Home PublicationsL&LIssuesVolume 29 (2001-2002) October (No. 2)

The School–Home Connection: Using Technology to Increase Parent-to-Teacher Communication By Melissa Huseth

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Subject: Classroom management, school–home communication
Audience: Teachers, technology coordinators, library/media specialists, teacher educators
Grade Level: 5–12 (Ages 10–18)
Technology: Internet/Web, e-mail
Standards: NETS·T V (www.iste.org/standards)

Communicating with parents is a time-consuming task for teachers. The majority of middle school parents in my district expect consistent contact from teachers. I can understand their need for reassurance; however, with 186 students, this task can be overwhelming. My goal is to alleviate some of the time spent contacting parents while still maintaining effective and consistent communication. I have tried several methods of parental communication in the past and have found some to be more effective than others.

Old Methods

Phone calls. The most traditional method is weekly phone calling. Early in my teaching career, I looked weekly through my gradebook for two problem areas: failing grades and missing work. I would highlight the names of students who fell into these categories. During my prep period, I would then contact their parents about my concerns. This method not only consumed valuable prep time but also time after school. I also found myself calling the same parents each week.

Progress reports. The following school year, I sought a less time-consuming method. In addition to midterm and failure notices sent out each trimester by the entire school, I created a science progress report that I did by hand. I sent out the progress reports to students in need every other week or after a major test or project. The reports—which include a current grade, missing work, and classroom behavior—have undergone several changes. This method proved effective but not very efficient. I still spent prep and personal time trying to keep up. Plus, I found that by the time they were mailed out through the district mail, some of the news was old, and phone contact with parents was still necessary. I needed to find a better way, be it traditional or non-traditional.

New Method

I first got the idea for a classroom Web page in the 1999–2000 school year from a math teacher in my school. She used her Web page to concentrate on her curriculum and classroom information; but I wanted to expand on her ideas and concentrate on parent communication. The perfect scenario in my mind was for parents to access my Web page to find information they needed regarding student performance in my classroom. According to Henderson (as cited in Parent Involvement, 1997), when parents are involved in their children's education at home, their children do better in school.

In summer 2000, I took a course titled Web Page Design as part of my master's program from St. Mary's University (Minnesota). This was a short course that concentrated on the basics of creating a Web page using Netscape Composer. The first two things I focused on were a calendar of homework assignments and due dates and a page of science-related Web links.

The calendar I created actually includes my entire House 82 at Falcon Ridge Middle School in Apple Valley (See Welcome to My House, on the right). Teachers in House 82 give me due dates and upcoming assignments, and I enter the data into the calendar. I update this house calendar monthly. I have the House 82 Events Calendar link located at the top of our school's House 82 home page. Parents and students are then able to find due dates of assignments in all curricula. Next, I added a page that has links to the World Wide Web. I concentrated on the units that we cover in the eighth grade at Falcon Ridge; however, I also included links to science study guides and trivia sites.

Parent Feedback

My Web page (www.isd196.k12.mn.us/
Schools/frms/pages/HOUSES/HOUSE82/
pictures/husethpictures/index.html) was coming along nicely, but I wanted to include more information for parents and students. I decided I needed some input from them. In an effort to accomplish this task, I needed to find out what was most important to parents and students. In early October 2000, I sent home a Web Page Design Parent/Student Survey to obtain input on what they felt should be included on a Web page (Figure 1). From their input, I found the top three parent needs were:

1. a science calendar of assignments and due dates,
2. a current list of student grades and missing assignments, and
3. research links to the World Wide Web.

At this point, I am unable to post the gradebook on my Web page for confidentiality reasons and a large class size of 186 students. I will pursue this venture in the future. I was, however, able to meet the other wants and needs of parents and students. For the handful of parents who had no access to the Internet at home or at work, we used more traditional forms of reporting student progress, such as calling, sending progress reports home with students, or mailing reports home.

My Web site has nine pages including the home page.

Home page lists contents.
Page 1 has my school year calendar. Parents can find out when I am teaching and when I am on prep.

Page 2 has my eighth-grade science curriculum listed in chronological order.

Page 3 has the science Web links.

Page 4 has my grading scale and late-work policy.

Page 5 is the science calendar of upcoming assignments and due dates.

Page 6 includes the eighth-grade volleyball schedule and team statistics.

Page 7 is a personal page including information about my education and family.

Page 8 has some student work examples with pictures.

This layout idea originated from Sharon Sumner's Web site (http://eagles.k12.mo.us/sumner/index.html, as cited in Sumner, 1999) that shows student work on a monthly basis. Parental permission was obtained beforehand. During Open House at the start of the 2001–02 school year, I will have a general form that parents will sign for Internet purposes. I will also collect e-mail addresses at this time. Student pictures, not names, are posted.

The final thing I added to increase parent–teacher communications was an e-mail parent contact distribution list. Each Monday an e-mail letter is sent to parents that contains homework assignments for that week from all curriculum areas associated with our house. Several parents offered feedback about the e-mail letter.

Final Analysis

This teaching tool will benefit all parties involved by improving communication between the classroom and home. By using the Web site, I have decreased time spent on the phone and mailing letters. Parents and students in my district have shown an overwhelming interest in the Web page and e-mail letter.

Of the 186 students I have this year, 172 turned in my Web Page Design Parent/Student Survey. On the survey, 164 of the 172 parents indicated that they had access to a computer either at home or work. Thus, 92% of the parents returned their survey, and 95% of those parents have access to a computer on a weekly basis.

During the 1999–2000 school year, my records indicate that in fall 1999 I had a final missing work percentage of 17% overall. After initiating my Web page, the missing work rate dropped to 11% in fall 2000. The percentages are not all that different however. I had a smaller class size of 163 in 1999–2000, compared with 186 in 2000–2001. But I see any improvement to be a positive one, and I hope to see even better results as the school year progresses. The average grade when comparing last year to this year rose from 81% to 84% in Trimester 1. But as students move through each trimester of a school year, their effort seems to decline, so that by Trimester 3 (spring term), the average grade seems to drop. I'm hopeful that it will not drop as much this year because, in theory, there will be more parent involvement. Walberg (as cited in Parent Involvement, 1997) concluded from an analysis of more than 2,500 studies on learning that an academically stimulating home environment is one of the chief determinants in learning.

The Web site has even sparked the interest of my colleagues and administration. My principal is very interested in finding a way to post student grades and missing work over the Internet. By doing this, we could decrease paperwork for the entire school, which would save the school district money. Obstacles, however, have surfaced. First, not all parents have access to or like this way of reporting grades and missing work. For those parents, I used traditional communication methods (e.g., telephone and mail) to report student progress. Second, convincing a large staff to use this way of reporting missing work and grades would be an immense task. All teacher participants would have to be willing to take the necessary time to organize and set up the online gradebook and progress reports and to use electronic communication tools. A beginning step would be to report grades on the Internet with a small group of willing teachers in a pilot period. More traditional means of communication would be in place if e-mail was unavailable to parents. We could then collect some evidence to support or dispute our endeavor. With data, it could be an easier sell to the entire staff. Risks are worth it if time and money are saved in the long run.

My Web page is a work in progress, and I am always searching for new ideas and activities to add to my existing pages. My hope is that this Web site will be a general tool for success. Parents will become more involved in their children's education and life in general, and students will have higher self-worth and, I hope, become more responsible. When I added a page to my Web site that showed off student work, the Web page not only presented pride in student work but also allowed distant relatives to see student work examples. When schools work with families to support learning, children tend to succeed not just in school but throughout life.

References

Parent involvement and student achievement [Online document]. (1997). Available: www.sdcoe.k12.ca.us/notes/51/parstu.html.

Sumner, S. (1999, April). Parent communication? Try a classroom Web page. www4 Teachers [Online serial]. Available: www.4teachers.org/testimony/sumner.

Melissa Huseth (huseth.melissa@cannonfallsschools.com) holds a BA in biology from Gustavus Adolphus College, a 7–12 teaching license in life sciences from Buena Vista University, and an MEd in teaching and learning from St. MaryÕs University. She started her first full-time teaching position at Falcon Ridge Middle School in Apple Valley, Minnesota, in 1996, where she taught eighth-grade science for five years before accepting a position in Cannon Falls, Minnesota.

Copyright © 2001, ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education). All rights reserved.