My School is like a Home: Using Metaphors to Assess Students' Attitudes toward Parenting,Teaching,and Schools

Abstract

This study explored the metaphors 186 students used and the relations these metaphors have to scores on an attitude inventory of parenting, teaching, and schools. Analyses suggested relations among the descriptions used to define parents, teachers, and schools. Generally, when students characterized parents using positive terms, a positive view of teachers was given as well. Likewise, when negative statements were given for parenting, this negativity also was seen in similes used to describe teachers and schools. Responses to the metaphors were predictive of students' ratings on the attitude inventory, suggesting that assessment of metaphors by practitioners might be an effective means of determining students' attitudes about the learning environment. Students' perceptions can have a pronounced effect on performance, therefore, the use of such data could facilitate understanding of the complex interactions of learners with parents, teachers, and schools.