The school supplies are purchased, new clothes are hanging in the closet and the initial school paperwork has been sent back signed. As a parent, these subsidiary points are part and parcel with the start of a new school year. The most prominent question facing parents and students alike at the outset of a new year is what to expect from their teachers.
School systems across the country are focusing their efforts on revamping their curriculums to meet new education standards and fight their way towards education reform. Staff has been reduced in schools and talk of teaching salaries being tied to student achievement has taken the forefront in many school board and teachers’ union meetings.
What should you expect from your child’s teacher?
Parent Teacher Organizations have long commended open communication between teachers and parents regarding student behavior, performance and grades. The same holds true in these times of drastic change in many of our schools, but there’s a twist.
As a closer focus on teacher accountability takes the stage, the communications between home and school need to be more focused, more detailed and need to specify the goals of everyone involved regarding the student or students in question.
Other Communication Upgrades
In a day of online communications, when Facebook and emails are more the norm than the anomaly to share information, there are no real reasons for communication between parents and school system to fail.
• Many teachers provide their email addresses to parents at the outset of the year. Take the time to log them into your email addresses, your phone or whatever access you use to communicate via email. If you have a need to ask a question, this will remove any reason to put it off.
• Facebook can be an open forum between parents and school. If your school doesn’t have a page, you may want to suggest they build one to keep parents and students updated on events, news and schedules.
Good Communication Begins at Home
Take time every day to talk to your child about their day, any concerns or questions they may have. If anything strikes you as critical, shoot an email to confirm the details with their teacher at once.
If we are going to hold our teachers to a higher accountability standard, then it can only be expected that we as parents do our part to support them in their efforts. Keeping the lines of communications wide open not only make it easier for teachers to do their job, it can enhance the overall quality of our kids’ education.
Posted By: Paul Adams
Friday, September 17th 2010 at 1:44PM
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