question could be answered simply yes or no , yet one-third of the parents who said that they did not tell their children how to behave with other children volunteered the explanation that this was unnecessary and a similar proportion of those who said they never told their children not to play with certain other children elaborated their answer by saying there was no need to do so in this school and/or district : no : the children at this school are nice children and no : it is unnecessary around here . the marked difference , then , between directing and non-directing parents is a function of area and not of social class . the greater tendency among parents of area A to direct behaviour reflects their lack of confidence in the social contacts available to their children . behaviour which the school should encourage . the greater emphasis in working-class area A on the school &apos;s responsibility for behaviour-training does not necessarily reflect a lack of concern for parental duties : the school is often given the job of directing behaviour because , it is felt , only the school can do this effectively . the reason often volunteered for assigning so much responsibility to the school was that the children would take more notice of teachers than of parents . the anxiety over children &apos;s disobedience towards parents is reflected in answers to the question : what kinds of behaviour do you expect the school to encourage in your child ? parents who expected the school to guide behaviour were asked to particularize . out of the 77 parents in area A who gave such particulars of the attitudes , virtues , and qualities of personality which they wished the school to develop , 70 per cent showed a concern for various forms of unruly or anti-social behaviour . 