Effective teachers recognize the essential role of parents in the lives of students and actively seek and implement ways to reach out to them. We know that parents are the most influential adults in our students’ lives and recognize that the frequency of communication between students and parents about school matters plays a major role in determining whether a child stays or drops out of school. Students who are most likely to drop out are those whose parents never talk about school affairs.
The important role of parents in the lives of students can be shown in several ways. For instance, when parents approve of their children’s school, chances are, the youngsters are more likely to receive approval and encouragement for a job well done. Parents can also give an invaluable assistance to teachers by helping their children in their projects and homeworks. In a limited number of cases, the system of reward and reprimand in school is not enough to bring about desirable changes in students. Parents may be asked to involve themselves in developing an effective reformative plan for their children.
Communication between teachers and parents need not be a stressful and emotionally draining encounter. Positive contact can be achieved through simple yet inspired ways.
ESTABLISHING EARLY CONTACT TO PARENTS- Teachers should establish a cordial relationship with students’ parents from the very start of the classes. Just like their children, parents may also feel anxious and apprehensive about the prospect of meeting the “new teacher”. Introducing them to the curriculum and letting them get a glimpse of a teacher’s classroom management style can significantly help build parent-teacher rapport. This positive initial interaction sets the right mood between the two parties and is a happy deviation from the usual reason for the parent-teacher meeting— a child’s negative behavior.
PROMOTE TEACHER-PARENT COMMUNICATION – All parents want their children to perform well in school and succeed in their studies. Most of them would like to be kept posted on their children’s academic progress and their performance in individual subjects. Concerned teachers make an effort to inform parents when a child starts to lag behind the rest of the class lose interest in discussions, fail to turn in their homework, or worse, act up in front of everyone and skip classes. It is not surprising for parents to get annoyed when they find out that their children have been performing poorly in school. They customarily feel that a crisis could have been prevented if they were informed beforehand of their children’s performance.
Phone home, this is one of the most efficient ways to communicate to parents. Calling may serve as a warm gesture that does not necessitate visual encounter. Parent’s school visitation is another method of calling parents’ attention. A talk between teacher and parents is an intimate gesture and can make them solve the student’s misbehavior. Children get worried when they knew that their parents would visit school, therefore, they would do well in class. Home visitation, there are parents who are not available of visiting school. In this way, the teacher may show her full concern for the student. Even the critical parents, however, would appreciate the teacher’s effort of making a home visitation. Another easiest way of parent-teacher communication is through Messenger. Every millennial class (section) has the GC or group chat. Let every parents involve or add themselves in the GC so that they would be informed about the activities, assignments and performances of their children. The teacher should update the parents from time to time, post the important announcements for the students and send all the concerns about the students. It would be good to start and end the conversation with a positive note. Like the students, parents respond most favorably when given a sense of competence and power.
How the teacher plans to deal with the child’s problem should be laid out to the parents concerned. After all, it is their child’s well-being that is at stake so that parents have every right to know the courses of action the teacher, students and parents must follow to resolve the problem. Hostile parents can even become the most avid supporters if they will be involved in the process of helping out their child. Parents and family are vital factor in children’s education, particularly for those who are at risk. The influence and support given by the family may directly affect the behavior of children in school, their grades, and the probability that they will finish high school.
By: Maria Cristina E. Bautista |Teacher I- English |Bataan National High School|Balanga, Bataan
