Article Link: http://exchangepress.com/article/parent-meetings-creative-ways-to-make-them-meaningful/5017585/
Do you frequently complain about holding parent meetings because “hardly anyone shows up.” Do staff huddle up grousing that the parents who “really needed the information” didn’t even attend. Have you felt a little resentful about having to bribe parents into attending meetings by offering food and free child care?If so, you’re not alone. Many of us early childhood professionals get discouraged when parents don’t seem as enthused about family enrichment opportunities as we think they should be. But if you are consistently seeing your parent relations cup as half empty, rather than half full, you and your staff need a bit of an attitude adjustment.
What kind of adjustment? First, re-define your criteria for a successful parent meeting. It’s always easy to be disheartened by numbers, especially in the U.S. where we often judge success by size �" big showy numbers denote achievement whether we’re discussing our family incomes or our sports team’s performance.
In our work, if we focus ONLY on numbers �" namely how many parents attend any one meeting, we set ourselves up for disappointment. We also jump to some false assumptions. For instance, if attendance numbers don’t meet our expectations, we consider ...