IN THIS ISSUE
Feature: Dr. Anita Parhar Q&A: Improving Home-School Relations
Teacher's Lounge: Black Hawk Down? The End of Helicopter Parents
Lesson Plan Bank Spotlight: Tools to Get Parents Involved
Michael Josephson Commentary: Shaping Values, Shaping Lives
ON THE SIDE
Announcements
Resource of the Month: What's a Parent to Do?
Training Programs
Donuts in the Lunchroom: The Seven Habits of Happy Kids by Sean Covey
Free Resources For Teachers: Introduce CC! to the Family
CC! in the News: Michael Josephson’s Appearance on NBC's "News Conference"
Did You Know? We May Be Born Helpless, But We Want to Help
Web Poll: Who’s Your Favorite Parent?
Feature
Dr. Anita Parhar Q&A: Improving Home-School Relations
Dr. Anita Parhar is an instructor in the Faculty of Education at the University of British Columbia, an advisor and researcher for a British Columbia school district, and a former public school teacher.
She’s helped develop school-based models to improve home-school relations, facilitated workshops to strengthen parental participation, and presented strategies to support and engage ethnic parents and communities.
We asked her how educators can involve parents more, why schools tend to have a middle-class bias, and what can be done about abusive parents at school sports events.
CHARACTER COUNTS!: Why should families get involved in their children’s school?
Anita Parhar: For over three decades, research has found a correlation between parental involvement in school and children’s improved academic achievement (homework completion, higher test scores, and higher grades) and improved social behavior, improved attitude toward school, improved attendance, increased motivation, and increased interest in pursuing post-secondary education. Getting involved is a vital component to their children’s school success.
CC!: Conversely, how much should schools try to involve parents?
Parhar: They have a responsibility to engage parents about how schools and families together can support learning. Schools have often been criticized for failing to account for the knowledge and interests of all families. Schooling alone is not enough.
CC!: How should schools reach out to dysfunctional, disengaged, distressed, and/or broken families?
Parhar: Historically, schools have supported the interests of middle-class families. Thus, staff who reach out to marginalized families must interrogate their practices in order to place the needs and interests of the marginalized with equal importance on the school agenda. Deficit thinking, labeling, and blaming parents for not having the middle-class knowledge, skills, and attitudes to help their children succeed hinder the ability of staff to connect with such families. Otherwise, these families won’t feel comfortable addressing their experiences and perspectives with school personnel.
CC!: Many schools have no bilingual or Spanish-speakers on staff. How can they reach out to Hispanic communities?
Parhar: If multicultural workers and interpreters are limited, schools can organize a volunteer, school-based, bilingual parent liaison group to help teachers contact Spanish-speaking parents by phone or home visits. And community agencies and Spanish-speaking volunteers could assist the parents at school.
CC!: Many non-English-speaking students are relegated to special-education status because teachers don’t have the time or resources to understand their linguistic difficulties. Whose responsibility is it to ensure these students’ needs are met?
Parhar: Meeting their needs must be a collaborative effort on the part of schools and families. Through district and school resources, teachers can understand English-language learners’ abilities once they enter class. Accurate assessments and anecdotal information are vital to supporting the intellectual and social development of linguistically diverse students in English-language-dominant schools.
CC!: It’s difficult for teachers to meet with families when both parents work. How can schools and teachers better engage working parents?
Parhar: Through telephone conversations, e-mail, and notes. If teachers contact parents at the beginning of the year, they can learn their work schedules, preferred methods of communication, and when they’re available to meet face-to-face.
CC!: At school sports activities, parents are most often the cause of violent incidents and unsportsmanlike behavior. How can schools educate, monitor, and police parental conduct?
Parhar: They must take into account the kind of role modeling parents demonstrate. When parents are inappropriately involved in their children’s sports, they’re sending a message to their children that “sports rage” is okay and that violence is acceptable. It’s our responsibility to establish policies regarding parental behavior and enforce the consequences should violations occur.
CC!: It’s frustrating when parents just don’t seem to care about their kids’ education. How can we get disinterested families to become more active at home and at school?
Parhar: Misconceptions and misunderstandings between school staff and families are often based on assumptions made of each other. Part of building a collaborative approach is for school staff and parents to understand each others’ role. Schools need to find out what parents understand their role to be, and parents need to learn what schools understand their role to be. Once teachers know what activities parents engage in with their children at home, they’re better able to suggest how parents can be more active at school. Unfortunately, many teachers and parents are apprehensive about having this conversation.
“Everybody thinks of changing humanity and nobody thinks of changing oneself.”
– Leo Tolstoy, Russian novelist (1828-1910) |
Teacher's Lounge
Black Hawk Down? The End of Helicopter Parents
Helicopter parenting has, perhaps, become a blight on the educational landscape. Hyper-attentive parents who are constantly hovering around the school and overly sensitive to their child’s every trial and tribulation are facing a backlash. Not only from schools but from the media too.
A recent article in Time heralds the end of helicopter parenting.
The article suggests that, as the recession continues, parents will start looking inward more than outward. They’ll begin to question whether they can afford the expensive educational toys, the extra tuition fees, or the nanny. For some, the reality might be a return to the workplace as family finances become tighter. All of which will mean less time and financial resources dedicated to their children.
Makers of a popular series of videos were forced to retract the statement that their product was “educational” after a class-action lawsuit was threatened. This was partly the result of more scrutiny from parents in an economic downturn and parents saying “no more” to the constant pressure from the media and retailers to educate their kids as early as possible so they’ll gain a competitive edge by the time they’re in kindergarten.
Helicopter parents may be about to land, but what about those who never got aboard in the first place?
They’re the ones who never come to school, rarely communicate with teachers, or are difficult to get hold of to discuss their children’s education.
How can your school strike a balance that’s healthy for all concerned? It’s about to get a lot easier.
Here are some tips to get parents on board with their children’s education:
Set clear expectations. Outline expectations for parents and teachers. Ensure that the role of involving and including parents doesn’t fall on one teacher and that efforts to include parents are streamlined throughout the school.
Provide procedural guidelines. Give parents an overview of the subjects taught to their children including vocabulary they’ll need to know to participate with them. Introduce the philosophy and values the school stands by and the basic norms such as school-parent communications they will receive, procedures if their child gets into trouble, how to contact the school, etc.
Organize parent education nights. If you have a high ESL population in your community, communication may be frustrating for both school and parents. So hold education nights. These are good opportunities to give them tools to use at home such as the Six Pillars of Character. Encourage discussion with other parents about different parenting styles.
Introduce CC! at Back to School Night. Have you introduced CC! to the wider community? A Back to School Night might be the perfect opportunity. Present PowerPoint slides about CHARACTER COUNTS! using the material received at the CDS (there’s a parent presentation on the CD-ROM). Give them ways to talk about the values of the Six Pillars of Character at home. (Use our parent tip sheets available this month in the Free Resources section.)
Publish a newsletter. Everyone knows handouts sent home with children don’t always make it home. If your school has the capacity, consider putting the information online or in e-mails. Some parents might not have computer access, but almost everyone can receive information on their mobile phone. Use this tool to increase communication with parents. Parents will appreciate being included in the life of the school.
Other ideas: Talk about CC! at parent-teacher conferences and involve parents in the CC! committee. Find ways to make parents feel comfortable about being involved. Brainstorm how to work around their schedules and other responsibilities. Look outside the box.
What might be the norm for your school may not be what parents are used to. Setting clear expectations and determining how to meet them will reveal other strategies for parents and staff alike.
“An important part of who you are is what you want to be.”
– Unknown
|
Lesson Plan Bank Spotlight
Tools to Get Parents Involved
Some might argue that teachers are paid to teach and parents owe it to their children to parent them. Although schools are clearly over-burdened with programs and initiatives, making the most of parental resources can ease the tension between home and school roles.
We’re sharing a selection of tools created by Tulare County Office of Education to help you reach out to your parent constituency, to partner with them in their children’s education, and to inform them of the CHARACTER COUNTS! program. Whether you have parents who never come near the school or helicopter-parents who are never away, these tools will create a beneficial balance.
Access the free tools here.
Would you like to see your lesson plan published? Submit it here. Lessons will be entered in a monthly draw to win CC! balloons!
Commentary by Michael Josephson
Shaping Values, Shaping Lives
Blessed with the opportunities and burdened with the aggravations of raising four teenage daughters, my wife Anne and I are profoundly aware of the importance of instilling good values and decision-making skills to help them be safe, successful, happy, and good.
I think we’re doing a good job, but we know that isn’t enough. We worry about the values and character of other parents’ kids who may befriend, date, or marry our girls. And we worry about what our kids will learn in classrooms, playgrounds, and sports fields about things like honesty and honor, respect and responsibility, kindness and compassion, and service and self-discipline.
Read more and comment here »
Michael Josephson's Gabriel Award-winning commentaries air on radio stations across the country. They also appear daily in the Commentary blog, where you can post responses and see what others have to say.
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