Preparing for Parent Teacher Conferences
Every year, without fail, there are two time periods when our phones are ringing off the hook. Octoberish and Aprilish - aka parent teacher conference time.
Here we are, getting near the end of October, and once again, Compassionate Counseling is getting busy.
So, I thought we’d share a few suggestions with you, our parents, about that time of the year where you think everything is going great… and then you go “oh no.”
Because while you may think you know exactly how your child is doing at school, not every parent does. And there are a few suggestions that we can pass along to help you from feeling blindsided at parent teacher conferences. So, get ready for our suggestions on…
Preparing for Parent Teacher Conferences
Tip #1: Send an email to the teacher (and ask these 3 questions)
Teachers have A LOT on their plate, and they’re also trying to balance keeping parents informed without overwhelming them on all the details (plus, emailing one parent is one thing, but emailing all 25 parents in a classroom with specific information on each and every child is a whole other beast).
So instead of blindly walking in to parent teacher conferences, we encourage parents to preemptively reach out and ask these three questions.
Academically, how can we help support the work you’re already doing in the classroom?
Behaviorally, what are you noticing with our child?
In order to prepare for our meeting, are there any specific issues, concerns, or incidents we should talk with our child about first?
Tip #2: Check in with your kid
So many parents pick up their kid from school, or check in with them at the end of the work day, and ask “how was your day?” 9 times out of 10, your kid is just going to say “okay.” Even if it was a wonderful day! Even if it was a terrible day.
To get a more clear picture of what’s going on, we encourage parents to try asking these specific conversation starters, and to incorporate more open ended questions. We use these tools in order to get at a more complex answer than “good, bad, fine” etc.
Tell me one good thing that happened today.
Tell me one not so good thing that happened today.
What’s been really challenging about class lately?
What’s been really easy?
And for this next week or two specifically: I haven’t heard anything rom the teacher, but you know parent teacher conferences are coming up. What do you think the teacher is going to say about how you’re doing in class?
Tip #3: Know how to roll with the punches (and what NOT to do)
Ultimately, you can’t control how parent teacher conferences go. If you’re surprised about the information the teacher is passing along, it’s okay to notice any feelings of defensiveness, frustration, or worry come up.
But here’s our most important tip for parents: don’t let these emotions take over.
It’s very natural to blame the teacher for poor classroom management, or for not challenging your child enough in the classroom. It’s also really common to want to provide a consequence to your child for these past behaviors.
The best way forward, though, is to actually move forward and focus on how you can help support your child and your teacher for the remainder of this semester. Listen to their suggestions, and ask specifically how they plan to measure progress in behaviors or academics.
How counseling can help:
You may also want to consider counseling (like our many October and April parents do), because having a therapist who understands how anxiety and stress impact behaviors can be crucial.
We often get release’s from parents to work with schools and classroom teachers, sharing information on what strategies we’re building in therapy, getting detailed reports on how the child is doing in class, and taking in this information to help wrap around services and make sure we’re actually improving on what we need to improve.
Curious to learn more about preparing for parent teacher conferences? Feeling just a little worried that your child may not be doing as great in school as you hope? Set up a free phone consultation right on our website to learn more about how we can help. We work with families of children ages 4 on up throughout the St. Louis area, including Clayton, Ladue, Creve Couer, and many private, parochial, and public school districts.