Blog Posts By TeachMoore
Editor's note: In the final of a series of four guest blogs on how teachers view parent involvement and engagement in public education, Renee Moore responds to Larry Ferlazzo's distinction: Parent Involvement or Parent Engagement?
Earlier today, we published Larry's response to Renee's posting, How Much Parent Involvement Do Educators Really Want?
Larry’s thoughtful distinction between “involvement” and “engagement” of parents is more than just semantics. We agree that the attitude of educators toward parents significantly determines the quality of response we can expect. For a more detailed look at the dynamics of trust in parent/ school relations, read the book Trust in Schools (Bryk and Schneider, 2002).
Larry is also right (as numerous studies and our own teaching experiences show) that any level of school/community/parent cooperation produces some positive effect on student achievement. My concern is that ...
Editor's note: This is the first in a series of four guest blogs on how teachers view parent engagement and involvement in public schools. Stay tuned for a contribution from teacher-blogger Larry Ferlazzo.
I grew up in a big city and graduated from a magnet high school that had 5,000 students. My teachers barely knew who I was, much less who my parents were. How different from the Mississippi school districts where I’ve taught for nearly two decades. The total population of one town was just under 2,000, and half of them were students in our schools.
Parent involvement takes on a very different meaning when I see the parents of my students every week ringing me up in the grocery store, rinsing me out at the beauty shop, tuning up my car at the local garage, or delivering my mail. I worship with them, bowl with them, sit in the waiting rooms with them. I know them, and they trust me.
Trust is the issue with most parents. Here in the Delta, over 40% of the adults are illiterate; others have ...
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A Village Route to Early Childhood Education
In the 1990s, we at Davenport Community Schools noticed a trend: Children were coming to kindergarten unprepared to learn. A troublingly low number of our district’s children (more than half of whom receive free or reduced price lunch) had preschool experience. Recognizing the importance of early childhood education in ensuring students are ready to succeed in school and life, we developed the Children’s Village, which includes formal preschool classes and all-day, year-round programming serving children from six weeks to five years old. Today, when a Children’s Village student arrives for the first day of kindergarten, the teacher can say, “This child is ready to learn.”
With early childhood education, students learn more, teachers accomplish more and taxpayers get more for their education tax dollar. But it takes all our students, teachers, staff, administrators, parents and partners to make the Children’s Villages a success. Indeed, it really does take a village to ensure quality early childhood education. Read more
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