The phone calls home to the families of your students…
When?
How?
Why?
I am going to jump up on my soapbox here for a second, but in my career, if I have learned anything, it is that real, meaningful relationships are the key to teaching success. You must build these relationships with administrators, support teachers, teaching teammates, other teachers, and, most importantly, your students and their families.
Building relationships with students can, at times, be an incredibly easy task, and at others it can feel like a daunting undertaking. My bulleted responses to the questions below are not a textbook plan (in fact, the textbook plan I tried failed miserably). Instead, this is the procedure that I have found works for me and the population of students that I work with.
When?
· Before you “need” to. – The first call home for the school year for my students comes at the end of the second full week of school.
· A week or two before conferences
· A week or two before the end of the year
Why?
· I call home during the second full week of school to make sure my first personal contact that I have with a parent after meet the teacher is a positive one. I get a strange feeling of mischievous satisfaction when Mom answers and hears that it is her son’s teacher. I can hear her sit down and brace herself for the news. Then I get to say that Johnny is off to a wonderful start this year and I am so glad that I am lucky enough to be his teacher. I imagine this as a rollercoaster ride for some parents.
· Calling home a week or two before conferences is something that I will absolutely do for the rest of my career. Almost every teacher I have ever spoken with dislikes the time they must spend at night completing conferences, but they also feel the frustration of trying to fit so much information into a 20 minute conference. Because I speak with parents a week or two before conferences there are no “surprises” when we meet face to face. They know my concerns and I know there concerns because we spoke on the phone a week ago.
· You should see my classroom the day after I have made phone calls home. The students come in absolutely glowing. They know I care about them so much, and I am so proud of them, that I took the time to call and tell their parents.
How?
· It might not be very fun to hear this, but calling parents does take time. I have made these calls with groups as small as 20, and others of close to 30.
· I do what I call the “Call Home Marathon Night.” The janitor knows to come back and vacuum later when he sees my student information cards spread all over my desk. I have found that many of my conversations last 2-3 minutes while others can last 10-15 minutes. I try to limit the time to about 15 minutes, but they rarely get this long. Typically I can call and speak with or leave a message with every student’s family in less than 2 hours.
· At the beginning of the year I usually start my conversations with “Johnny is off to an absolutely wonderful start. He is learning the classroom procedures, making friends, etc. I then ask the parents if they have any questions or concerns about the first two weeks of school. I am always surprised that almost every parent I talk with has at least one little question that they ask. I also often hear, “this is the first call we have had from a teacher before, thank you!”
· Before conferences/report cards I usually start with, “I was just looking over Jessica’s report card and I guess I wanted to share the good news with you before you see it at home.” I then discuss some of the positives and end with any of the opportunities for improvement that I see. These calls take a little longer, but again, they make conferences a breeze.
· At the end of the year, I reiterate to families, that when a student is in my class, I fully intend to maintain my relationship with the student and his or her family. I usually share a sentimental memory or two about the school year, and then I end by reiterating to the families that I fully intend to maintain my relationship with their child and continue to be a part of his or her education.
Judging just by the length of this blog entry, relationships and home communication are something that I am very passionate about. This entry was sparked by an email that I received tonight from a parent of one of my students. In it she wrote, “We are indeed moving to the new school that you and I discussed on the phone. She is disappointed to leave her friends and school, and essentially start over, but I think she will be ok. You were kind enough to say that you knew some teachers at other schools and might be able to provide some information that might help soften the blow.” --If it wasn’t for the phone call I made home to this family, because of a relatively shy student, I would not have known that this family was moving.
When?
How?
Why?
I am going to jump up on my soapbox here for a second, but in my career, if I have learned anything, it is that real, meaningful relationships are the key to teaching success. You must build these relationships with administrators, support teachers, teaching teammates, other teachers, and, most importantly, your students and their families.
Building relationships with students can, at times, be an incredibly easy task, and at others it can feel like a daunting undertaking. My bulleted responses to the questions below are not a textbook plan (in fact, the textbook plan I tried failed miserably). Instead, this is the procedure that I have found works for me and the population of students that I work with.
When?
· Before you “need” to. – The first call home for the school year for my students comes at the end of the second full week of school.
· A week or two before conferences
· A week or two before the end of the year
Why?
· I call home during the second full week of school to make sure my first personal contact that I have with a parent after meet the teacher is a positive one. I get a strange feeling of mischievous satisfaction when Mom answers and hears that it is her son’s teacher. I can hear her sit down and brace herself for the news. Then I get to say that Johnny is off to a wonderful start this year and I am so glad that I am lucky enough to be his teacher. I imagine this as a rollercoaster ride for some parents.
· Calling home a week or two before conferences is something that I will absolutely do for the rest of my career. Almost every teacher I have ever spoken with dislikes the time they must spend at night completing conferences, but they also feel the frustration of trying to fit so much information into a 20 minute conference. Because I speak with parents a week or two before conferences there are no “surprises” when we meet face to face. They know my concerns and I know there concerns because we spoke on the phone a week ago.
· You should see my classroom the day after I have made phone calls home. The students come in absolutely glowing. They know I care about them so much, and I am so proud of them, that I took the time to call and tell their parents.
How?
· It might not be very fun to hear this, but calling parents does take time. I have made these calls with groups as small as 20, and others of close to 30.
· I do what I call the “Call Home Marathon Night.” The janitor knows to come back and vacuum later when he sees my student information cards spread all over my desk. I have found that many of my conversations last 2-3 minutes while others can last 10-15 minutes. I try to limit the time to about 15 minutes, but they rarely get this long. Typically I can call and speak with or leave a message with every student’s family in less than 2 hours.
· At the beginning of the year I usually start my conversations with “Johnny is off to an absolutely wonderful start. He is learning the classroom procedures, making friends, etc. I then ask the parents if they have any questions or concerns about the first two weeks of school. I am always surprised that almost every parent I talk with has at least one little question that they ask. I also often hear, “this is the first call we have had from a teacher before, thank you!”
· Before conferences/report cards I usually start with, “I was just looking over Jessica’s report card and I guess I wanted to share the good news with you before you see it at home.” I then discuss some of the positives and end with any of the opportunities for improvement that I see. These calls take a little longer, but again, they make conferences a breeze.
· At the end of the year, I reiterate to families, that when a student is in my class, I fully intend to maintain my relationship with the student and his or her family. I usually share a sentimental memory or two about the school year, and then I end by reiterating to the families that I fully intend to maintain my relationship with their child and continue to be a part of his or her education.
Judging just by the length of this blog entry, relationships and home communication are something that I am very passionate about. This entry was sparked by an email that I received tonight from a parent of one of my students. In it she wrote, “We are indeed moving to the new school that you and I discussed on the phone. She is disappointed to leave her friends and school, and essentially start over, but I think she will be ok. You were kind enough to say that you knew some teachers at other schools and might be able to provide some information that might help soften the blow.” --If it wasn’t for the phone call I made home to this family, because of a relatively shy student, I would not have known that this family was moving.
1 comment:
This is an excellent post and reads almost like an advice article! It is full of great tips which I will most certainly be using fom now on, particularly the 'phone call home two weeks in to the school year.
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