I have a confession to make. I am not a very social person and I dread the topic of parental involvement. My husband and I don't have kids of our own so I sometimes feel like the only thing I have in common with parents is that I like their kids. Case in point, last term in my Master's class, a colleague did a presentation on the importance of parental involvement and we discussed visiting students' home and meeting the parents. The very thought terrifies me. I would no more visit a student's home than stop by a friend's house (which I almost never do). I am not a "visitor" and unless I am very comfortable with a friend, I will rarely hang around their (a use of a plural pronoun to be gender neutral - the focus of another post) house.
So, what does a socially awkward teacher do when she avoids people whenever she can? The first thing is I ask a friend to help me write good news postcards home to parents. I love the idea but I just can't figure out what to write. Can you send home a postcard that says, "you have a darned nice kid there"? I am even socially awkward through the mail.
I teach seniors so I rarely need to call home but I would like to let parents and students know about the good things that they are doing. The same friend who writes my postcards started using the App, Remind. She convinced another colleague (hello Daniella and Kathy) to use it as well and they did so with great success last year. So, I am going to give it a try. At least my Grade 9 parents will know what is going on and I will take that as a first step towards more parental involvement in my classroom.
Remind lets a teacher text out a message to subscribed parents and students. It is a one way line of communication, so it does not open up the possibility of parents or students responding. I think there are a few too many ways that parents and students can contact me in my life already. All students and parents have to do is text the number Remind designates and use the code generated when you create an account with them. There is an option to use a google sign in and I am all Google, all the time, so that is great for me. Then, you can text to all the subscribers. My friends say it is easy so I will give it a try.
Has anyone else faced their fears of parental involvement? Have you used Remind? Any suggestions?
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