1. Parents, Family & Community
By:
Kristine Welper, Sammy Schell, Tami Jahnke & Caitlin Hacker

2. “It takes a whole village to raise a child”

3. Three General Types of Parents
Parents who love you
Tutoring
Supplies
Volunteering
Chaperoning
Parents who you will never see
See signatures once and awhile
No relationship with them
Will have to beg for a conference
Parents of children who do no wrong
Defend children to the end
Undermine your authority by your age, experience or stories child has told
Love to get last word-may be unkind
Don’t take personally

4. Importance of Involving Parents
Parent teacher interaction is the contributing factor to a child's success in school
Child, teacher, parents will all have shared understanding of goals
Parents and teachers usually have the same end goal in mind. This helps parents become better parents and teachers more successful
Let parents know how their child is-helps parents be more responsive to those areas their child needs work
Involving parents increases the likelihood that they will remain engaged in children’s education
Assist parents to create healthy homes that support their child’s physical, emotional and cognitive development.
One shared goal-to give all children opportunities to pursue their dreams and to achieve success—this relationship impacts children's affective functioning, leading to positive self-image, a productive orientation to social relations and to positive attitudes about a school

5. Involving Parents continued
Enhances children’s cognitive development
Improve behavior
Boost academic achievement
Increase language and problem-solving skills
Decreases changes that children will be referred into special education classes
Parents can increase their knowledge of child development
Be informed about appropriate approaches to guidance
Trusting relationship built between parent and teacher-parents will be confident dropping child off at school

6. Ways to Involve Parents
If parents feel invitation for involvement is sincere they will be more involved
Be available to all families
Show interest, respect and caring for each child
Short notes home
Journals between parents and teachers
Bulletin boards
Telephone conversations
Web sites
Newsletters
Open houses
Regular scheduled individual conferences
Home visits-Know students family background
Short notes home-about class trips, homework, children special accomplishments
Open houses-describe child's daily schedule, arrange materials as children would use them, know how children spend their days
Conferences-help families understand how their child is developing and what he/she is learning, talk about specific goals
Home visits-extremely valuable way to learn more about children: teachers are seen as they care enough bout child to visit their home, family members likely more comfortable in their own home,

7. More Ways to Involve Parents and Families
Parent education
How to parent
How to help with learning at home
School-to-home communication
Notices
Bulletin Boards
Report cards
Signs posted
Volunteer opportunities
Be specific on ways families can volunteer
School decision making
Ask parents for advice about school decisions that will affect their children
School-wide events
Parent night
Open house

8. Tips for Working with Parents
Always begin conversations with positive comments
Don’t insult parenting
Use several forms of communication
Balance
Constant contact
Document all parent contacts
Be a professional when talking with parents
Positive-no matter how difficult the child is-should be able to find one good thing to saw, once you made positive comment-lead to real reason for disscussion
insult-assume parents are doing their best-offer suggestions by saying, “I had another student who was having this same problem, and his mother found that by____ he became more successful”
Several forms-calls, letters etc. find one that works best for you and stick with it
Balance-try to make at least as many positive as negative comments with parents
Constant contact-send letter home every two weeks, have children get notes signed,
Document-if a problem becomes critical and an administer asks if you contacted parents, you can show you did
Be professional- no negative talk about school, students, teachers, no gossiping or using profanity

9. Families
Family-Centered Programs: Programs that focus on meeting the needs of students and their families.
Family-Centered Teaching: Instruction that focuses on the needs of students through the family unit, whatever that unit may be, and is designed to help both generations while strengthening the family unit.

11. Families Teachers, Pre-K-12 Outcomes/Benefits Parent/family education
Literacy programs
Counseling programs
Referrals to community agencies
Assistance with problems of daily living
Programs designed for specific purposes (i.e. how to help with homework)
Increase knowledge, skills, and understanding of education process
Help families and children address and solve problems
Increase student achievement
Promote school retention and prevent dropout
Provide greater range of resources and more experts that schools alone can provide
Relieve families and children/youth of stress to make learning more possible

12. Importance of Involving Community
Stakeholders
Provide resources for educators
Provide services for low- income families
Discussion Questions: How was your community involved in your school and vice versa? How would you get your community involved in your classroom and vice versa?

13. How to: Involve Community
Advisory boards or board of director positions
Fund-raising
Professionals Day
Voluntary Community Service
Display student work in community
Develop school-community partnerships

14. Setbacks
&
Barriers
4:00 min.

15. Barriers & Setbacks Language Cultural values, morals, traditions
Don’t understand school system
Different opinions of education
Time and financial constraints
Feel uncomfortable
Confused about options, lack of information

16. Mock Home Visits

17. Resources
Decker, C. A., Decker, J. R., Freeman, N., & Knopf, H. (2008). Planning and Administering Early Childhood Programs (9th Edition) (9 ed.). Alexandria, VA: Prentice Hall.
Jaruis, S., Algozzine, B. (2006). Everything I need to know about Teaching…They forgot to tell me.
Morrison, G.S. (2009). Teaching America. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.
Saracho, O.N. (2007). Hispanic families as facilitators of their children’s literacy development. Journal of Hispanic Higher Education, [Vol. 6, Num. 2]
Trumbull, E. & Pacheco, M. (2005). The teachers’ guide diversity: Building a knowledge base.
Wherry, J.H. (2010). The barriers to parental involvement- and what can be done: A research analysis. The Parent Institute. Retrieved from