How Your Involvement Helps
It's no surprise that teachers' morale improves dramatically when they
feel that parents strongly support them and their work. Research clearly
shows that improved teacher morale has a direct impact on our children.
Student achievement is higher, the school enjoys a better reputation
in the community, and parents and members of the community show increased
support of schools and willingness to pass local tax bonds to support
the school. It's a powerful cycle, and parental involvement is key.
Parents are not equally available to be actively involved at school.
And every parent has times (or years) when she's more or less available.
Sometimes you'll be able to participate, sometimes you won't. Research
shows that a parent's decision to be involved, no matter her
circumstances or amount of available time, has the greatest impact on
a child's education. Studies have found that parent involvement
occurs not just in high-resource, leisure-rich communities, but equally
vigorously in communities principally composed of working parents, low-income
parents, or largely non-English-speaking parents.
Who Benefits?
Studies show that all children in a schoolėnot just the children
of parents who are involvedėdevelop better attitudes about school and
schoolwork when parent volunteers are in the classroom. The general
presence of parents in the classroom communicates that schools and schoolwork
are valued and important in the community.
How Your Child's School Can Use Your Help
- Academics. Be involved with the academic program as a classroom
volunteer.
- Fundraising. Help raise funds to pay for enrichment activities,
either by conducting fundraising events or writing grant proposals.
- Materials. Gather or help provide materials for science activities.
- Decision making. Serve in a decision-making or oversight
role, such as being a member of the school site committee.
- Advocacy. Serve as a school proponent/supporter in the community,
at the school board, with local businesses.
- Community Liaison. Help your school form partnerships
with business and community organizationsėstarting with your
own!
Practical Ways in Which You Can Support Your Child's School
- Ask teachers how you can help.
- Visit your child's classroom; sit in on classroom activities
or lessons.
- Share your knowledge, skills, or interests with your
child's class.
- Help in the classroom. Work with students to provide
extra support.
- Help with field trips and other extracurricular activities.
- Assist
your child's teacher by obtaining and preparing class materials.
- Join
parent/school decision-making committees.
- Learn about school programs
and needs, and then advocate for those needs to your communityėyour
neighbor, the school board, community organizations, etc.
- Raise money
for school projects.
- Call the local newspaper to get news coverage
for school events or unusual class projects.
- Volunteer to help office
staff conduct school mailings.
- Organize community "appreciation
events" for teachers,
such as cooking and serving a meal on a day when teachers need
to stay late, or organizing a "thank you brunch."
Every parent has different interests, talents, and available time.
The key is finding your way (and your year) to be involved at your child's
school.
Consider advocating for active school/parent
partnerships, starting at the classroom or school level. The Great
Explorations in Math and Science (GEMS®)
program at the Lawrence Hall of Science has published a handbook called
Parent
Partners: Workshops to Foster School/Home/Family Partnerships,
with a variety of resources that can be used to build
such partnerships.
Adapted from Spark
Your Child's Success in Math and Science (GEMS, 2002) |
