Making Parent/Teacher Conferences more Focused

Every time conferences come up, I always think of ways that I could improve and get more information to parents and from parents in regards to their child. There are times where it seems like I always end up saying the same thing over and over as the conferences go on and forget to "customize" my conference time for each student. It gets easy to get into a groove and just breeze through a conference. After I had finished my "presentation" and got all the information about progress reports, MTSS reports, pre/post testing, state assessments, important dates, interventions, etc, etc, etc. to parents that I thought was needed, the parents weren't left with much time to ask many questions before the next set of parents were waiting their turn. There always seemed to be more time needed and that I would ramble over seemingly trivial things and didn't have time for some of the more important aspects of the conference, the parent's concerns and questions about their child.

So, I tried to do somethings this time around that would hopefully help me stay more focused and give parents that information that they really want to know, "How is my child doing in class?"

I am a very reflective person and I feel that you can learn a lot by thinking back and giving yourself a little "self-assessment" of how things are going. (This blog is a case and point of that.) Having my students reflect on their year to date was a good way for me to see where students feel that they are at as far as classroom performance, work ethic, teamwork, etc. Usually students are harder on themselves than I would be, so for the most part, I can get an accurate representation of things from the student's perspective. I had them take a "self-assessment" of their own to help guide my thinking and discussions through the conference. The student filled out on side of the chart and I filled out the other. Any glaring differences are easy to spot and that's when a discussion can result of it. The results from this chart helped me pinpoint some areas of concern that I might have.

Student Self-Assessment

Next, I wanted a way that I could communicate with parents before the conference and get somewhat of a "preview" of any concerns, scenarios, questions, etc. that they might have beforehand. I told my students that their parents had the homework for the evening (and it was amazing how many kids sat and made sure that their parents did the work). The homework was a question and answer form that could highlight things that they, as parents, wanted to make sure was talked about during the conference. This was also a good way to get a "heads up" on any major concerns that a parent might have. There is nothing more uncomfortable than being bombarded by a frustrated parent about a scenario you knew nothing about. It was nice to have an idea as to what questions they might have so that, I make sure to have an answer for them.

Parent Pre-Conference Form

And finally, again being reflective, I just couldn't help myself. I created a form for parents to fill out during the conference that was an easy way to organize their thoughts. I created an "organizer" for parents to write down any celebrations they heard during the conference, any improvements that needed to be made, goals set, or things to work on, as well as important dates and other information. Well, to my surprise, parents loved this idea and I was glad to see parents writing vigorously things down to make sure to celebrate with their student and goals to keep track of.

Conference Notes

Overall, these subtle changes have given me a little more confidence heading into the conference session and gave the parents a lot more thorough and useful information so that their time wasn't totally wasted. These things helped me get past the explanation of things and give parents much needed and wanted information about their favorite thing in the whole world, their child.