5 Ideas To Bring Parents Into The Learning Process
by George Couros • • 0 Comments]
 |
| cc licensed ( BY SA ) flickr photo shared by Spiro Bolos |
“The role of parents in the education of their children cannot be overestimated.” ~Unknown
When you ask parents from any country in the world, what they ask their children at the end of the day about school, their question is very similar:
“What did you learn today?”
The disconcerting thing is that the answer is almost always exactly the same.
“Nothing.”
Parents are a great untapped resource in our schools, and social media gives us an opportunity to engage them in their child’s classroom in a way that we never were able to before. The traditional modes of communication are still vital in the way we connect with parents. I am a firm believer in the importance of calling parents to share good news and hearing a voice is the only way that bad news is delivered. I strongly suggest that an educator never deliver any bad news about a child over email. Although I do not have children of my own, I remember my secretary distinctly saying to me, “When you call a parent to deliver some bad news about their child, you are about to destroy their world. Make sure that you let them know the positives and that you still care about their kid.” That advice has always stuck with me.
With all of that being said, I think that there is a larger role that we can ask parents to play in the learning of their child. In my view, if a parent reinforces the learning of the school, at home, the child is more likely to be successful.
Here are some ways that we can build strong connections with the parents in our school communities:
1. Use what the kids use - Often times, when communicating home with parents, we have created special platforms or have put a lot of money in developing a website to ensure that we constantly “branding” our school. Yet this type of communication is all surface with little depth. If we can connect using mediums (blogs, YouTube, Twitter, etc.) that our students use, not only are we building an understanding and instructional leadership within our schools, but we are familiarizing our parents with many of the tools that their children will be using. The first time a parent uses a blog, should not be from their child, but from adults in the school. This shows that we are not just “throwing” kids online, but we are building our own understanding as well.2. Have an open mind - I cannot count the number of times I have heard from teachers or administrators that “the parents will never go for this”, when talking about the changing landscape in schools. My question is, “Have you asked them?”I fell prey to this assumption before. After a session with a group of parents, one of the parents had her hand raised and looked annoyed with what I had just presented. Preparing myself for the pushback I was used to receiving, she said to me, “Why are