Reading the guide will empower teachers to demonstrate improved awareness and knowledge of forging partnerships with families in the most unexpected of ways. Particularly helpful are the plethora of professional videos and downloadable content. Best practices will be reborn, honed, and invented. Educators will learn the importance of making themselves available to families even before the school year begins, reaching out via a parent communication app., a phone call, or a touching letter to introduce themselves. At Back to School Night one might be compelled to emphasize that they view each of their students as a stakeholder, their caregivers as their first teacher, and a promise that no family member will ever be marginalized in that classroom. 'Powerful Partnerships' is evermore important right now as teachers are challenged to examine their beliefs about family engagement with extreme urgency due to distance learning required as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Teachers and adminstrators all over the world have been challenged to connect with families and students in a way that is practical and realistic. Continuing the use of the class communication platforms that students and families are already familiar with, providing feedback, offering social emotional support, and continuing critical dialogue is imperative as educators are unable to form face-to-face partnerships. In order to facilitate live video conferencing a teacher might choose to use a peer to peer platform, schedule and attended virtual meetings with families and/or make phone calls to make connections. We as educators will never have a more powerful opportunity to network in a more personal way with parents.
These meetings will allow families to continue or begin the process of building trusting and respectful relationships. The work of family engagement- when parents are invited to any school function by their child's teacher, contributes tremendously to their sense of being welcomed and honored. Get on the phone, draft an an email, or send a message today if you have not already. The goals of these meetings will be for parents to know that their child's teacher sincerely wants to partner with them. You will stay connected as a learning community because of these initial meetings. They are exhausting but worth it. For the first time in many of our careers, every family can, in some way, become connected to their children's learning and teachers are in a position to truly differentiate learning for every child.
Mapp, Carver, and Lander encourage educators to begin to or to continue to implement creative and family friendly ways to engage their learning community. For now and until the world is safe again, that entails utilizing technology, distance learning strategies, and maybe, an old fashioned pocket chart and chart paper hanging awkwardly from the back of your bedroom door. Use a blog and meaningful tweets to share Powerful Partnerships messages of welcoming, honoring, and connecting with families. Buy the book and make the read copy available to any colleague who would like to read it too.
There are many ideas in the that book are definitely worth discussing and possibly implementing for the benefit of classrooms and campuses. Good News Phone Calls - an administrator or teacher calls an unsuspecting parent with good news, for example, serves to let famies know that schools recognize that their child is cared for and important. Hopes and Dreams Letters - letters that families write to their child in the langugage that they feel the most comfortable, are an important way to demonstrate that families are a critical part of a learning community. These could be displayed in the classroom, along with a photo of the student and their family, throughout the year. All families have dreams for their children and this is a way to honor that.
Each of us is a history maker. Each of us has the power to guide the path that history will take. When parents and teachers forge dynamic partnerships, students win. Read the book - it is a simple and powerful guide, schedule a meeting, and be that teacher that your student writes an essay about one day.
References
Mapp K., Carver I., Lander J. (2017). Powerful Partnerships, A Teacher's Guide to Engaging Families for Student Success The Atlantic. Scholastic Inc. USA