CP Blog Entry #8.5: Do you feel the communication provided is meeting your project's needs?

Yes, I definitely feel the communication provided is meeting my projects' needs. The Power Team members and I are working together to brainstorm changes for our mid-January parent meeting and for next year. We have discussed a new invitation for the parents to promote more participation, ways to get the materials earlier than a week before, and ways we can make the Power Team parent meetings even better for next year.

CP Blog Entry #8: What feedback are you getting from your powerful team?

I have been in contact with my powerful team members several times over the past two months. I have coordinated meetings and trainings, created flyers and PowerPoints, given advice on parent meetings, and helped teachers prepare materials to send home to parents. However, the most helpful information I have received has come from the feedback given by the Power Team staff members and the parents who attended the meetings.

After our September 22nd and 24th parent meetings, I sent a survey to the classroom teachers and the parents who attended. The feedback has been very helpful in assisting me in preparing for the next parent meetings in mid-January.

 Overall, staff members felt the first parent meetings went well, but were disappointed in parent attendance. We had 28% of our parents attend from the 21 classrooms. 95/339 students were represented. Staff members also felt a little overwhelmed and rushed in preparing materials since I was unable to receive monetary assistance from my PIT Crew team (formerly PTO) until September 9th and then did not get orders delivered until September 18th. Also, most of the staff members want to have our first meeting EARLIER next year! So far, the current members are looking forward to the second meeting in mid-January and six other staff members say they would like to join next year!

Parents gave outstanding positive feedback overall, but a few wanted to be able to meet individually with the teacher after the meeting was over. They were glad there will be individual conferences in October and November. Many were glad for the chance to see where their child stands against other students and for the handouts and activities to use at home.

CP Blog Entry #7: What are the official goals and objectives of your change project?

My goals are as follows:

SPECIFIC:

1. Increase parent involvement at Meadow Park Elementary School through evening group parent 

    meetings.

2. Increase student i-Ready assessment scores in Reading and Mathematics by focusing on specific  

     skills.

3. Decrease teacher-time spent conferencing throughout the school year by meeting with parents 

    as a group and holding one individual parent-teacher conference for each child during the year.

 MEASURABLE:

 1. Teachers will have a sign-in sheet for the parent nights and the parents will fill out a recording 

      sheet to keep track of the time they spend practicing skills at home with their child.

2. I will produce an excel Spreadsheet for all Power Team teachers and their students to record BOY, 

    MOY, and EOY i-Ready scores in Reading and Mathematics.

3. Teachers will fill out a conference recording sheet to keep track of time spent conferencing during 

     the school year. 

ATTAINABLE and REALISTIC: 

1. We are able to hold evening Power Team meetings as approved by our administration.

2. We take i-Ready assessments three times a school year.

3. Teachers hold conferences during every school year.

TIMELY:

All three goals will follow the regular school year. Therefore, the time frame will be during the nine month school year and will be completed by June 30, 2016.

 

CP Blog Entry #6.5: What is your change project?

My change project is the use of Academic Parent-Teacher Teams, or APTT. 

         The APTT is a parent involvement program developed by Maria Paredes, the Director of Community Education at Creighton School District in Arizona, which increases the communication and interaction between parents and teachers to facilitate collaboration between school and family. This provides parent/teacher support for the academic success of the children.

 The Academic Parent–Teacher Teams (APTT) involve two main components. The first consists of three 75-minute classroom team meetings each year. These team meetings are initiated by a personal invitation to the parent by the teacher, and consist of the teacher, the entire class of parents, and a parent liaison. Each meeting includes a review of class and individual student academic performance data, parent–student academic goal-setting, teacher demonstration of skills to practice at home, parent practice, and networking opportunities with other parents.

Children in the district are tested informally on a weekly basis and then formally every quarter with a district-developed standards-based assessment in the areas of reading and math. The APTT meetings are timed to coincide with the release of the quarterly assessment scores. The second component consists of a 30-minute parent–teacher conference: Once a year, teachers meet individually with parents to review their child’s performance data and create action plans to optimize learning. Teachers schedule individual meetings to take place within the first four months of school, prior to the second APTT meeting, and hold additional meetings when parents request them.

Another benefit of APTT is to lessen the amount of time teachers spend conferencing with parents during the school year. Only low-achieving students will require individual parent-teacher conferences.



Paredes, Maria. "Academic Parent–Teacher Teams: Reorganizing Parent–Teacher Conferences Around Data." Harvard Family Research Project. Harvard Family Research Project, 1 Oct. 2010. Web. 30 July 2015. <http://www.hfrp.org/publications-resources/browse-our-publications/academic-parent-teacher-teams-reorganizing-parent-teacher-conferences-around-data>.

CP Blog Entry #6: Is your initial data supporting or not supporting your change project goal?

As stated in blog entry #2, my goal is that "within a few years, my entire school would be participating in the APTT and hopefully finding that our student assessment scores have increased as well. By using this model, it should be evident that time spent conferencing will decrease, while parent involvement and overall student assessment scores will increase."

I believe my initial data is supporting my Change Project goal.

At this time, I have 31 members of the APTT, which we are calling the Meadow Park Power Team. Twenty-five of those members are teachers just about split evenly from K-2 and 3-5. The initial comments I am hearing from teachers are that they are excited to try something new and meet with the parents as a group on a regular basis throughout the year. As far as assessment data is concerned, there will always be room for improvement. So far, i-Ready scores are showing at least one weak area in Reading and in Mathematics at this initial testing phase for most classes. A few of the honors classes are showing even scores, but the teachers know the areas where the scores will fall during the school year.