End Of Year Parent Meetings.

[catma]

I have 39 children and as the only class teacher the expectation is that I will meet all the parents in individual meetings. We have a system where we can timetable our own appointments over a pre determined week, with the late night on the thursday, but even so this will take for ever! I'm thinking of other ways this could be done in the nursery. Any other systems that work well out there??

[mundia]

Hi there Catma. We also have 39 children with 1 teacher. But the nursery nurses have their own family groups and they know their children better than anyone, have the most dealings with their respective parents and are therfore te best people to talk to parents at the end of the year. To allow this to happen, we have ours in open afternoons, taking one group on each of 3 days. This is well attended as our parenst (many of whom dont work) find it easier to attend than they would if it was an evening. As a teacher, I attend the formal 'parents evening' and speak to those who are not able to come during the day- but this is rarely more than 6-8. I am also available if parents want to speak to me rather than one of my colleagues. We find that this works really well, and we get a better response than if we had one parents evening for them all to come.

 

To add, in a previous school where we had more working parents, we asked the staff to stay behind in the evening, and gave them the time off in lieu. This didnt pose any problems either.

[Guest]

Over the years we have tried many different ways, while the children are having an end of session story parents return early for a 15mins consultation, takes quite a while to get through everyone but I see the new parents at the start of term and those who are leaving at the end.

I know of other settings that close for the day to allow staff time with parents. This year we are having an open evening so working parents can come, my nursery nurse is being paid extra hours. We are encouraging the children to come with their parents and show them around.

[Guest]

i find that the key worker system does not work in my setting as my TA is not qualified and I would have to moderate all her aseesemtns. So though it is more work for me I find i know my chidlren better. and so does she as she works with all of them. Budget stretched schools are not willing to pay TA more hours to be involved in assesment etc and i do all the planning etc etc. Now after months of my complaining and pleading to the powers that be, she is being paid for 1/2 hour more per week so that we can discuss planning, observations etc bec as it stood before she finished at 11.30 am along with the chidlren and went home almost immediately. I feel guilty about giving her any work to take home as she is not being paid to it.

[catma]

Interesting ideas there! We don't have a "key worker/family groups" set up so the nursery nurses x2 have never been asked to stay. In previous years there were 2 teachers and groups of 20 so they had less pressure. (By dropping one place the HT saved the salary of 1 teacher! Devious) They have been able to help me write reports as we have used a statement bank so I could get their opinion but I don't think either would feel comfortable doing "feed back".

I have considered just having one slot as a drop in with tea/biscuits etc where parents could pick up their report, read it and ask questions if needed. The nursery nurses could stay for that if they wanted to. Any thoughts?

[Magenta]

We have a similar system to Mundia, chn. aren't in family groups but staff know all of the children. We have 2 open days - parents come in and see their chn. working then talk to whoever is available - we also have an after school session - very poorly attended NNEBs stay for these sessions too and have never been paid extra! - will have to talk to the Head!

We don't usually provide tea and biscuits as staff are all busy.

 

We used to have single parent's evenings too but this was a nightmare!!

[Rea]

Hi, we've been pushed for time this year as far as the reports go due to a number of factors, so staff and committee have decided to do parent consultations only for the children who will be moving up to reception. The children who are going to a nursery class will be given their assessment sheets and a small written report. Obviously the reports can be discussed with us but our main priority is for the parents of the children entering school. The children who are returning to us in September will be given a short written report. Hopefully this will please everyone but only time will tell.