Great news, even greater news, and the greatest news of all! Oh, and a little on Parent Conferences

Last week was a bit of a bummer... As I may have mentioned (about a million times to those around me-sorry), my laptop crashed, and I thought I lost a lot of hard work. The great news is that even though my motherboard is bad and I need a new laptop, my hard drive is okay! I am so relieved! The greater news is that my new laptop is set to arrive this week, which is very exciting (you know, its the little things...). And the greatest news is that I only have five more days until Spring Break and our weekend mini-trip to Atlanta! It will be our first real trip with our one year old (other than to Indiana to visit family once a month, or so). We are going to visit the zoo, aquarium, and children's museum! I cannot wait!

Now, onto a little on Parent Conferences... As part of what must be some cruel joke on teachers, we send Report Cards home and have Parent Conferences the week after Spring Break. In preparing for my conferences, I thought I'd share what I do with you all. At my school, we hold conferences twice a year, and we do not have to meet with every child's family each time. I think this is simply due to time constraints since we only hold conferences after school from 2:45 to 5:45.

Even though I don't get to meet with everyone, I still like to take the time to at least reach out to all of my students' families to let them know their child's current strengths and weaknesses. This is where my Parent Conference Rubric comes in handy. Prior to conferences, I fill out this rubric for every single child. It discusses things like achievement, work ethic, behavior, etc.

A couple of weeks before conferences, I send a Conference Scheduling Form home with the rubric attached to it. The scheduling form tells the parents if I would like to have a conference with them or if I do not feel like they necessarily need one. I also give them the opportunity to request a conference if they would like to do so. Then, when it comes time to hold conferences, I use the rubric to guide our conversation in addition to addressing any concerns the parents may have.

If you would like to use my Parent Conference Form, please feel free to click the picture above to download from google docs.  It has really helped to make conferences go a lot smoother for me, even if it isn't the prettiest document...maybe next year I'll fancy it up a bit and reshare it! If you've got any other Parent Conference tips, I'd love to hear them!