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Provide one or two examples of new ways you might include parents by allowing them to use their skill sets.
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One way we can include parents in the classroom is to see how our content area is being used in the real world through a parent’s job or career. This helps students see the the material they are learn isn’t static, but in fact is dynamic.
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Being a new teacher who has only taught full time for 2 years, and due to COVID, I have not had the opportunity to include parents other than my first year field trips and classroom parties! I would love to invite parents in and have them play educational games, monitor a literacy center, prepare/set up materials for Science experiments, and read to my students. I think providing a questionnaire at the beginning of the school year would be beneficial to see what parents interests are in helping, and to let them know what specific opportunities are available. As I get to know them better, and learn of their strengths, I can also ask them to do specific tasks. For example, more outgoing and animated parents might be a great choice for read alouds. I might ask artistic parents to run a special art activity. I can also ask them to share different talents such as music or engineering activities.
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Once we are allowed to have guest speakers, I would like to include parents in my home economics course. I would like them to share with the course something that they are “experts” in.
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I have not been proactive about using parent skills in my classroom. However, whenever I think I have a problem with a parent, I find that there is a lesson for me to learn. Sometimes, parents share their disciplinary actions with me (e.g., taking away a phone, skipping athletics until school work is caught up, etc…) and I later can share those ideas with other parents. Sometimes parents share an experience they remember from school and I can incorporate it into a lesson. I think I should be more proactive in the future about (1) keeping parents better informed about student progress and (2) asking for parent participation ideas rather than trying to wedge them into my plans.
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One thought might be to have a survey form at the beginning of the year. Usually we ask parents to fill out something similar about their child so we can get to know their child and be aware of any specific situations we should. It might be wise to have a form that asks parents a few questions about what they are able to do. During a program we do for one day called “Outdoor School” we teach 5th graders survival skills for an entire day. I was able to utilize a parent who was a search and rescue professional to help teach that day. He was very excited to be there and enjoyed sharing his knowledge. I realized how wonderful it was to let the parents share from their expertise. I certainly could utilize parents on a regular basis to grade papers, but I would love to find more ways for them to share from the areas in which they are skilled. A survey at the beginning of the year would help me as we work through the curriculum to find ways to include them on a regular basis.