Quiz for Teachers

TEACHERS, HOW ARE YOU DOING IN TERMS OF 
PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT???

Getting parents connected to the school is the most important and, in many ways, most difficult job parent groups undertake. There are many facets to building involvement, and it requires a focused effort. Take our quiz to get an idea of how your group stacks up. For each question, choose the answer that best fits your group and score the number of points listed next to your answer.

1. The school year has just begun. Your first correspondence with parents most likely will be:

A welcome packet with information about your school and group (3)

A newsletter with dates and upcoming activities (1)

A flyer announcing the fall fundraiser (-1)

2. New families at your school are:

Oriented right away to the school and your group. Your group holds a big welcome event or has a family buddy system to let them know how to get involved at school (3)

Given contact names and information for each board officer (2)

Encouraged to come to meetings to see how they can get involved (1)

3. When a parent complains about the lack of information regarding your parent group's activities at school, you:

Kindly share your group's website, newsletter, and officers' email addresses with her (3)

Encourage the parent to come to a meeting if she feels left out of the loop (1)

Chalk up the complaint as no big deal; it's only one parent, after all (-1)

4. Attendance at your last two family events this year has not been as high as it was last year. Your group figures:

It should send out a survey to parents asking for suggestions or ideas for other events (3)

More communication is needed in advertising the events through your website, newsletter, flyers, etc. (1)

The events are not worth the effort and will probably cancel plans for future ones (-1)

5. The same four volunteers have run your spring carnival for five years. Two new faces announce that they would like to take it over this year. Your group:

Puts them in touch with your carnival committee so they can share their ideas (3)

Informs the newbies that you could really use their help elsewhere (1)

Tells them the committee is all set with carnival volunteers this year and to check back next year (-1)

6. Your newbie auction chair has at least 10 questions for your board every time you meet. You've explained all of her duties to her, but she still requires major hand-holding. You:

Remind her of that trusty procedure binder or partner her with a seasoned auction veteran until she's more secure in her role (3)

Advise her to go over last year's meeting minutes and financial records to find out how last year's chair managed (1)

Let her figure it out; it's not rocket science! (-1)

Tell her that she's taken on too much and that one of your board members will take over from here (-1)

7. When it comes to thanking your volunteers, your group:

Takes the time to personally thank all who help out with your events and programs (3)

Personally thanks only those who do the most or best work (1)

Thanks people with a general thanks to everyone who helped out but doesn't make much of an effort at personal thank-yous (-1)

8. When you do hold family events at school, such as family fun nights, you charge how much for admission?

Nothing; they're free (3)

Just enough to cover costs—a dollar or two (2)

Enough to make a profit (0)

9. How well do you reach out beyond your core group? Give yourself two points for each of these that your group has:

A male officer or committee chair (2)

A dads' club (2)

A grandparent or guardian as an officer or committee chair (2)

A committee chair or officer who speaks English as a second language (2)

Newsletters and flyers regularly translated into a second language (2)

10. Is someone specific in your group assigned the responsibility of building involvement?

Yes, we have an involvement committee (3)

Yes, we have an involvement coordinator (1)

No (0)

Extra Credit:

Give yourself one point for each of the following that your group has:

Greeters at every event who are responsible for welcoming newcomers (1)

Nametags required at every meeting (1)

Officers' personal contact information on all correspondence to families (1)

Adults-only nights out organized and publicized by your group (1)

Scoring

Total possible points: 41, including extra credit

Above 30: Excellent

You have a strong understanding of what makes involvement grow, and your group is focused on best practices. Continuing to welcome and empower parents will keep your group energized.

21-30: Very good

You have good practices in place to build involvement. Continue to make personal approaches to potential volunteers, reach out to the entire school community and not just your core group, and treat people with respect and appreciation.

11-20: On the right track

Your group does some good things to build involvement. Consider creating an involvement committee if you don't have one. Assigning people to focus just on that important task can really help your efforts.

0-10: Need more focus

A more concentrated effort on involvement will add strength and vitality to your group. Start by making sure your day-to-day contact with parents is friendly and personal—and not always about fundraising.

Below 0: Time to rethink your involvement efforts

It's easy to get caught up in the tasks and activities involved in running a parent group. But making the effort to build involvement can make everything easier.

Quiz retrieved from http://www.ptotoday.com/pto-today-articles/article/407-quiz-rate-your-involvement-iq

Tips for Teachers...

Educators:

·      Seek out opportunities for professional development in training in parental involvement.

·      Make parents feel welcome in the school.

·      Provide a parent center for parents to use while at school.

·      Reach out to parents whose first language is not English.

·      Learn about the various backgrounds of the students and know how to communicate with diverse families.

·      Accommodate parents' work schedules when creating parent-involvement opportunities.

·      Assign homework projects that engage each child's parents and family and make learning more meaningful for the student, such as a family history, interviews with grandparents, or descriptions of parents' daily work.

·      Keep parents informed of their children's performance and school activities by means of notes, telephone calls, newsletters, conferences, and meetings.

·      Provide clear, practical information on home-teaching techniques for parents of children who need extra help at home.

·      Provide opportunities for parents to visit the school, observe classes, and provide feedback.

·      Start the school year with an opening conference. 

·      Develop a plan to promote parent-teacher partnerships at school.

·      Invite parents to serve on school or district committees.

Parental Involvement in Schools

While the idea of increasing parent involvement most often receives universal approval, defining what parent involvement really means is far more difficult. Most parents when asked if they are involved in supporting their kid's education, growth, and development would answer in the affirmative and may even take offense at anyone assuming otherwise.

In 1999, Public Agenda, a non-profit organization dedicated to unbiased public opinion research, conducted a study and produced a report, "Playing Their Parts: Parents and Teachers Talk About Parental Involvement in Public Schools." The results were fascinating, finding a lot of murky areas of communication on the topic of parent involvement. What they did find was a common concern for the welfare and future of our nation's children and the "feeling" that there is something different that parents and schools need to be paying attention to.

According to the study, the term parental involvement means many things to many people. For some, it means getting more parents involved in school governance, volunteering in the classroom or fund raising to benefit the school. But for many others, the focus is on what is happening at home.

While the research showed that volunteering at school is helpful and important, there was overwhelming agreement that it is not what parents do at school but what they do at home that makes the difference. Both teachers and parents agreed that teaching kids respect, effort, and self-control is essential to support academic learning. These core values, echoed by all, are what make the difference in kid's success in school and in life. The study showed that "teachers across the country believe that they simply cannot do their best job teaching because too many students lack the basic upbringing and supervision to make them ready to learn."

Parent involvement is much more complex than meets the eye. Today's parents know that education is of great importance to their children's success and they face a number of new pressures unknown to past generations, including the effect of the media and the internet on children. They already feel they are more involved than their own parents were in raising them. So what priorities need to change? How can parents and schools come to terms with these important issues?

The non-profit National ParentNet Association, through its work with more than 40 schools over a ten-year period, recently launched a new website, ParentInvolvementMatters.Org to encourage grassroots action in local school communities. The emphasis is placed on what parents do at home to support kids learning and how parent involvement programs must facilitate collaboration between parents and schools.

ParentNet is one program that has been used successfully to build a network of communication between parents and schools and to facilitate learning about the things that matter most to our kids. Although the website offers access to ParentNet and its materials for schools to freely use, it also provides a window to many other resources, articles, and success stories that are being developed around the country.

Much more discussion is necessary between parents and between parents and schools on the subject of parent involvement. As reformers work to improve education, we must ask some tough questions about how parents are currently "involved" and what that involvement may look like if it were to better support the learning goals of most educational institutions.

Marilyn Mitchell is a co-founder of the National ParentNet Association. A non-profit organization dedicated to improving parent involvement in schools and education.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Marilyn_Mitchel

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/931411