Family involvement in any area of education is crucial to help foster student success. This is especially true in Special Education. Some students may not be able to tell their parents how their day was and what they learned. Read on to learn easy ways to facilitate family involvement!
Parent News Board
If you teach in a school where parents/families are coming in for drop off and pick up, it can be helpful to have a bulletin board posted outside of the classroom. This board can contain important information related to the class and school. This example below is from a preschool. Parents can see the daily schedule, daily lesson plan, a QR code for a class wish list, and more.
Daily Communication Logs
It can be beneficial to send home a daily log with the student for their families to look at. These can be as detailed or as simple as you’d like.
You may want to do something more detailed like keeping a composition notebook for each student. Every day, you can write a note to families about how the student’s day was, any successes and challenges, things learned, etc. This is also a great place to note any upcoming changes in the child’s schedule (school holidays, field trips, etc.) This notebook can go back and forth every day, and parents/caregivers can write back to the teacher with any questions, things that happened at home the teacher may need to be aware of, etc.
If you want to keep it more simple, Simply Special Ed has home/school communication sheets. These are focused on different areas the child participated in and even lets the child reflect on how their day went by circling a picture. They also allow space for teachers and parents to add their own notes.
Use apps
There are many different apps that parents/families can download on their phone to stay involved with school. I have personally used Remind, Google Classroom, and ClassTag. There are many others out there!
These apps allow the teacher to post quick updates for all parents/caregivers to read. This is helpful when you want to remind the whole class about something, like picture day being tomorrow. These apps also allow you to message parents individually if it’s something that just involves their child.
These also help you maintain a work/life balance, as families are not being given your actual phone number. You can also set certain office hours on the app, so you are not taking messages all hours of the day.
Newsletters
Newsletters are one of my favorite ways to help with family involvement since I think they are fun to design! When I was a classroom teacher, I sent a newsletter home every Friday.
The newsletter had bullet points describing what students learned/worked on in each subject that week. It also had a spot for important reminders, as well as a section for any materials that were needed for the classroom.
Encourage family learning at home
In my opinion, the best kind of “homework” is the kind that encourages students and their families to spend quality time together. Many activities can be tied in with academics.
As a classroom teacher, I liked to send home an optional homework calendar over school breaks to encourage the students to spend time with their families doing fun seasonal things. For example, over winter break, they would be given a calendar with different ideas for every day of break (build a snowman, make hot cocoa and count how many marshmallows you add, draw a winter picture, etc.)
Reading at home can also be made fun by making it a game that parents and children can do together. Reading bingo is a great way to encourage learning at home.
Simply Special Ed also has seasonal parent handouts that encourage family involvement and learning at home and places in the community.
Family involvement at school does not have to be complicated! Hopefully you can take some of these suggestions into your classroom to support your students and families.
Leave a Reply