According to a recent report published by the government, “Attempts by schools to engage parents in their children’s learning are unlikely to be successful if they represent a ‘bolt-on’ to mainstream activities.”
Trying to engage parents as an additional supplement to the school day, or as a separate activity, can mean that parents see their role in the school as something segregated. They, therefore, don’t integrate with the school system as well as they would if interaction was undertaken more holistically. Parental engagement strategy should (according to government guidelines), therefore, be integrated into a whole school approach.
The report goes on to say that “Parental engagement with children’s learning is effectively supported when parents receive clear, specific and targeted information from schools.” This reinforces the idea that an effective communications strategy is intrinsically linked to an effective parental engagement strategy. By providing as much relevant information to parents as possible, you are empowering them to feel more involved in their child’s education, as well as enabling parents to take a more active role in both their school life and their learning.
This is why streamlining that communication between home and school is more important than ever, and why schools should look at their current communications system, and evaluate where it could be improved. Technology has completely revolutionised the way we communicate and interact with one another; therefore, it is only a natural step forward for schools to try to harness these developments to better improve their relationships with parents and, by extension, better improve the children’s education.
Schools always have copious quantities of information that they need to distribute to parents, sometimes on a daily basis. This can range from details about parents’ evenings, school events and general school news to more personal updates on children’s progress and homework. For decades, schools have been reliant on children to communicate these messages home to their parents, often resulting in important letters or notifications being found months too late, crumpled at the bottom of a child’s bag. As a result, most schools in the UK today now employ some kind of messaging alert system that keeps parents up-to-date with goings-on, namely through text message. However, this is on the brink of being usurped by more efficient Internet-based forms of communication.
‘App’ and coming
It is estimated that 91%of adults have their Smartphone within arm’s reach, but it seems that texting is only part of the reason. With the Smartphone now dominating the mobile world, our devices can do much more than simply text and ring. The use of applications, or ‘apps’, has become part of how we manage our everyday lives; from checking the weather forecast to managing our online banking, there is an expectation that, whatever your need may be, ‘there will be an app for that!’.