How To Get The Best Out Of Parent-Teacher Conferences?

A cooperative connection between school and home is one building block for a better pathway for one’s child as a student. Most parent-teacher conferences don’t last longer than 10-15 min which isn’t specifically a lot of time to connect on vast aspects of your child’s school performance. So, with a bit of preparation and planning, one can make the most of this time.
So, here’s a list of what to do

Before the meeting:

1.Talk to your child

Get in a talk with your child about homework, assignments, projects, friends, environment, and other sorts of schoolwork. How is the teaching side of school going? Is the reading appropriate and given in an adequate amount? Asking questions like “Is there something you would want me to talk about from teachers?” would also be a good take.
Try to get a hold of previous report cards, any kind of message, and reports from teachers.

2.Be prepared

As you have talked with your child and reviewed schoolwork, make a list of questions to ask during the parent-teacher conference like What are my child’s most vital and weakest subjects? Does my child hand homework in on time? How are my child’s test-taking skills? What can one do at home to help support their child’s academic progress?

During the meeting:

1.Be on Time

Check the time being allotted for the parent-teacher conference and try to be ready a few minutes prior. As there’s only a limited amount of time allocated per student-parent couple so being late will just shorten your time with your child’s teacher and will affect their entire day schedule.

2.Positive attitude

The goal of both the teacher and parent is the success of the child. So, it’s essential to keep your emotions in check during the conference. Using a respectful tone will help in the process of working together to find solutions for your child. If there’s an instance of you disagreeing with the teacher, be sure to speak up about it; not doing so can make the teacher assume that you don’t have concerns. Try to start with a compliment for a cheerful light mood for the conference.

3.Get informed

One of the most essential parts of a parent-teacher conference is the process of getting info about children’s curricular and non-curricular performance. So, stay calm through the process and obtain information through the teacher. Get a close on if the teacher mentions any kind of recent/past unusual behavior of children, be it academic or during interactions.

4.Ask questions, listen.

With the previous list of the question prepared and the once emerged as you went through listening to the teacher, try to ask the most important ones first as there is only a limited amount of time available.
Listen to all that is talked about care and the feedback on what can be done to resolve the specific type of issue that emerged was there and could be improved upon.

After the meeting:

1.Work on the feedback

During the exchange, there must be feedback on what could be done from the parent side/what the parent can help the student with to further improve or draw attention to specific weak points in students’ curricular and co-curricular activities.

The Global Child Prodigy wishes you Happy Parenting!!!

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