Parents appraise schools: A study of counter-narratives

•Parents use counter-narratives to impact their children's literate trajectories.•We identified five kinds of counter-narratives and associated discourse practices.•Counter-narratives are diverse in their form and function.

We examine the counter-narratives parents tell about their children's literacy development and their involvement with schools. Situated in the contested terrain of parental involvement, we ask: When parents tell counter-narratives, what structure and topic do they take? We conducted interviews with thirty-one parents whose children struggled with reading or writing. Drawing on the tools of narrative analysis and critical discourse analysis, we identified five different kinds of counter-narratives. The counter-narratives are diverse in thematic focus and grammatical structure. They vary in how they couple critique with action, alternate vision, acceptance or an emerging counter-narrative. We define each type of counter-narrative, give a representative example and identify the discursive features associated with each type. In the discussion we present an expanded notion of counter-narratives that foregrounds the epistemic privilege of parents.