Ask an expert: Improving parent-teacher interviews

What teachers can do to make parent interviews positive and productive

• Establish the belief that the meeting will be real, meaningful and relevant for teacher, parent and child. The meeting must result in productive strategies and hope. It must be honest and fair.

• The conference should be a celebration of who the child is, what he or she knows and can do, and what the possibilities could be if certain strategies are put in place. The root of evaluation is to "value", the process should be positive. That does not mean that you ignore the tough stuff…the things that need work and attention. What it does mean is that you talk about the needs and difficulties in a way that the essence of the child is not destroyed and hope is not eroded for all parties.

• It is helpful if the facts have been shared before the interview: a report card before a reporting meeting, a note about what the meeting will be about when it is an invitational conference about a particular concern. Parents and teachers need enough information to prepare for the conference no matter who requests it. If parents or teachers are not informed about the nature of the requested meeting, there is the possibility of feeling ambushed by blame fixing and the result is that someone is set in a defensive position. Frustration, anger, fear, discouragement often result and so hope is blanched, the child suffers and the result is far from hopeful for change.

• The conference should be practical. The results should be manageable actions and or strategies.

• It should build partnership and relationship, not set up opposing forces.

• The conference must allow all voices to be "at the table": the teacher's, the parents' or caregiver's and the child's. If the child is not there in person (our first choice) then the child should be aware of what is being said about them and have been involved in preparing the portfolio of work discussed. A report should be given to the child about what was discussed, planned and celebrated.

Some other things
Involve parents whenever possible in the school. Some excellent suggestions for schoolwide activities that build community can be found in At Home in Our Schools (Developmental Studies Center, 1994) If parents are comfortable in the school, that makes a huge difference.

• Involve caregivers in classroom activities. Allow them to just visit, invite them to volunteer in various ways, invite them to be a part of their child's education in any way they can.

• Have a classroom newspaper that reports what is happening regularly in your classroom. Allow the children to act as reporters who describe and comment on learning experiences and class news. Invite parents to contribute to the newspaper.

• Involve the student in preparing a portfolio of work to share with the parent or care giver. This portfolio could contain a sampling of dated work that would demonstrate the development and learning of the student from the beginning of the year. An additional reflection could be prepared where the child and the teacher together described the learning accomplished in the chosen pieces. This metacognitive exercise reinforces the learning and celebrates the learner's accomplishments. For example you might include: excerpts from the writing folder, the reading log book, some pieces of special writing, a math test, a social studies project, an art piece, a music composition, a spelling test...