Creating and Sustaining Family Friendly Schools
IV. Communicating with Parents, Including Reporting on Progress of Students and of the School
The findings of the present study suggest that the content of school-to-home communications is important. When these communications contain information that may influence parents' perceptions of their children as learners, when they give parents a sense of efficacy, and when they make the parent feel comfortable with the school, parent involvement seems to be enhanced.29
This section discusses issues of communication between charter schools and their parent communities. Effective communication is particularly critical for schools of choice, and schools that may be pursuing nontraditional programs. First is a discussion of some general issues around building trust and rapport with parents. Next, communications regarding a particular student (including parent conferences) is discussed. Finally, communication regarding progress of the school as a whole is addressed. Most charter schools are required to do some sort of whole-school reporting each year (e.g., an annual report), a process which provides an opportunity to review the school's accomplishments and plan for the future, in addition to meeting statutory requirements.
- Building Trust and Rapport with Parents
Communication is the most important thing. Parents are stepping into unknown territory when they are dealing with a new charter school. It is hard to have information readily available for them. The school must initiate the effort to get parents involved.30
Building trust and rapport between a school and its community of parents is critical if partnerships are to be effective. It is crucial to attempt to see parent involvement from the parents' perspective. What are parents' expectations of the school? Some of the surveys in the final section of this Guidebook can help generate this information. A recent case study of parent attitudes toward involvement at their elementary schools found that
Parents expressed a clear distinction between what the school should and should not be doing. Although the school should be a resource for parents, it should not dictate to parents what their role should be. As one father stated, the school should not tell parents "what good parents are." Furthermore, schools need to realize that "parents have a personal essay prior to their existence as parents." In other words, the school should respect all parents and appreciate the experiences and individual strengths they offer their children. The school should be available to offer advice and assistance to help parents work with their children.31
One way to defuse a difficult situation is to use active listening, to respectfully paraphrase what the parent is saying. This doesn't have to mean agreement, just that you've really heard the point. It means listening and hearing the other person's viewpoint and courteously saying it back in your own words, "What I hear you saying is..."
Efforts made by teachers are likely to be critical in determining the amount of family involvement. Joyce Epstein and a colleague have found that "the attitudes and practices of the teachers, not the education, socioeconomic status, or marital status of the parent, were the important variables for understanding whether parents were knowledgeable and successful partners with the schools in their children's education".32
In dealing with difficult parents, a teacher must remember that they may be acting according to misperceptions or previous negative experience with schools. Usually, poor attitudes reflect poor communication. A parent's initial anger or aggressiveness must not intimidate a teacher. Politeness, careful listening, and avoiding defensiveness will usually help.
-- Jonson, 1999.
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A welcoming environment for visitors to the school is critical. As Swap puts it, "The key is avoiding a foreboding, institutional atmosphere and creating a more home-like, human-scale environment".33
Most of the charter schools the authors are familiar with have had good success in creating a welcoming environment. Charter schools tend to have an advantage in this regard as they are newer schools, most are relatively small schools, and many were started out of frustration with the institutional atmosphere of traditional public schools. A charter school director from Pittsburgh commented that "Attending the school is a choice, and people want to be there, so most people are eager to get involved to help with their child's education."
In addition to having a clean and brightly lit building, here are some other steps schools can take to enhance appearances and create a welcoming atmosphere:
- Display signs that welcome visitors. Does the sign on the front door say "Welcome! Thanks for coming. Please check in at the office" or just "Please check in at the office"? Kids can generate signs on the computer, or sew them (if English is a second language for many parents, add welcome signs that reflect the language of families' countries of origin).
- Post a map that explains where the office is.
- Arrange flowers, brightly colored murals, children's pictures, other displays, and/or photographs in an entrance hallway.
- Designate space for a parent center and have coffee, tea, or cold drinks available.
- Assign a parent to greet other parents at the entrance of the school at drop-off and pickup times during the first week of school.
- Explain to secretaries their importance in supporting family involvement and brainstorm a variety of strategies for welcoming and supporting parents.
- Arrange for translators for parents who do not speak English.34
A more extensive list of specific steps you can take to make your school a "welcoming school" is provided in a recent report on the state of schools in Kentucky: Kentucky Updates: A Parent/Citizen Guide for 1999-2000 (pages 70-71), available on the Internet at
http://www.columbiagroup.org/99updates.PDF.
Further advice and links to resources on creating a school climate that facilitates parent involvement can be found in the North Central Regional Educational Laboratory's Critical Issue: Creating the School Climate and Structures to Support Parent and Family Involvement report, available on the NCREL Internet site at
http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/envrnmnt/famncomm/pa300.htm.
Specific actions schools may undertake to build trust and rapport with parents include, in no particular order:
- Hold informal social gatherings which parents, students, and school staff attend. The Family Learning Center and Concordia Creative Learning Academy charter schools in St. Paul, Minnesota, hold bimonthly Family Nights, which start with a potluck dinner and may include a presentation of student work, discussion of school policies, or an outing to a local event such as a baseball game. While such social events may not directly support student learning, they are an excellent way to initiate positive relations between the school and parents.
- Hold a special "welcome-back-to-school" event at the beginning of the school year. This can take the form of an open house, at which families can meet teachers and chat with them informally.
- Make school staff easily accessible. The school needs to publicize information on contacting its staff, and teachers should encourage parents to communicate with them regularly. One way to facilitate this is through a good voice-mail system. Many schools have established voicemail boxes for all teachers, where parents can leave messages with questions or concerns. If going this route, it is vital that the system be easily understood (a direct line or separate extension for each staff member is desirable), and that staff return calls promptly.
- Teachers can offer to do home visits for conferences or other meetings with individual parents. Home visits have proven successful in helping schools reach the more difficult-to-reach families. A teacher who has been to a student's home will gain insight into the family's beliefs and expectations of the student, while also providing the opportunity to help the family understand the school's expectations including specifics about curriculum, what and how learning are to occur, and desired home support.7
- Make it clear from the beginning that parent involvement is important. Immediately involve parents in the hiring of teachers and the curriculum process. Establish a hiring committee - made up of parents and some teachers. Teacher candidates have to be interviewed by a parent and a teacher. Establish a curriculum committee - made up of teachers and parents. This committee researches national standards in order to set up the curriculum (recommendations of teacher Betsey Douberley of Lake Eola Charter School in Orlando, Florida).
Involve parents in creating a school handbook
To gain the trust and cooperation of parents, it may be a good idea to involve parents in the development of parent/student handbook. The handbook would explain the mission, goals and objectives of the school as well as details of school policy. California-based charter expert Eric Premack has provided a list of what such a manual could address:
- A brief overview of the charter school concept and the school's history;
- Parent involvement expectations and responsibilities;
- Reciprocal obligations of the school toward the parent and student;
- Constructive suggestions on how the parent can support learning in home and families activities;
- A contact list explaining how parents can raise and resolve concerns regarding the school's operations and policies and suggestions on how parents can take a constructive role in identifying and resolving issues and problems; and
- A description of the school's governing structure and how parents may become involved in the school's governance.
Premack, 1997, p.58
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- Communicating with Parents About Their Student
This section discusses several strategies schools may use to communicate with parents about their particular student, including conferences and report cards.
The parent-student-teacher conference is perhaps the most important way most schools communicate with parents about their children's work in school. Consider having the first conference of the year before the school year begins or at the very beginning of the year, to allow parents and teachers to get acquainted and plan for the coming months.
Teachers often receive little training for the vital task of the parent conference. High school principal Steven Enoch developed a set of nine strategies to help increase the value of conferences for both teachers and parents:36
- Identify strengths and weaknesses in the areas of reading, writing, listening, and speaking.
- Establish a clear understanding of academic areas where the student is progressing and any areas where the student is not making adequate progress.
- Provide parents with samples of work that reflect their child's progress.
- Identify the level of the student's participation and contribution to group work and cooperative assignments. What process role does the student seem most comfortable assuming?
- Does the student think critically and creatively?
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Review the quality of the child's peer relationships for the parent.
- Identify two or three growth goals for the student.
- Provide specific expectations for what parents are to do at home to help.
- Take time to listen to parents about their child.
Community Learning Center charter schools employ the following checklist for students' advisors to use in preparing for and carrying out conferences with parents. Teachers, in their role as advisors to students, are to keep in mind that the process is about holding a conference with the child and caring adults (advisor, parents) not about the child. It is another good learning experience for the child: they think about goals, express themselves and demonstrate accountability.
- Prepare for the conference:
- Check with other staff who work with your advisee; and
- Develop a packet for the conference, including:
- Student's goals
- Samples of work
- Reports or notes from other staff (can gather at a staff meeting).
- Rehearse the conference with students by role-playing:
- Students present their goals, learning activities, samples of work; and
- Students ask for comments and suggestions from parents.
- Conduct conference with the student, parent, and advisor. Advisee takes the lead to the greatest extent possible:
- Have a comfortable, pleasant setting, e.g. right sized chairs, coffee, and cookies;
- Establish a time period for the conference, e.g., 20 minutes;
- Review goals set earlier (if none, it's time to set goals);
- Review progress toward goals;
- Review progress with samples of work from learning activities;
- Review attendance and handling of responsibilities at school/home;
- Modify goals for balance of the year as necessary;
- Determine other learning activities to accomplish goals;
- Describe upcoming events and activities;
- Discuss how the home can contribute to learning;
- Parents give their thoughts on student's progress; and
- Ask parents and students for questions, ideas.
Even before planning the conference itself, it is important for teachers to give attention to cultural barriers that may separate them from their students' families. A recent article outlined strategies teachers may use to do this, including consideration of differing concepts of family roles, expectations for behavior and academic performance, and cultural awareness. The authors point out that "When teachers are working with parents of diverse cultures and families of students with disabilities, it is important for them to consider their perceptions of family roles within the culture, including the roles of extended family members. Family roles should not be judged based only on personal experience of the perception of a normative group."
Teachers' expectations about academic performance and appropriate behavior may differ from those of students, and this can result in miscommunication. Student behavior "may reflect the value the family places on education, the amount and types of the student's household and family responsibilities, the family's expectations for appropriate behavior and academic performance, and the level of parental involvement."
Finally, teachers need to learn about the customs and traditions of specific cultures from which their students come.37
School director Thomas R. Hoerr has suggested that schools reverse the usual parent-teacher conference format, making the conference primarily a forum for teachers to listen to parents. His school instituted "intake conferences" at the beginning of the school year, in which teachers were expected to listen 75-80% of the time.38
A list of discussion questions was sent ahead to parents to facilitate the conference dialog. Using these questions at the conference should help to gather data needed to help teachers understand students' family background and avoid misunderstandings during the conference. The questions included, in part:
- Questions about children:
- How does your child view school?
- What are your goals for your child this year?
- What is you child's activity schedule away from school?
- How do you deal with homework? Do you help your child with it, or check to make sure it's finished?
- What is your family routine at home? How does the family spend its evenings?
- How does your child solve problems at home?
- Questions about diversity:
- What holidays does your family celebrate? Will any of these celebrations affect your child's activities at school?
- Would you share a bit about your family's heritage?
- Has your child seen family members in situations in which they were discriminated against?
- What are some of the ways that your family has worked to help your child appreciate racial or ethnic differences?
Positive phone calls are a straightforward way to enhance communication between teachers and parents. In many cases parents expect to hear from the school only when their child gets in trouble. The impact can be tremendous when a teacher calls parents to tell them about their child's particular accomplishments, or to ask if they need any information on the school program and activities. Staff can take 15 minutes for this two to three times per week.
The U.S. Department of Education's Reaching All Families guidebook suggests that
To be most effective, parents need to receive at least two or three positive phone calls over the course of the school year. Some topics for consideration are:
- introducing the teacher to the parent;
- describing the child's curriculum;
- commenting on the child's progress;
- informing the parent of a special achievement or improvement by the child;
- telling the parent of particular strengths of the child and sharing an anecdote about them; and
- Inviting the parents to open houses, conferences, volunteering in the school, and other school functions
While simple in concept, a positive phone call program does require time and effort. Strong support is needed from school administrators, who must provide teachers with the time, feedback, and resources they will need to implement this program. Teachers also need to be involved in the planning to ensure their commitment (U.S. Department of Education, 1996, available online at http://www.ed.gov/pubs/ReachFam/).
How to assure frequent communication from the school to parents
The Massachusetts Charter School Handbook provides a list of suggestions:
- Provide families with a clear description of school rules and expectations: create a Family Handbook
- Send home student work folders weekly for review and signature
- Speak by phone with families; be accessible at school for telephone calls from families
- Publish school newsletters
- Take photos of students at work in school and send them home as postcards
- Publish school calendars, notices of events and activities, etc., well in advance of the activities
- Send Student Report Cards frequently and on a regular basis; include written comments from teachers
- Schedule Family Teacher Conferences 3 or 4 times a year
- Create a one-page listing for families of school staff to call regarding specific issues
- Complete a family satisfaction survey each year.
--Massachusetts Charter School Resource Center, 1999, p. 23.
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Individual class newsletters are one way many elementary school teachers communicate with parents. A newsletter can consist of descriptions of classroom activities, goals, plans for the coming week, and recognition of students. Generating a class newsletter may be an opportunity for a teacher to enlist help from a volunteer, to take on responsibilities for writing and editing the newsletter.
Report cards. While many charter schools have moved away from the traditional report card, with its emphasis on letter grades given in traditionally-defined courses, it remains important to provide some form of written documentation of each student's achievement. It is important that the report be easily understood by parents. If you report standardized test results or mandated state test results, sketch the context for the student's score (so parents will understand how it compares to other students in the school, to the local district, to statewide scores, etc.). If you report results on school-developed evaluation instruments, explain how the instruments work and what the measurements mean. You may have to strike a balance between a reporting format based on the school's unique mission and goals and the need to address parents' desire to know how their students are doing in the basic skills and traditional curriculum areas.
Appendix 3 provides student report forms from the Urban League Charter School of Pittsburgh and the Learning Adventures Middle School (LAMS) of St. Paul. The Urban League school serves grades K-4, while LAMS is a grades 6-8 charter school. The LAMS reporting format incorporates both the state-mandated Graduation Standards and "life skills" areas specific to the school.
Some schools rely on parent conferences more than written reports for conveying the richness of how students are doing. In one case, a school provided a narrative account of the student's accomplishments and status to augment the parent conferences. Some of the charter school contacts interviewed for this project said that rather than a standardized report card form, they develop checklists and narrative reports specific to school curriculum. These types of reports may change each term depending on the specifics of material covered in different courses.
- Communicating with Parents and Community About Progress of the School as a Whole
Effective communication with parents about the progress of the school is important for good community relations on an ongoing basis. The broader community including the sponsor, the state, and legislature are generally interested in how charter schools are doing.
One of our interview questions asked charter school people what methods they used to report on the progress of individual students and of the school as a whole. The most common methods mentioned were annual reports, standardized tests including state-mandated tests, parent conferences, and individualized report cards or student progress reports. Other reporting methods mentioned included reports in local newspapers, portfolios, public presentations, direct parent/teacher communication, weekly newsletters, and parent satisfaction surveys.
When asked how they reported to parents, families, and the community, responses were similar to the above, with additional answers including phone calls home, visits by assessment teams when the school is up for renewal, "portfolio days," and parent meetings to explain standardized test results.
Annual Reports. Most charter schools produce annual reports describing the school's mission, goals, and achievements in the past year. Many states require an annual report. Regardless of whether this is mandatory, doing the annual report provides a great opportunity for school staff to reflect on the school's progress, and to facilitate good relations with parents and the broader community by telling them the "good news" about the school and indicating areas for further development. A report can include many photos, charts, and attractive graphics, or it can be produced using a common word-processing program. The main goal should be explaining what your school is about and reporting on your accomplishments.
Your state department of education or state charter resource center may have guidelines for what is to go in a charter report. Minnesota's Department of Children, Families and Learning recommends the following "data elements" be included:
- Student Mission Statement;
- Student Background/demographics;
- Student Participation;
- Teaching Staff Information;
- Parent and Community Involvement;
- Program Success (and/or best practices);
- Program Problems/Challenges (and how they are being addressed);
- Accountability Data from the year being reported on;
- Two academic goals for the new school year and what pre/post test will be used for measurement;
- Two non-academic goals and what pre/post test will be used for measurement; and
- Other school accountability measures.
Below are tables of contents for annual reports of three charter schools. The introductions to the annual reports are reprinted, as Appendix 4.
Minnesota New Country School, a secondary charter in rural southern Minnesota, had the following Table of Contents in its fifth-year report:
Introduction
The Study
1.1 General Progress Report of School Operations
Introduction
Demographics
MNCS Board of Education
Public Relations
Graduation Rule Implementation
Staff Development
Parent Involvement
1.2 Review of Financial Management and Operations
1.3 General Student Progress Report
Introduction
Student Projects
Student Outcomes
Student Testing Results
1.4 Review of Facilities
1.5 Review of Services and Contracts
1.6 General List of Learning Activities, Community Services and Partnerships
Conclusion
Attachments
Attachments to the New Country School report included Learner Rubrics used by the school; a statement of school mission, vision, guiding principles, and values; summary of school finances; results of a student survey; an independent evaluator's report on student achievement on the Stanford Achievement Test; and a summary of current activities of the school's graduates.
The Hickman Charter School (located at 13306 rth Street, Hickman, CA 95323), a California-based charter catering to the needs of home-schooling parents, produced a 1996-97 Annual Evaluation Report with the following Table of Contents:
Introduction
Hickman Charter School - At a Glance
About the Organization of This Report
Section I: Context and Background
About Charter Schools
Homeschooling and Hickman Charter School
Section II: Purpose and Methodology
Purpose of Study
Methodology
Selected Focus Areas
Hickman Charter School Parent Survey
Section III: Findings
School Governance and Statistical Data
Facilities
Hickman Charter School - A Service Organization
Roles and Responsibilities:
School, Parents, and Education Coordinators
Monitoring Learning Progress:
Standardized Test Data Results; Learning Records;
Mathematics and Student Writing Work Samples
Student Support and Activities:
Elective Classes; Field Trips; Enrichment Experiences;
Computer Technology; Socialization;
and Student Self-Esteem and Attitudes
Special Services: Special Education; Remediation
Parents: Staff/Parent Communication; Reference Binders;
Materials and Curriculum Assistance; Training, Workshops,
and Conferences; Parent Training Needs; Parent Involvement
Section IV: Conclusions
Section V: Commendations and Recommendations
Conclusion
The St. Paul Family Learning Center, an elementary charter school, produced a report on the 1998-99 school year with this table of contents:
Introduction
I: FLC Response to St. Paul Public Schools Charter School Evaluation Plan
II: FLC History
III: Student Population, Attendance, and Special Services
IV: Program
Adoption of the community Learning Centers Design
Individualized Student Tracking and Assessment Strategies
Parent and Community Involvement
Best Practices and Program Successes
Program Challenges
V: Staffing
VI: Evaluation and Accountability Data
Standardized Test Data
Stakeholder Satisfaction Data
Student Retention Data
VII: Financial Information
Attachments
Attachments to the Family Learning Center annual report included: an example Work Sampling System Developmental Checklist used by the school; a Personal Learning Plan Student-Parent-Advisor Agreement form; statement of the FLC's Instructional Performance Pay Schedule and Expectations of Instructional Staff; the FLC's Professional Development Plan Process; sample Personal Learning Plan Goals sheets; the FLC 1999-2000 School Year Calendar; and a record of staff development activities for the year.
School newsletters. Besides annual reports, another important way most charter schools communicate with families is through school newsletters. The U.S. Department of Education's Reaching All Families book suggests that "Newsletters can provide a steady stream of information from the school to the home...A quality newsletter may well be the least expensive way of informing families of school activities and expectations. As their name implies, newsletters provide readers with "news" in an informal "letter" style. They are useful when careful thought is given to: "Why have a newsletter?" "Who is the audience?" "What do we want to communicate?" "How should we present the information?"39
A charter school newsletter may be prepared by the principal/director, teacher, school support staff member, parent volunteer, or other interested party. At St. Paul's Family Learning Center charter school, a parent serves as school newsletter editor, gathering material from school staff and students to put in the newsletter. At the higher grades, working on the school newsletter can be a great opportunity for students to learn about writing, design, layout, and desktop publishing, while carrying out a real-world task of benefit to themselves and the school community. Perhaps interested students can form a "newspaper club" for this purpose.
In planning and producing a school newsletter, don't be over-ambitious. It is better to have a single page that's completed on time and is well-done, than to struggle to find material to fill eight or even four pages. Most recipients won't read a longer newsletter in any case.
Often school newsletters will consist of items such as calendars of upcoming school events, the school lunch menu, activities carried out by specific classes, and profiles of particular students. In addition to these usual sorts of items, a charter school might include discussion of the school's goals, or progress toward specific elements of the charter vision. The school newsletter is also a great place to put tips for parents on ways to promote their students' learning in the home. One option is to buy a newsletter service with lots of content to choose from or to adapt. Sources for this include:
- The Parent Institute
, 800 756-5525, or on the Internet www.parent-institute.com. Provides the "Parents Make a Difference" newsletter.
- Resources for Educators, Inc.
, 800 394-5052 or via email at rfecustomer@rfeonline.com. They provide a series of monthly newsletters that can be customized to include school-specific materials.
Something you may wish to consider doing in your schools newsletter is including a note saying "if you read this newsletter, sign, cut out, and return this portion to your child's teacher for a special treat/prize for your child." This can be an effective way to find out how many parents are really reading the newsletter. Once you know, you can look for ways to increase the number of readers.
The Washington State School Directors' Association has provided a two-page summary of steps to undertake in publishing a school newsletter; this is included in this Guidebook as Appendix 5.
Parent meetings/school events. To communicate the progress of the school and keep parents involved, many schools invite parents to meetings or other special events. A regularly-scheduled event, to which all parents are invited, is a powerful way to build parent support of the program. Minnesota's New Country School regularly invites the community to student "exhibition" nights, where students demonstrate projects they have carried out at the school. The Cape Cod Lighthouse School in Massachusetts reports that ongoing parent involvement has been part of the school culture since the beginning. To support ongoing communication with parents, the school has a meeting once a year with all parents, and has community meetings involving the students three to four times a year. A school spokesperson reported that "at these meetings kids can give presentations about the work they have been doing. We also use this time to discuss community concerns or issues and try to find solutions, e.g., if there are community problems with kids' behavior."