Our Blog: March 31, 2023
Family engagement is a great way to build a strong connection between home and school for your child. Understanding the activities and routines that are being implemented at school can help your child maintain similar learning at home. Our school strongly encourages families to come into the classroom in many ways.
Summer Camp Connections
Our summer school themes offer multiple opportunities for families to come in and share their talents, traditions, or careers! Work with your school administration team and teachers to coordinate a time to make real-life connections between your skills and our summer camp experiences. Some examples of things you can share are:
- Your culture – As we visit other areas of the United States or other countries and continents, come share stories, music, art, artifacts, or dates of significance and celebrations with the children.
- Your language – Do you speak another language? Consider sharing a story or reading a book with the class so the children can hear the beauty and appreciate the rhythm of that language.
- Your travels – Have you visited or lived in other places? How did you get there? Car, train, plane, or ship? Children love to look at pictures and hear short stories of unique experiences.
If you have other unique talents, work or life experiences, traditions, or skills we want to see them! Creating connections to real-life situations and experiences is a great way to bring our studies to life.
Family-Teacher Conferences
Family-Teacher Conferences are hosted twice a year. This provides a great opportunity to ask questions and talk with your child’s teacher about their development while reviewing the learning that is taking place in the classroom every day. Conferences are also a great chance for you to create or build upon a partnership with your child’s teacher.
During conferences, your teacher will show examples of work your child has completed throughout the year, as well as discuss the successes they’ve seen. Conferences should be interactive and are a great time to share with your teacher any questions or concerns you have about your child’s learning or things you’d like to ensure they know about your child.
If your child is talking about Montessori works that are unfamiliar, ask your teacher for a lesson! Montessori guides love to share the particulars of the materials and opportunities available in the Prepared Environment of your child’s classroom.
Volunteering
You can work with your school leader or classroom teacher to set up a time to volunteer in your child’s classroom. Our teachers can support you in leading an activity or setting up a time to share your child’s favorite book or celebrate their birthday with the class.
Your school also hosts many engagement opportunities throughout the year and school leaders welcome not only your attendance with your child but often an extra pair of hands for set up or clean up to ensure the school is ready for students the next day!
Donate Supplies
Montessori classrooms typically have a list of items they would love to make available for the children’s daily experiences. Common requests include flowers for trimming and arranging for botany studies, varieties of fruits for peeling, chopping, and taste-testing experiences, and paper scraps that can be used to extend collage experiences. Engaging with your child while shopping or searching the house for items to support their classroom experiences is another great way to engage in your child’s learning.
As we move into the final stretch of the school year, we are focused on continuing to build community and celebrate the successes of all our students. We are also excited to head into summer, and we hope you are too! Building strong home-school connections along the way will ensure your child’s learning stays on track and supports their overall development.
