Building Relationships With Families
Have you found any good strategies that keep your absenteeism rates lower?
We introduced a school wide award that is awarded to the classroom in each grade level with the highest attendance rate each month. When our individual classes have attendance above 95% on a daily basis, we get a postcard with our mascot on it to display outside our classroom door (with the date earned). When our classroom earns 10 of them, we get a visit from the Woot-Woot wagon and each student gets to pick a treat!
🎥 Family Book Trailer Challenge
What it is: Families work together to create a short video trailer for a favorite children’s book.
How to use: Share through Seesaw, Padlet, or Wakelet. Adds media literacy + excitement.
Our families utilized this as an extension after Reading Month in March.
How do you encourage students and their families to continue to celebrate reading - even after Reading Mont has ended?
🌱 "Story Roots" Project
What it is: Families trace a favorite story or folktale from their cultural or linguistic background.
How to use: Students share the origin, language, or meaning behind the story and retell it (via video, audio, drawing, or writing).
Bonus: Builds home-school connections and honors multilingualism.
This is one of the projects our upper elementary students are using with their families.
What unique projects are families in your area doing?
We had a late Reading Month celebration due to snow and ice storms followed by spring break. Last night we met with families and shared all kinds of fun reading and math alternatives to common board games. Here is the Google file with a few of the FILE FOLDER games we shared! Feel free to share them, print them etc!
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1vw2EFbC-XW6n4pbOkDU5WyU0Uvu4SCWC?usp=sharing
How did you celebrate reading month with families this year?
Celebrating Reading Month with Families! Check out all of the FREE literacy activities at: https://www.ginapepin.com/blank-10-1-1
In lieu of Night of the Notables, which has historically focused too much on white men and has raised concerns about cultural appropriation, we hosted a TEDx Event to give students the opportunity to take on the role of changemakers—a major focus of our civil rights unit. This event allowed them to share their own ideas, passions, and leadership, amplifying diverse voices and meaningful, authentic storytelling.
It was truly inspiring to see these young voices confidently express their unique perspectives and innovations with the world. Rather than looking only to the past, this event empowered students to shape the future. Do other schools also host TEDx Talks? I'd love to see them!
This year our school is using the theme - board games for reading month. We all design and create board games on our classroom doors. We make them interactive so that students and families can enjoy them!
My door is based on the game Mad Gab - and I used the sentences from UFLI to create this fun activity!
March is reading month! This year our reading month theme is - board games! What theme is your school using for reading month? And do you have a family night - if so, what type of evening do you plan with your families?
Michigan Department of Education shares several resources for family literacy and home to school connections. It is entitled: Family Engagement for Literacy. Here are a few of the documents included:
Supporting Families in the Essential Practice of Read Alouds; Sharing Why the Read Aloud Is an Essential Practice With Families
Does your state department of education share valuable resources you can use to collaborate and build understanding with families?
https://www.michigan.gov/mde/services/academic-standards/literacy/family-engagement-for-literacy
How can we reassure parents that struggling with reading is not a reflection of their child's potential, but rather a natural part of the learning process?
Next week we are planning an hour with our families for our first and second grade students. We are part of the Leader in Me program and we have invited families to come in and view our Classroom Mission Statements and then create Family Mission Statements! We have set up social media picture spots in the building for families to pose by/at. What hashtag do you think would be fun to use? We are the Lemmer Leopards ;).
As we continue to build relationships with the parents, here is an example of an email I sent to everyone because, well, I made a mistake.
Good Tuesday afternoon everyone-
Remember that time you thought it was a Tuesday because the teacher said it was a Tuesday and you were expecting a Tuesday folder to come home on Tuesday because Tuesday is when the Tuesday folder comes home?
Well, the teacher knew it was a Tuesday and did not send the Tuesday folder home on Tuesday because there was a FAST test on Tuesday and the teacher who even sent an email home saying it was a Tuesday in the subject now has to apologize on a Tuesday for not sending the Tuesday folder home today which is a Tuesday because he forgot it was a Tuesday.
Tuesday word count: 18
Being able to joke during your mistakes helps ease the tension with the parents. It also opens up a closeness when there is effort to be vulnerable with your mistakes. In the grand scheme of things, it is not that big of a deal but it brings people together.
