Communicating with Parents

Editable Back to School Mailbag Labels

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I cannot believe that it is already time to prep for the new year again!

It’s to set up our classrooms and get everything ready for the new students and parents who are new to the school routine and how we each organize our own classroom.

Let’s be real. Communication with parents needs to happen ALL. THE. TIME. in Kindergarten and primary grades!

As a result, one of the very first things I tackle each year is my communication mailbags. Students send them home nightly with any mail that needs to go home and return them the next day. I’ll be honest, I like a uniform look so I make the bags up myself and it allows parents to read our expectations instantly, as a reminder, if required.

I always ensure that students names are on the bag so that they are easy to identify if they get lost.

Parents appreciate that they know I’ve got everything ready for them and I love the organized look!

Teacher Tip: 
Ensure you have these ready for your first parent meeting so you can go over expectations in person. Parents truly appreciate this personalized communication.

Happy back to school!


Back to School: Just In Case Clothes

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I cannot believe that it is already this time of the year again!

Time to set up my classroom and get everything ready for the new students who have never been to school before!

Let’s be real. Accidents happen ALL. THE. TIME. in Kindergarten!

As a result, the very first thing I tackled this year is my “just in case” clothes bag. We keep it in students buckets in our hallway and at night their indoor shoes go on top of the bag. I’ll be honest, I like a uniform look so I make the bags up myself and it allows parents to realize that the clothes should fit inside this container.

I always ensure that students names are on the bag so that they are easy to identify if they get lost and I like to add a list for what parents can add in the bag.

The list is pretty simple:
2 pairs of socks
2 shorts/pants
2 shirts
2 underwear

Parents appreciate that they know I’ve got everything ready for them and I love the organized look!

If you’re interested, you can check out these identical editable labels by clicking here

or you can see my blog post about a similar set of mailbag labels by clicking here.

Teacher Tip: 
Always have a spare change of clothes readily available at your school. You NEVER know if you will ever need them.

Happy back to school!

Parent Communication Organization

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 I love having an organized parent-teacher communication binder.

It helps keep me focused and I don’t need to search for multiple binders when everything is all located in on spot. My binder does get quite big by the end of the year but I do appreciate having a one-stop-spot for everything.

Binder Organization

What Do I Keep?

Basically, I keep every form of communication with parents which is written in my communication binder and much more! Such as:
Parents “wishes” that they want me to know about their child

Notes about student behavior
Parent volunteer lists (dates, times etc)
Parent sign up lists (snacks, play dough, etc)

Any information from our Special Education team or any
professional who comes to service students.

Parent communication log – both praise points and concerns

If you want to check out the log I use in my binder click on the image to view it!

Labels

Basic Labels
If I have tabs that I want to reuse every year I assign each student a number and then attach a class list to the front of my binder using a clip. I then can easily flip to the students’ number by counting to find their information quickly.

I have also used numbered tabs for multiple years but I find they don’t last as the ones I have purchased are not reinforced and I often have had more than 31 students in my class and I like a consistent form of organization.

If I had regularly had fewer students than 31 I would be more inclined to use these again. Click on any image on this page if you want to check them out on Amazon affiliate for more information. I don’t make a lot off of this at all, just hoping to cover some costs of running this website.


 Write & Erase
These, by far, are my favorite!

AND have saved my sanity this past year.

I have found that the Avery Write & Erase labels are often more durable than other dividers as they are reinforced along the edge where the holes are punched.

I also love them because I can write students names on these and reuse them year after year! I’ve had the set shown below but in the colors of my photos for a year and all of the dividers are in perfect condition despite daily use!

Exploring Inquiry in the Classroom

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If you are anything like me, adapting to an inquiry approach is often a journey that many of us educators dapple with timidity at first.

This blog post isn’t going to explore what inquiry is but how to support providing it in the classroom.

I quite remember my first few weeks and months exploring inquiry which is now three years ago.

I didn’t know what to expect from myself or from my students.

I remember wondering…

Will this work?
How will I facilitate students learning?
How do you manage a full class of students while keeping them engaged?
What inquiries do you investigate and which ones get left behind?
How can I justify exploring some topics and not others?
How can we “go deep” when there are so many questions in the classroom?
How do I know what to ask them, probe their interests without overtaking their learning?

Sometimes I felt that I had more questions than answers but I’ve learned to become comfortable with that.

It took a little while for me to be comfortable with the children leading the learning in the classroom.

When I first started teaching there were certain “themes” that were great for exploring our curriculum at different parts of the school year. My first ECE teaching partner had taught in an inquiry environment for a couple years and she was amazing at reminding me to relax and let the learning just happen – and it does!

One thing that helped me during this process was to post a variety of question prompts in my classroom to help guide my thinking. When my planning time teacher, supply teacher or parent volunteers come in they often reference these questions while engaging with the students in the classroom.

Simple question prompts that guided my thinking included:

I wonder…
How can we…
What are you wondering about that?
Why did you say that?
How do you know?
Why do you think that?

If you want to see the questions I actually posted in my classroom click on the image below.

One of the nice things I have learned about inquiry is that there really is no right or wrong answers. 
I have found that the students really love to guide the learning in the classroom when they are given the freedom to do so!

How do I Include All Students?

This year I plan on being more purposeful for ensuring I capture each student’s ideas. 
One way I’m going to be ensuring this is that we will be creating an “I wonder” class book that the students can read throughout the school year. 

I Wonder Book

There will be one or two class books at a time based on the number of students in the classroom. 
The book will go home on the weekend with a student and they can draw a picture and write (or parents scribe) what they want to learn about. 
When they return the book on the following Monday we will have a week to do research about their topic and share the learning with the class!
I am really excited about this opportunity to honor each child’s curiosity and am excited to see where our learning will go! If you want to see the booklet we will be using feel free to check it out by clicking on the image below!

Are You Considering SeeSaw for Documentation?

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Are you considering SeeSaw for documentation in your classroom? 

 I there are many great options about it as well as a few items to think about! 

I recently decided to use the program SeeSaw in my classroom to help with documentation of the learning.

I LOVED parent communication with it as you can send out notes and reminders through it. It is easy and efficient to use. 

My student’s parents absolutely loved looking up their student’s photos, work, and assessments which were shared with them. A few parents checked it regularly and raved about it. Other than that, to be honest, I didn’t get any other feedback from the families in my classroom. I loved working with this app!

Assessment

There is a lot of AMAZING collaboration which can happen with this program! 

 So many people have already created many assessment tools to share with others. These can easily be found in collaborative grade Facebook groups or with friends who you know who have created them. 

 It helps teachers keep assessment simple and not having to worry about reinventing great assessments which have already been created.

Limited or slow internet?

Consider using a computer to search for assessment or add an assessment to SeeSaw. 

 At first, I was using my iPad but I eventually found that this was the most effective way to access all my stored information as my iPad ended up slowing down too much.

With having two educators in the classroom I didn’t always know what had been uploaded and the computer provided the fastest “check” for me to see so I wasn’t making duplicates!

iPad problems

Our school had purchased a large allotment of iPads for teacher and student use which we have been very fortunate to be able to use. 

 The unfortunate part of this is that in order to purchase many iPads, the purchasers sacrificed on storage space and our iPads came with the smallest amount of storage space available. 

 Once our Board installed apps were added to them we had next to no storage space left! I found that SeeSaw is a memory hog as it is always trying to access what has been downloaded. As a result, the app crashed all the time. Computers were my lifesaver when using it!

Final thoughts

Ultimately, this upcoming year I will not be using SeeSaw because an administrative decision which is unfortunately totally out of my control. 🙁 We are a pilot school using Google for documentation and I’ve found it much more cumbersome and less user-friendly than SeeSaw ever was. To be honest, I miss SeeSaw greatly.

 If I could, and I had access to better storage on an iPad for convenience, I would LOVE to continue to use it! I highly suggest you try it out!

 What have your experiences been with SeeSaw? Please comment below to let me know!


Recognizing Student Achievement

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I love recognizing the student achievement in my classroom.

From hard work, a great attitude, to the most improved in a subject student achievement is important to celebrate.

There are many different ways to recognize students.

Here is a small listing of a few ways I have used over the years in my classroom:

Phone Call Home

Calling home to parents at the beginning of the year is a great way to establish a connection with the families in your classroom.

Random calls throughout the school year are especially important for families who you do not see on a regular basis.

Positive praise points

A simple kind word of recognition goes a long way to build character and encourage students in their learning.

This is often the most effective and personalized way to acknowledge student growth!

Brag Tags

Brag tags are a fun way to recognize student behavior and learning in the classroom.

Students can collect their tags throughout the school year or take them home nightly to share with their family!

My students love earning these on a regular basis and it is a great motivator for helping in the classroom.

  

Points

Students earn points through achieving learning goals or through positive behavior with classroom management programs like classroom dojo.

Have students compete against themselves so that they see improvement and gains throughout the year!

Before or After School Chats with Parents

Children love it when they hear their teacher proudly share about all the great learning they are doing in the classroom.

Parents know whether or not their child’s teacher understands them and they love to hear about their child’s growth.

Instant feedback is a great way to do this!

End of the Year Awards

Student awards at the end of the year are one of my favorite ways of celebrating student achievement in a tangible way for kids to take home and share with their family the growth they have made throughout the year.

If you want to check out the end of the year awards I use to recognize my students click on the link below!

Kindergarten Fundraiser Ideas

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We are always in need of a little extra cash for running our kindergarten program.

Most of our fundraising goes towards our outdoor classroom.

We are constantly finding new ways to make our learning environment more engaging and, to be honest, outdoor materials wear out a lot faster than our indoor materials.

1. Cupcake Sale

Make cupcakes as a class and sell them!

2. Art Gallery Fundraiser

Buy canvases of various sizes for students to paint at the Dollar store or local art store.

Parents come to either purchase the paintings at a fixed price or auction them off.

I’ve heard of action prices start at $20/piece. For a set price I have heard schools successfully sell the artwork for $25.

At a fixed price, each parent can buy their own Childs art. Saying that there is more motivation to spend more at an auction.

3. Cookie & Lemonade Stand

Make some cookies with a favourite recipe or two!

Make several drinks and sell them to the staff, school or parents at a special event.

4. Prepackaged Popcorn

Prepackaged popcorn is great for selling as there is no prep.

Perfect for a nutrition break sale! You just need a place to store the boxes throughout the week.

5. Sell Popcorn to the School

Have a popcorn machine at your school? Put it to use!

6. Book Sale

Parents donate books they no longer need.

Then, sell them to students and parents in the community. Students can learn lots by organizing the books!

7. Gift Cards

This can be done around the holidays or all year long. I’ve seen it successful at some schools and not work at all at other schools.
www.fundscript.com

8. Basket Raffles

One for each class (allow each student in each class to pick a theme) and at a time people need gifts (Christmas or Easter)

* Be aware of local gaming licensing

9. Spaghetti Lunch

Make a meal together and sell a limited number of tickets.

Looking for a staff meal for a Friday? This might work!

10. Label Fundraiser

Students always need to label their school supplies!

11. Bulb Sale

Perfect for organizing from January to March to help families prepare for the spring weather.

12. Cake Raffle

Our school loved this!

The kindergarten teachers organized it and gathered parent volunteers from our kindergarten parents to help facilitate with the organization. We charged $1.00 for five tickets.

13. Movie Night

Although you cannot charge for watching a movie where I live, we can charge a minimal amount for pizza or popcorn.

Although this fundraiser will not earn a lot of money, students and parents alike enjoy coming to spend time together at the school and be with friends! An average of $200 per night would be considered great.

14. Pizza Kits

This works best if it is sold to the whole school. Companies such as Little Caesars sell kits to schools!

What other ideas have you found work great for your school?

Welcoming Families To Kindergarten

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Including parents in their Childs education is extremely important.

Children feel more comfortable sharing about their school day when they know that their family understands what they area talking about!

Parents feel more involved with the school and it becomes a more welcoming place.

Some thoughts

I wanted to make a list of activities to invite parents in on a regular basis.

Having something fun or exciting makes the activity a bit more engaging for families to want to participate. Our first invitation was for Stone Soup and we did not invite siblings as we knew the participation was going to be huge.

Our suspicion was correct and our classes were bursting at the seams!

In the future I will consider inviting younger siblings to help ease their transition into kindergarten!

Ideas

The following is a list of the ideas that I would like to use in my classroom.

Several of them I have used in my classroom already.

I hope you find this list to be useful.

As I come across new ideas I will be adding them.

Play Invitation

Invite parents to learn along with you as a natural part of the day.

Some teachers do this quarterly, monthly or weekly.

I know colleagues who have invited parents for the last 45 minutes of the day. Others invite them for the last block and I have even heard of a “drop in” style where parents are invited any time of the day to stay for 30-60 minutes at a time.

“Welcome Wednesdays” and “Family Fridays” are two coined phrases I have heard of over the years to help parents remember when the visit days are scheduled.

Stone Soup

This is the very first family visit that we had in our class. Students bring in a vegetable and we made a soup together. During the last learning block, families were invited to eat with us and learn with us as we shared our soup! Click here to read about our stone soup experiences!

Games Day

Who doesn’t love playing a game?

Children love to play and harnessing this energy makes learning fun! Most games have many math concepts which support the math curriculum. Plus, the extra bonus of social/emotional development.

Have families bring their favourite to play and swap for the afternoon with other families to learn a new game!

Puzzle Day

Families bring their favourite puzzle to school and build it together with friends.

Share/swap with other families for a new challenge.

Math Event

Provide a variety of math games for parents to participate and learn along with their children.

Reading Invitation

Provide a wide variety of books from the library and invite parents to come in to read with their child a wide variety of books!

Baking Fun

Students bake something that they all can enjoy (we have many allergies in my classroom) and share with their visiting family members!

Class Concert

Practice a song or two and put on a concert for your families!

Children love to perform and what can be better than an intimate concert? If you’ve already presented for an assembly, perform the same activity for the families!

Class Play

If your students have created a play, shown an interest in puppetry or love nursery rhymes this is a perfect opportunity to put on a show!

Inquiry Celebration

After an inquiry, students can show off all they have learned to their families!

Multicultural Food Day

Have families bring in a special food from their culture to share with others. Make sure they bring an ingredients list if there are allergies.

Build a Community

If your students have an interest in community helpers, 3D figures, maps or even treasure hunts this might be a big hit in your classroom! Have students create a community and show it off to others. This can be done with Lego, recycled materials or even as a mural that they create together. The options are endless!

Gingerbread Traps

The gingerbread man is on the loose in the school! Challenge parents to make a trap with their child in order to help catch him. When parents come the children can share how they created the trap with each other.

St Patrick’s Day Trap

St. Patrick’s is on the loose in the classroom! Challenge parents to make a trap with their child in order to help catch him. When parents come the children can share how they created the trap with each other.

Teddy Bear Picnic

Invite parents to a teddy bear picnic with their child. Bring your own food or make it a special event to share food.

Create Gifts

Teaching others to reach out to the greater community is a valuable lesson to teach even young children.

We have hosted parents coming in to make crafts that we have donated to local senior homes in our community.

Parents and children love to be a part of this and the seniors love to decorate their residence with gifts from our class! In the past we have made wreathes with patterned paintings of our hands and door hang decorations for during the holiday seasons.

Stone Soup: Inviting Parents to Our Learning

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This year we invited our parents to come and learn with us!

It was a great experience and a way to build community.

We had read Stone Soup recently and decided as a class that it would a lot of fun to do this together.

We ended up having so many vegetables donated to our class collection that we ended up making two soups. One was a potato leek soup and the other was a mixed vegetable soup.

We made two versions to accommodate our students due to various allergies in our classroom.

I ended up borrowing my mothers’ food chopper. All hands were on deck to help out. 
From cleaning, chopping and adding the vegetables to our pots! 
The teachers cut the vegetables up into small manageable chunks and then students were able to press them into the chopper. 
We have three learning blocks in our classroom. 
Parents were invited to our third learning block. Students were learning at various learning centers and parents joined in. When they were ready to eat, they came and sampled our soup. 
The children were extremely proud to show off their learning. They showed off their learning portfolios and many included their parents in their play! 
Several students showed off how we do math talks to their parents, pretending to be a teacher as their parents participated in the learning as a student. 
Students and parents both enjoyed the experience and many parents were happily surprised to see their child eating and enjoying vegetable soup. 
We cannot wait to have more learning opportunities like this on a regular basis as we plan on doing this monthly!

Four Frames Bulletin Board Set

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I love creating bulletin boards that represent the learning of the children in my classroom.

Our old curriculum was very subject bound.

At times we would have a writing, art, science or math focus on them.  I love the freedom of our new curriculum as it has changed to the Four Frames.

There are so many cross-curricular links and I love being able to show that off.

One of my personal favourite ideas is to make a collage of current photos and collages we have made of the learning in our classroom.

We have five different bulletin boards in my classroom so we use one board for each frame except we use two to separate demonstrating literacy and mathematical behaviours.

If you’re interested in checking these out, click on the image below to pick it up from my store!

There are five title pages and four pages with the corresponding expectations for each of the Four Frames.

The titles are identical to what I have in the photos above but the expectations look better in the download.

I hope you enjoy it and find it useful for your classroom!