Developing positive relationships with parents

Schools have many ways of communicating with parents thanks to social media and applications designed to engage parents with their child’s learning, think Facebook, Class Dojo, See Saw and Edmodo. These applications do a great job of keeping parents informed about how their child is going with learning and providing an insight into their child’s classroom.

Communicating positive behaviours

For the most part teachers and schools communicate with individual families for two reasons:

  1. Unacceptable behaviour
  2. Sharing information about learning (positive and negative).

What is communicated less (for some students never) is when students demonstrate positive behaviours. Things like showing initiative, communicating well, being a good friend, helping others and demonstrating leadership etc. While parents enjoy and appreciate being able to see and hear what their child is learning they appreciate even more feedback about their child’s positive behaviours (being a good ‘human being’).

Schools and teachers are required to report about learning and we have to communicate when poor behaviour reaches a certain level. What we don’t have to report to parents is when their child behaves in a positive way or does something out of the ordinary to help others. Yet it is often this feedback that makes a parent most proud and can help mend or build relationships between the school and families whose only connection with the school may be because their child is always in trouble.

Below is a real example of a message home and the resulting message back to the teacher from the parent. The positive conversations generated by this message at home and the resulting perception of the school/teacher noticing their child in a positive light can only result in a strengthened relationship between the school and family.

 

It is not possible to continually communicate with parents but when we have the chance we should try to take it. Especially with those students who often don’t display the best behaviour. Try to catch them doing something good and let their parents know it could help you and the school in the long run.

Connecting with Parents at PBAS

There are significant benefits to communicating a child’s learning to parents outside of the traditional term report, take home book and parent teacher interview. This post looks at two ways to engage parents and caregivers beyond the traditional structures schools put in place to connect student learning with home.

The following are benefits resulting from increasing parent involvement in a child’s learning:

  • Children tend to achieve more, regardless of ethnic or racial background, socioeconomic status, or parents’ education level.
  • Children generally achieve better grades, test scores, and attendance.
  • Parents have a better understanding of the teacher’s job and school curriculum.
  • Parents’ perceptions of the school are improved and there are stronger ties and commitment to the school.
  • When schools have a high percentage of involved parents, teachers and principals are more likely to experience higher morale.
  • Teachers and principals report an increase in job satisfaction.
  • Schools that actively involve parents and the community tend to establish better reputations in the community.

To see another 16 reasons why engaging parents with their child’s learning is important click on the following link: Excerpt from Home-School Relations: Working Successfully with Parents and Families, by G. Olsen, M.L. Fuller, 2008 edition, p. 129-130.

The following two communication methods are practical examples of how classroom teachers can connect with parents. Both methods have been successfully used this year by Kelly and Ange.

Kelly uses the Seesaw app  (available on Apple and Android devices) which allows moments in time to be captured via image or video along with student or teacher comments and made available instantly to the parent of that child. If time does not allow for sharing instantly then video, images and comments can be uploaded later at a more convenient time. It allows Kelly to create portfolios of work for each child with control over what is posted, who can see it and when it is posted. These portfolios can be divided into subject folders.

The benefits that Kelly has found by using Seesaw over traditional take home books include:

  • The ease at which information can be sent home.
  • An instant connection with parents. Parents will often comment on their child’s work the same day it is sent.
  • It provides parents with a more regular up date of their child’s progress as opposed to a take home book that only goes home at the end of each term.
  • The regular nature of sharing student learning allows parents to have better informed conversations around their child’s learning at home.
  • Seesaw allows video to be used which is much more powerful (at times) than static work samples or images found in a take home book.
  • Kelly no longer has to store and keep track of a take home book for each child.
  • Kelly no longer has to spend time cutting and gluing work samples into a take home book.
  • NIT teachers for Kelly’s class can be connected to the account and add to student portfolios.

 

On Thursday of week 10, term 3 Ange invited parents in for the last lesson of the day to have her students show parents some of their learning. This began by showing parents Mindset videos students had made around the topic of maths. This was very powerful as not only was it reinforcing the importance of mindset to students but it was educating parents at the same time. This means that a certain level of consistency has been created between what students are learning and what parents understand to be happening in the classroom. Students then took parents out into the wet area and demonstrated their coding skills with the Bee Bots. The students final task was to show their parents two Keynote presentations which had been made on the iPads. Students had to go through their presentations explaining the content they had created. One presentation was on spiders and the other on a country of the students choice.

Ange’s classroom was packed with parents and caregivers all keen to see what their child had been doing. Every child had an adult attend.

Having had conversations with the parents and teachers involved in these communications methods it is clear there has been some significant upside including improved parent understanding of the curriculum and the teacher’s role, improved parent perception of the school, improved parental engagement in student learning and a sense of job satisfaction felt by the teacher.

A real life problem solving approach to maths for parents – Ann Baker

The teaching of maths looks at lot different for students than it did for their parents. How do we get parents to understand new teaching methodologies in maths? Maybe the following video is a starting point. Sharing the following video with parents might be one way to bring parents closer to understanding the Natural Maths approach to teaching maths.

If you are nterested in more information, resources and videos on Natural Maths then go to the naturalmaths website.

Natural Maths is the publishing and education consulting business of Ann Baker and Johnny Baker.”

“We both have a background in University research as well as practical classroom teaching so it is appropriate that our goal for Natural Maths is to “bridge the gap between research and practice” in maths education.” 

Communicating with parents

Communicating with parents is an important part of teaching. When students don’t complete homework, miss due dates or are not using class time effectively we will usually approach parents to inform them and discuss solutions. Often we do this after the problem has occurred. Implementing effective regular communication processes with parents may help avoid or minimise these problems.

The benefits of communicating regularly with parents are:

  • It allows for parents, students and teachers to be on the same page. Students will struggle with the, “I have no homework” statement when parents know what has been set for homework or when the next due date is coming up. Making expectations clear to parents is a way of avoiding potential future conflict between students, parents and teachers.
  • Parents want to know what is happening in their child’s classroom and appreciate the time and effort made to keep them informed.
  • Increased communication is more likely to see the teacher receive support from the parent if an issue arises with their child.

It is up to teachers to implement communication processes that are workable for both the teacher and the parents over the long term. Processes need to be sustainable and work simply and easily once in place.

Examples of traditional methods for communicating with parents include:

  • Notes home in diaries/communication books.
  • Formal letters
  • Phone calls
  • Face to face meetings

Examples of less common methods for communicating with parents include:

  • Emails (email groups)
  • Messaging (create parent group contacts on your phone)
  • Edmodo (teacher creates a class group and invites parents using a code)
  • Twitter (create a class hashtag)
  • Facebook (create a Group and invite parents to join)
  • Blog (use Edublogs to create a class blog)

My belief is that there is a place for all of the above forms of communication and depends entirely on the situation faced by the teacher. Having said that I cannot go past the second list for ease of of use to regularly (daily/weekly) communicate with parents (and students). Most teachers have used the methods on the first list to communicate with parents but these are time consuming and not as efficient for daily or weekly communication.

The four that I think are the most effective for constant regular communication are group emails, group txt messaging, Facebook and blogs.

1. Group email – Collecting everyones email may take some time and effort but once set up is an easy way to communicate important information quickly and easily. Attach images, documents and links.

2. Group txt messaging – Like emails, collecting phone numbers may take a little time and effort (although the school should have almost all parent mobile numbers). Set up a group contact for use at any time (our phones are always with us). This is a bonus as we often think of things we should have reminded students/parents when we are away from our work spaces or a computer.

3. Facebook – Setting up a Facebook Group that is open to all students/parents in your class or maybe a separate group for parents and students is an effective way to communicate. The benefit of Facebook is that most parents use it. Post information regularly about upcoming due dates, events, images, links and documents.

Below is a post and parent reply to my Facebook Group “PBAS HPE 7-10 Course Information”. This group is open to students and parents and currently has 28 members.

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4. Blogs – Set up a blog if you want to give parents a window into your classroom. This is a little more time consuming than Facebook/emails/messaging but can have a big impact on parents perception of you and what you do with their children at school.

Click on the image below to visit my Junior PE blog.

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With any form of communication that allows you to post information about children (blogs) or could considered intrusive by parents (sending txt messages, emails or Facebook Groups) it is important to send an explanation letter allowing parents to consider the pros and cons of the proposed system. They can then give their permission (or not) to be a part of the process. I still see great value in a Facebook or email group even without 100% participation by parents. Those that opt in will reap the benefits as will the teacher.

R-6 Reports Parent Review

Today I met with five parents who sat with me and discussed reporting at PBAS for R-6 students. Here are the slides that we went through as part of our discussion. I have added in the data produced by the discussion so staff can have a look at it. Some of the comments made by the parents are in relation to reporting formats that they viewed today. R-6 staff will get to have a look at these reporting formats in a staff meeting which will help make some of the comments clearer. Primary staff will need to meet early term 3 to discuss this parent feedback and look at developing a new reporting format for PBAS. This new format could end up being a slight modification of our current report or a totally new format altogether.

The source of the slide show below is Slideshare. This site is blocked so the slides don’t show up at school unless you unblock the site first. Requires you to go to Slideshare and unblock and come back to this page and it should work or just view at home.

Parent Review R-6 Reports

I have started to put together a process for discussing R-6 reports with the parent group. I would really like feedback from R-6 staff and leadership. By no means is this a final copy. Any feedback would be appreciated either through the comments or come and see me face to face.

Some formatting lost and writing looks average. This is just due to uploading the power point to Slideshare so please ignore this.

Communicating with Parents

Is this the only time we communicate with parents?

How do we connect parents to our classrooms? It is often difficult to connect parents with their child’s classroom in a consistently meaningful way.  At what level do we share with parents, is it superficial and only really scratching the surface or do we share in a more deep way that educates parents about our programs, our expectations and how they can help their child at home? Do we make ourselves accessible to parents? Can parents easily and regularly view their students work?

Creating positive links with parents is no doubt more work than not. However the potential benefits are high for the teacher, parent and the student.

Students whose parents are connected with school are more likely to get consistent messages from home and school. Parents are more likely to work and talk with their children about school if they know what is happening in the classroom and have suggestions from the teacher about how to help their child. Students are more likely to feel good about school (and their teacher) if their parents are receiving positive communication from their teachers which is in turn fed back to them via their parents. The Keys to Success postcards are a great (and probably underused) tool for this.

Parents who understand the way in which a teacher teaches and the methods they use and the beliefs they have will feel a lot more comfortable helping their own child knowing they are supporting the teacher. Parents who have a clearer picture of what is happening in the classroom are more likely to strike up a conversation about school with their child and their child’s teacher(s). Hopefully well connected parents are less likely to see the school and the teacher in an intimidating light.

Teachers can build up strong positive relationships with parents through sharing all the good work they do. Strong positive relationships are very beneficial when those times arise that are not so positive. Teachers can help to get parents on board with home work expectations, deadlines for assignments and methods of learning that will assist students like letter formation, tips when reading with a child etc….

Below are some links to ideas used by other teachers.

Student-Led Conferences: How they work in my classroom.

Why my 6 year old students have digital portfolios

Using email to communicate with families

My blog sharing Reception, Year 1 and 2 HPE with parents