15. Parents Want to Know

15. Parents Want to Know

This we believe (NMSA, 2010).

*The school actively involves families in the education of their children. Family Involvement

Parents are one of our greatest advocates for their children. We must embrace their efforts and communicate with them!

I have been contacting parents since the beginning of school. I was able to contact the parents whose emails I had during weeks 1 and 2, but that was only a small percent of them. This week I had the opportunity to engage with parents three different ways.

Individual communication: About a week ago, I said to a student, "I am thinking I need to call your parent because you don't seem to be doing what you need to do." The response was, "Do you really need to call them?" The answer is, "Yes."

Group communication: Yesterday, I gave my students a progress report that showed what I was missing from them, in case it was stuffed in some crevice of their notebook, or tucked in the classroom folder where all papers live. I was happy to recover some missing files. I told the students that I would be placing all grades in our course management system this weekend which gives parents and students access to information.

Responding to parent contact: In addition, yesterday a parent contacted the guidance office to share that his child was confused and frustrated, asking for a meeting. The parent came to school with their child. We talked about what he was doing and determined that he needed to be moved. (This week he made a 90 on his quiz! Was it the parent meeting? I called the parent to let him know how his son did. He said, "Thank you so much for letting me know.")

This is what we hope for... communication and active pursuit of helping students become successful. We need to help them become more self-reliant. We need to have systems to collect and record data, and we need our parents to be pro-active in letting us know how their children are feeling and what they need.

I think we need to find more ways to communicate with parents. The more parents are part of their child's education (Teaching them how to behave, how to get organized, how to ask for help...) the better the environment is going to be. They are the third link in the team (Children and teachers are the other two links) and need to receive information so they can provide more insight and can reinforce a focus on being successful.

How can we open these lines?

Advice

1) Parents and students need to know how the children are doing. I found a weekly progress report provides parents and students with updates of their behavior as well as their performance. Giving parents and students the opportunity to communicate about performance can be very helpful. I have several students who are now coming to my classroom at the end of the day to get extra help!!! Yahoo!!!

2) Consider creating assignments that involve parents in some way. I first asked students to teach an adult in their family specific content years ago. I found that it gives parents some insight into what their child is learning and allows them to have a conversation related to their academic performance.

3) Contact parents early. If you can get parents' emails, contact them. One of my former students shared that once a week she sent out an update of what was being taught as well as the pages that students were going to be working on. She shared that the parents loved being informed and they were able to contact her regularly via email.

4) Even if an unpleasant telephone call must be made, always remember that the focus on the conversation is to help the student be successful. When there have been conversations to check on a student, always consider giving an update to the parent.... (I spent yesterday morning re-contacting parents.) It is a good practice.

5) Finally, go to ball games. I am finding that my students' parents attend ball games. It is a perfect place to give an update, brag on their student, and give them a heads-up on what is happening next! Just today I was taking money at the ball game and met several parents of students I teach. It was fun to share with parents how much I enjoy working with their child.