Parent Interviews

Parent Interview Timeline

We conducted parent interviews on this project at three timepoints:

During the winter of 2014-2015 (when most students were in 6th grade).
During the fall of 2015 (when most students were in 7th grade).
During the fall of 2018 (when most students were in 10th grade).

Information about each of these interview timepoints is presented below.

6th Grade Parent Interview Description (School Year 2014-2015)

Purpose:

As part of the Early Math Study, parents of each participating child were asked to complete questionnaires in the fall and spring of students’ pre-k year. Questions were taken from the 2003 Treatment and Research Institute for Autism Spectrum Disorders (TRIAD) Parent Questionnaire.

Fall Questionnaire: This first questionnaire contained items grouped into:
- Skills and Home Environment: Questions involved the child’s math skills, computer games played at home, TV watched (type and amount), and children’s books in the home.
- Family Activities: Parents were asked how often family members interact with the child of interest for a variety of activities including telling stories, singing songs, reading books, counting objects, doing math activities, playing with electronic toys, etc.
- Demographics: We asked parents how many children lived in the household, what their highest level of education was, what type of work they did, what their average income was, how much their child weighed at birth, etc.
Spring Questionnaire: The second questionnaire was much briefer and only asked questions about the child’s school experiences. We asked how often the teacher sent home math activities, how prepared those activities made the parent feel to teach their child math, how well the child was doing in math at school, and how late/absent the child was in the last month.

As a follow-up to the work done on the Early Math Study, parents were asked to participate in a 12-item phone interview during the winter of 2014-2015, when most students were in 6th grade.

Creating the Protocol and Training Staff:

For the 6th grade parent interview, staff adapted questions from the National Household Education Survey (2014). The interview was 12 questions long and asked questions about household (e.g., how many adults live in the home, mother’s education level), homework (e.g., how often the child receives help with math homework), parent relationships (e.g., how well informed parent is about what child is being taught in math), and parent perceptions (e.g., how well parent did in math, how important parent believes math is for child’s future).

One day of training/practice was provided to staff. Training focused on understanding the questions, following the script, probing for responses, using the associated technology, and building rapport with parents.

Interviews were completed via telephone and were primarily conducted with parents in English. However, we had a bilingual staff member complete interviews in Spanish with Spanish-speaking parents.

During the call, data were recorded in real time by project staff in a custom built FileMaker database that had built-in checks to alert data collectors if any questions were skipped.

Parents were compensated for their participation.

Parent Data:

Of the 519 students in the official Math Follow-Up Study sample, we were able to conduct parent interviews with 93% (N=485).

7th Grade Parent Interview Description (School Year 2015-2016)

Purpose:

As part of our annual check-in with parents of participating students, we again asked parents to complete a short phone interview in the fall/winter of 2015, when most students were in 7th grade. The focus of this call was to learn more about the school history of participating students’ parents.

Creating the Protocol and Training Staff:

During this short phone call, data collectors asked for the school history information of the participating child’s primary caregiver. Sample questions include “Did you go to elementary school in Tennessee?” If yes, (1) “What was the name of your elementary school?” and (2) “What was the name of the city where you attended elementary school?”

Interviews were completed via telephone and were primarily conducted with parents in English. However, we had a bilingual staff member complete interviews in Spanish with Spanish-speaking parents.

During the call, data were recorded in real time by project staff in a custom built FileMaker database that had built-in checks to alert data collectors if any questions were skipped.

Parents were compensated for their participation.

Parent Data:

Of the 519 students in the official Math Follow-Up Study sample, we were able to conduct parent interviews with 90% (N=469).

10th Grade Parent Interview Description (School Year 2018-2019)

Purpose:

As a follow-up to the 6th grade parent interview, we conducted an additional phone interview in the fall/winter of 2018, when most participants were in 10th grade.

Creating the Protocol and Training Staff:

Questions in the 10th grade parent interview were designed to build off of the 6th grade parent interview. For that reason, the content of this interview was largely the same. In addition to the questions that were carried over from the 6th grade interviews, we added additional questions to the 10th grade interviews about:

The student’s household (e.g., included new questions about the current occupation of the primary male and primary female caregiver)
An updated measure of household income
Science (Note: The science questions mirrored the questions which were asked about math)

Interviews were completed via telephone and were primarily conducted with parents in English. However, we had a bilingual staff member complete interviews in Spanish with Spanish-speaking parents.

During the call, data were recorded in real time by project staff in a custom built FileMaker database that had built-in checks to alert data collectors if any questions were skipped.

Parents were compensated for their participation.

Parent Data:

Of the 519 students in the official Math Follow-Up Study sample, we were able to conduct parent interviews with 79% (N=411).