4 for Friday: Parent Communication

I don't know about you but my summer is officially over! Teachers in my district report back to work on Monday. I've spent my week lounging, lesson planning for the first week of school and designing posters for my classroom.

This week I want to discuss parent communication. I would say that it's one of my strengths, though parents may not have the time to read and explore all that I send home, its there if and when they need it. 
Parent Communication 1. Parent Flipbook- Some teachers give this to parents at Back to School Night but I choose to give it to parents at Open House so that they can have a snapshot of our classroom before school officially begins. 

My parent flipbook includes our Daily Schedule, Classroom Celebrations, Homework Policy, as well as information on our Smart Tags (brag tags), 7 Habits of Happy Kids, Whole Brain Teaching and how parents can contact me. I purchased my flipbook from Learning in Wonderland and added my content. 

2. Parent Handbook- I pass our my Parent Handbook during Back to School Night (which happens 3 weeks into the school year), instead of putting this information in a slide show, I put it in a handbook for parents to refer to when needed and I spend BTS Night, discussing expectations, curriculum and classroom management. 

My Parent Handbook consists of detailed information about the above information. Like I said earlier this is generally information that would be included in your BTS Night presentation but I found that I have more time to discuss the ever so important behavioral and academic expectations as well as the curriculum and what their child is expected to master during the school year. I got this idea from Primarily Speaking. 
3. Monthly Newsletter- Last school year I switched over to a Monthly Newsletter as opposed to a Weekly Newsletter and it was the BEST decision I have every made! I didn't have to worry about getting the weekly newsletter written, printed and copied every week which freed up quite a bit of time for me.  Last year I would copy our Monthly Project on the back of each monthly newsletter. Now that I'm going back to 2nd grade, I'm copying "Family Write Night" ideas on the back of each monthly newsletter. 

4. Weekly Email Updates- Although I switched to monthly newsletters, I still wanted to keep my parents informed weekly of what was going on in the classroom. I found that sending a Weekly Update on Sunday evenings was perfect. I could "draft" the email all week if needed, so I wouldn't forget anything. 

 I always included general reminders first, then included important dates and ended with what we were learning that week. Those topics directly correlated to their Learning Handbook so they knew exactly what to study.
I'd love to hear how you communicate with parents, leave a comment here or hop on over to our Facebook page and leave a comment.

Made it Monday 8*1*16

In last weeks Made It Monday post I shared about the welcome gifts I made for my students for Open House/Meet the Teacher. This week I want to focus on their parents.

After scouring Pinterest I ran across this cute idea from The Lemonade Stand. "Parents Like You Are So Refreshing!" All I need to do is get some mini water bottles, Country Time lemonade packets and string and they'll be ready to go. You can download a copy for yourself on her blog.

 Also waiting for the parents is the Parent Flipbook I made them. Last year I gave this to parents during Back to School Night, but this year since that night comes 3 weeks after school starts, I wanted parents to have a preview of our classroom from the very beginning. Most of this information is included on our classroom website but last year I found that very little of my parents actually took the time to read up about our classroom. They had many questions that could have been answered if they had just looked at the website!

If you haven't seen Learning in Wonderland's Back to School Flipbook Templates then you don't know what you're missing! This is the neatest little thing I've ever purchased. She even included a step by step video on how to customize it and print it. I created something like this in the past but it was "old school"... a lot of cutting and pasting and copying until it lined up right and even after all that... it still didn't!

Since I'm passing out the flipbook at Open House/Meet the Teacher this year, I needed something for Back to School Night. In comes the Parent Handbook. I got the idea from Primarily Speaking. She included a copy in her Back to School Forms, since I only needed the handbook portion, I created my own. In this handbook parents will find detailed information about:

• classroom communication
• behavior plan
• homework policy
• grading
• assessments
• cultivating leaders
• celebrations
• daily schedule

So what do you give your parents at Open House/Meet the Teacher and Back to School Night?

Looking for more Made it Monday ideas? Hop on over to 4th Grade Frolics!

Parent Communication

This month I'm linking up to discuss parent communication. I will say my parents appreciate the systems I've put into place to keep them informed about their child's education.   1) Weekly Newsletter- every Monday students take home a newsletter in their folder. As you can see I let parents know what we're learning that week, important dates, notes and homework.  

  2) Classroom Website- every weekend I update the classroom website with the weekly newsletter above and important dates. I have information about our classroom (wish list, birthdays, classroom management plan), math study guides and links to practice pages, as well as Social Studies and Science study guides and study cards.

 

  3) Parent Emails- In addition to the hard copy newsletter and classroom website. I occasionally send emails to the parents about items and events I feel need to be communicated directly and then I put it in the newsletter and on the website.