Chapter 9: Family Involvement

        Often times the task of educating 20+ students seems to weigh heavy on the shoulder of teachers. There is so much curriculum to cover and so many standards of achievement that students are expected to reach. This chapter outlines some current challenges, existing programs, and possible goals for having families help in this enormous, yet extremely special and rewarding, process of educating today's students. Each year students spend approximately 180 days in the classroom. This means that nearly half of the year is spent outside of the school walls with people other than teachers. Schools need to tap into the family and the critical role it can have in ensuring a successful school tenure for all students.

       In the text it says that one particular program, Arizona At-Risk Pilot Project, analyzed parental involvement by looking at the family's supportiveness of their student and their active participation in the school. Families could be divided into four categories. Those who support their child and are actively involved int he school, those who do neither, and those who do one of the two. The families that are supportive of their children but not involved in the school may be doing so for a variety of reasons. They may feel uncomfortable in school setting, lack access to transportation or childcare, or have work during the time of school based programs. No matter what the reason, "absence from school events does not indicate a lack of family support for their children" (p.226).

       Unfortunately though, I say that the lack of involvement, due to a plethora of reasons can have a negative effect on a student's emotions. This year, in an effort to get families more involved in not only PTA sponsored events, I decided to invite the parents in for a few of our writing celebrations of our published writing. Parents were notified via permission slip and my teacher website about the celebrations and invited to come, bringing small children if they did not have childcare. For our persuasive writing unit students wrote speeches and were scheduled to deliver them to the class at a particular time slot to which their parents were invited. To my pleasant surprise, about 75% of the students in my classroom had either one or more family members in attendance. These students took even more pride in their work and were beaming to see a relative in the audience.

      For one student in my class, who has two educated parents who work full time, the outcome of this invitation and attempt to involve families had the opposite affect. Jenny* did a wonderful job presenting her speech about protecting endangered animals, but later that day seemed out of sorts. When I checked in with her privately to see if everything was alright she told me that she was upset that her parents weren't there for her speech and never came to anything at school like the other parents. Jenny's parents were extremely involved in her education, coming to nearly all evening events at school, so I immediately reassured Jenny that her parents were just as proud as those who came, but unfortunately it just didn't work with their schedules. I then had her deliver her speech again at recess and I recorded and sent it on to her parents explaining what had happened in school and apologizing for any negative effects inviting guests may have had on their daughter.

       The connection, or so what, between this vignette and the message of the chapter might not be clear. I am sharing this because it is obvious that we want to strive for having parents who are supportive and actively involved in schools, but this isn't always feasible. We as teachers need to find a way to make families partners in the education of their children without alienating certain students whose families are unable to be a part of a certain event. My goal in the coming year is to set up some type of video conferencing so that parents who are unable to physically attend, but have access to the internet might be able to still "attend" these special moments in their student's classroom. For a majority of the families in my mostly middle-class school district this is a possible solution, but with whatever I decide going forward I will consider the positive and negative consequences a program has on my students.

       Another type of parent that may have trouble being a part of the schooling of their child is those who lack an education or competence in the English language. To tackle this issue it says "schools must complement families in educating children." This might involve basic literacy education for families, preschool, family education, and parent and child activities (p. 229). With the ever increasing rigor of school curricula, it becomes increasingly challenging for parents with limited education or their own to support their son or daughter. This section of the chapter goes on to discuss how some parents do not even know about the programs that are available to them and where they can go to receives these often free services.

       I say that this problem is magnified at my school due to the somewhat small percentage of the population that live in poverty or lack a formal education. Since this subset of my school is in the minority, the discussion surrounding support service and the available program seemed minimal and highly needed. I had two particular students in my class this year where the primary language spoken at home is not English. Both students were struggling learners, reading below grade level, and for at least one of them the family wanted to help, but felt unable to do so. Often Jack's* mom would come in to the classroom and explain to me how she wants to help him at home, but she can't read English and her husband gets home late from work so Jack is frequently on his own to complete his work.

       With students expected to come to school "ready to learn" and to be supported throughout their time as a student, my school needs to do more to connect minority and low income families with services they might not even know are available. So what? How can I as a classroom teacher make this vision a reality? I personally plan to commit myself to learning more about what my community has to offer and finding ways to help connect families to these services. While the majority of an education still falls on the teacher, enlightening parents and making them a part of the process can greatly benefit the student.

* Names were changed.

Chapter 5 and 6

What Makes a School Special?

Meryl Becourtney

Readingville, New Jersey. For many years schools have invested a lot of money in becoming “special.” The truth is what sets an education apart and leads to reading and writing success is the classroom teacher and what happens within the four classroom walls. The classroom can be a special place without any special program. There is also not always a need for a specialist to remove students from the classroom. Instead, their support can be given right in the classroom. Administrators too, can work to make the school a special place for all students to learn.

            If making the classroom a special place is what is desired, then it can be done through supporting teachers to become that special factor.  As Allington and Cunningham share (2007), “Schools with success in teaching all children had enormously effective classroom instruction” (p. 104). There is no special formula or program that makes certain teachers able to teach a group of students to read and write. Instead of focusing on finding the special curricula that will help students reach success in literacy, there needs to be more energy and resources put in to developing the teacher. “For too long, efforts in improving school effectiveness have focused everywhere but on the classroom teacher” (p. 105) He or she can be the super hero if given the proper support and professional development. Unfortunately, “Classroom teachers’ expertise… has not been valued” or acknowledged for how special it can be, especially when considering the vast knowledge they have about their students (p.106).

            The value of specialists and coaches should not be overlooked, but moving forward these supports should be collaborative with the teacher in the regular classroom. “Classroom teachers need the opportunity to work and talk collaboratively about their work with their peers” (p. 107). One way this can be done is through “shared development of lesson plans” (p.111). If the lesson plans can be delivered to the target audience together, that is even better. Delivering support services in an in-class setting have been linked to equal or greater gains in achievement than pull out services (p.111-112). So rather than removing a particular student to give her a specialized program or service, work to meet her needs in the classroom.  What should be special is the collaboration and teamwork between the teacher and support staff in the building.

            In order to truly have special teachers, it is critical to have a supportive administration that works with the educators to provide them with the support they need to feel equipped to teach their students. Principals need to move “toward building-level decision making with decision-making teams that involve teachers and parents, not just administration” (p.129). Principals are the ones who must support the special teachers in their buildings so that they feel comfortable and backed to “take the lead and support each other” (p.130). Administrators, like teachers, need to be trained and educated in the field of literacy so that they can support the teachers in their building, because unfortunately too few teachers have strong literacy backgrounds (p.113).

            It might be hard to believe, but there is no magic spell, medicine, or formula to get kids to read and write. Each year a new batch of students will enter the classroom and the special educator in that room will determine, with support from administration and other staff members, how successful the year is. Let's throw away the notion that something external needs to be done and instead focus on cultivating the leaders we have in front of America's youth each and every day.