#29 Parental Involvement by Kimberley K. Cuero

Essential Questions:

• Why is parental involvement an important component in teaching?
• How can we create an inviting, accessible atmosphere with our students' parents?
• How can we build and maintain a strong foundation with our students' parents?
• How can we encourage active participation and volunteerism among our students' parents?
• How can we keep our students' parents informed?

Topics to be presented:

We will discuss the above essential questions about parental involvement. Following are the 3 major focus areas and some examples:

1. Building a strong foundation--Make the initial contact with parents positive
   1. Home visits, phone calls, and/or letters to families at the beginning of the school year introducing yourself and enlisting the parents' expertise about their children
   2. Once school begins, either call or send a note about a good behavior or keen observation. This will help in forging a constructive, trusting relationship with parents. This relationship will be invaluable especially if and when the time comes to inform parents of a negative aspect of their child's behavior or progress.
2. Encouraging active participation and volunteerism
   1. Encourage participation at school and/or class events, such as Back-to-School Night.
   2. Have simple projects for parents to do like cutting out, putting together packets of material, stuffing folders, displaying work, etc.
   3. Enlist parents to accompany class on field trips or during special programs. Give them plenty of advanced notice so they can notify their work.
3. Keeping parents informed
   1. Develop a newsletter that includes special events, topics of study, etc.
   2. Create a phone tree or recruit phone captains to inform of special events or meetings.
   3. Take advantage of parent conference days to discuss not only student behavior and progress but also other issues of school and community interest.

We will form three groups. The groups may choose how they present to the class (e.g., role-play a parent-teacher interaction, present written information, present other practical ideas pertaining to their category). One group will work on "Building a Strong Foundation." The second group will have "Encouraging active participation and volunteerism." The third will have "Keeping parents informed." After the groups present, we will conclude by having each person name two things that they will try to implement during their first year of teaching.

Assessment Procedures

The students will anonymously evaluate each group member's performance using a form that looks like this:

Write the names of the people in your group including yourself. Rate each group member on a scale of 0-3 (three being the best) in the following categories:

Names	Participation	Motivation	Attitude