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From: Virginia Tardaewether <tarv@exchange.chemeketa.edu>
To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-family@literacy.nifl.gov>
Subject: [NIFL-FAMILY:1045] Re: Parents as first teachers (long)
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Sylvan and others
ANy idea how we can get working with parents/adults in your classroom
included in teacher training?
Virginia Tardaewether
Chemeketa {Place of Peace}
Outreach Instructor
Dallas, OR 97338
tarv@chemeketa.edu
503-316-3242
-----Original Message-----
From: Sylvan Rainwater [mailto:sylvan@cccchs.org]
Sent: Tuesday, April 30, 2002 11:33 AM
To: Multiple recipients of list
Subject: [NIFL-FAMILY:1043] Re: Parents as first teachers (long)
At 04:44 PM 04/25/2002 -0400, Virginia Tardaewether wrote:
>Why does a teacher have to go into another performance mode....? Can't a
>child have multiple parents and can't multiple adults help rear a child?
Sure, but it is a skill that has to be learned, by both teachers and
parents. We want to partner with parents, but some of us are easier at it
than others. We hired an excellent infant/toddler teacher who was
absolutely great with the kids, but had little experience working directly
with parents (she had worked for Migrant Head Start as a classroom teacher
only). In our program the teachers are also home visitors, and of course we
have the parents go into the classrooms every day for PACT time. She had to
learn, and we had to find ways to support her in that learning.
I saw that territoriality operating with her and have also seen it with
some other teachers. It is largely unconscious. You work hard to set up
your room to optimize learning, and then other people come in and end up
being an unknown factor in the carefully orchestrated equation. If you are
only factoring in kids, and an adult comes into the room, it is disruptive.
If that adult is also evaluating you, whether as a parent or as an
employer, it adds to the stress.
The trick is to make it all familiar -- having parents come into the room
every day forces teachers to factor in adults to their performances. After
a while it gets easier. But we shouldn't underestimate how difficult it can
seem to someone who's not used to that. And I suspect (though I don't know
for sure) that effective parent involvement is not something they teach in
elementary ed classes, or other education classes.
------------------------------
Sylvan Rainwater . sylvan@cccchs.org
Adult Education Teacher and Family Literacy Program Manager
Clackamas County Children's Commission . Oregon City, OR USA
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