Parent and Children Communication

Families and Education

Families ought to get worried in their children’s education as it strengthens their learning as properly as development through the connection of imperative contexts in education. The unique aspects of adolescents at home have a significant have an effect on their classroom performance. Therefore, it is important to apprehend these issues and connect them to the context of the learner and the classroom environment to establish nice methodologies that enhance the education of the children. The partnership between parents and teachers are more treasured than practicing parent involvement activities in isolation. Good ideas can be implemented with the assist of parent-teacher collaboration to enhance the learning of the child. The parent-school-community does not only result in the academic success of the children but also has a lifetime influence on the children. Involvement plan is needed as it increases the achievement of the children despite their background, economic status or the education attainment of their parents.

The Families and the Community

The Manhattan Day School has a population of more than eight hundred students. The school offers a diverse educational program and hence known for its diversity. The children in the school are disciplined, and most love their school work. Families are also supportive of their children, and they care about their education. The economic status of the community is medium, as there are no extremely low-income households as a majority are in the middle class. The community also values diversity ranging from their language of communication to their religious beliefs. Many of them are Jews, but there are other ethnic groups in the region. Non-Hispanic whites’ members make the largest number of the community, but there are other ethnic groups such as Hispanics and blacks.

Community Strengths and Resources

The school offers a multilingual program for the parents who are not natives to learn the English language. The programs aim at improving communication between the parent and teachers as well as helping their children in education. Services such as translation are also available although limited to parents with difficulties in a new language.(Saracho, 1999). The school partners with the community in various areas through community service and other activities.

The school has a farm where the students grow a variety of plants that later benefit them and the community. The students use the farm for practical learning, and it also supports their feeding program from the produce. Since the students cannot manage the farm alone, they involve the community hence providing employment for some of them. Also, some of the agricultural products are sold or donated to the community such as vegetables and eggs.

The Plan for Parent Communication

The involvement program requires the active collaboration of the parents and teachers. The program will focus on a strategy that enhances effective communication that ensures the success of this collaboration. These strategies include providing clarity of the message to be communicated to the parents. The message will contain information that is clear and uses simple language to enhance clarity. Also, information to parents who are not native speakers will be translated in their first languages to avoid confusion. Also, the teacher will be the only person providing communications to enhance reliability and uniformity of the message. Information that has undergone several interpretations is likely to lose its originality. Besides, all communications will be written in the form of memos and notices and follow-up process done through phone calls (Beamer & Varner, 2001).

Parenting is one type of parent involvement in their child’s education. The plan will implement various family support programs such as transition services and training for the parents. These programs will enable the parents to check the progress of their children at home and also help them as some of them are not natives hence language could be an issue. Also, the training focuses on different things such as health and dietary to improve the nutrition of the children (Epstein, 1995).

Epstein (1995), also states that communication is another critical step in parent involvement. The plan will enhance communication through the social media handles created for the use of parents with the kids in the first grade. Besides, a unique phone number has been set aside that will make it possible for the parents to communicate with the teacher at all times without issues. Also, memos and notices will be published as a way of backing up the information transmitted through social media to ensure clarity of the message being conveyed.

The storytelling session during the evening on every Friday

Will allow parents to volunteer and share with the learners through stories(Coleman, 2013). Will pick class representatives who will involve parents during major activities such as the end of year meetings to deliberate on the progress of the children and what should be done to enhance their learning experience. The class parents will choose their leader as a way of ensuring fairness and equality to all. The school farm is one way that the school collaborates with the community through taking care of the farm. Also, the learners will be given an opportunity to interact with the community through programs such as volunteer services in cleaning the square or educating the community on environmental conservation.

Conclusion

An involvement plan is essential in ensuring the academic success of children. The class will have parent representatives who will help in organizing the relationship between the parents and the teacher. Also, a common source of communication will be available and the teacher and parent representative to be the only sources of information so as to avoid confusion. Storytelling sessions to allow for volunteering on the part of parents and also enhance their involvement in the learning process. Home visits by the teacher to the homes to ensure a lasting relationship.

The task of designing a communication plan has taught me the importance of parent involvement in their learner’s education. Besides, it reveals that a positive attitude towards the program is the only thing that will lead to its success in the end. Also, the wrong form of communication could lead to disunity among parents and the teacher hence affecting the progress of learners in school.

References

Beamer, L., & Varner, I. I. (2001). Intercultural communication in the global workplace. New

York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.

Coleman, M. (2013). Empowering family-teacher partnerships. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE

Publications.

Epstein, J. L. (1995). School/family/community partnerships. Phi Delta Kappan, 76(9), 701.

Saracho, O. N. (1999). Families’ involvement in their children’s literacy development. Early

Child Development and Care, 153(1), 121-126.