Parent Conference Preparation
Activity #1 – Attitude Check
How well do you know your students – every single one? Do a mental scan of the seating chart in your classroom. Picture each child. (Secondary teachers, can you do this period by period without peeking at a chart or roster?) Double-checking, you might discover that you have overlooked someone. Do you know that student well enough to really help him or her succeed? What can you do about that?
Are you having trouble holding every child in a warm place in your heart? If you find that some of your students are hard for you to like, try this strategy to reframe your thinking. Picture that snotty girl or sullen boy as a precious newborn in a parent’s arms, innocent and full of promise, and not that much younger than now. That difficult student is someone’s cherished baby – or if he isn’t love like that at home, he needs you all the more. All our students need to sense that we expect the best of them, believing they can reach our high expectations, and that we will not give up on them.
“Research shows that the main predictor of achievement is a child’s perception of …Does this teacher like me?” (Robert Rosenthal, Pygmalion in the Classroom, 1968). This fact has not changed. Teacher-student relationships are a major factor in student success. How do your students know that you care about them as learners and as people? And how do they know you set high standards and expect their success?
Activity #2 – Reframing Your Message
When a student is doing well and the parents are happy, conferencing is fun – a festival of mutual admiration. But not all students fall into that category.
Think of a student with whom there is a problem. Do you need to raise a difficult issue with the parent, or deliver information that might trouble them? Try this activity to prepare yourself.
On an index card, just write what you would really want to say if you could put it bluntly. Just dump out the message – all of it.
Then work with a partner to examine and refine your message. Have your partner read it aloud to you, and put yourself in the parents’ place as you listen. Is it truthful, kind, and necessary? Does it convey respect for the child and parents? Is there a clear, underlying assumption that you and the parents both want the child to be successful and are working together to make that happen? Rework your message until it passes the Golden Rule test of how you would want to be treated if you were the parent. What are some pointers you could share with a student teacher about effective parent communication?
4/9/2019Mentor Program