Teacher-Parent Collaboration: An Emphasis on Parent Involvement

The author is Teacher III at Malino National High School Jenny Rose S. Razon

Teachers and parents generally agree that positive, supportive and open relationships between home and school, parent and teacher are desirable. It is also shown that parent engagement and successful parent-teacher partnerships result in improved educational outcomes for learners.

Children learn best when their parents, teachers, and other family and community members lives, supports and work together to encourage them. Schools alone cannot address all of a child's developmental and learning needs. It is essential to the children the involvement of parents and support from their community as well.

It is very important to have a strong partnership between schools and families to educate the children. On behalf of the children, neither educators nor parents have enough time to get to know one another and establish working relationship. In many places, parents are prohibited from spending time in classrooms and teachers are expected to consult with family members only when a child is in trouble.

Our society has created unnatural importance about the roles of parents and teachers should play in a child's development and learning. We often think that schools should stick to teaching academics and that home is the place where children's moral and emotional development should be taught.

When children enter the classroom they should not stop learning about values, relationships and attitudes about learning. This attitude or values show that they constantly observe how the significant adults in their lives treat one another, how decisions are made and carry out, and how problems are solved.

All the experiences children have, both inside and outside of the school, help shape their awareness that someone cares, their feelings of self-worth, and their beliefs about where they fit into the scene of things.

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The author is Teacher I at San Pedro Elementary School, Sasmuan District, Division of Pampanga.