Parents+and+collaboration

=** Parents and collaboration **= = = When researching for my presentation I came across an activity that teachers could use to identify their own strength and weakness’ in regards to communication with special needs students and their parents. The activity includes reading the options presented, choose the ones you disagree and agree with. Choose 2 options from each column and in groups come up with strategies to overcome these problems. This course has given me a lot of insight into how beneficial relationships between the teacher and parents are to the students. This activity is for the teachers to work out what they need to work on individually in terms of their communication skills. I feel communicating is essential for teachers as they can learn lots about their special needs students from their parents. In saying that parents need to communicate with teachers as well, both ends have to be open to talking and open to new idea and strategies concerning the student and child. Therefore this activity could also be given to parents of the students as a way to put both teachers and parents on the same page. Below is the graph or columns in which the activity is based on: Don't understand parental expectations Don't account for the presence of cultural or language differences of families Overwhelm parents with too much information Don't involve parents in programs Fail to develop realistic long and short term goals Don't provide parents with support and counselling Don't coordinate services Don't focus on positive attributes Do too much for parents in the short term without helping them network with outside organisations. Don't communicate with parents Don't ask adolescence about what they need || Don't have planned agendas when meeting with professionals Fail to realise or accept responsibility Don't communicate with teachers Look for a person or program as solution to their troubles Give away responsibility Over protect adolescents which fosters dependency Don't carry through on programs at home Fail to see progress Except poor or inappropriate programming Think that their child is the teachers only responsibility Neglects to say “thank you” Don't ask adolescence about what they need. || Bastiani (1989, in foreman 2008) identified the factors outlined below as contributing to poor relationship between teachers and parents.
 * **Teachers** || **Parents** ||
 * Don't understand total family picture
 * Reference list**

Bastiani, j. (1989). Working with Parents: A while school approach, UK: NFER Nelson, cited in Forman 2008, page 339)