This week our grade-level teaching team has been hosting families and students to fall conferences. We invited students to come to these conferences, and students prepared showcase portfolios as vehicles for sharing, discussion, and goal setting for the conferences. When students attend the conferences, they take the lead by sharing their learning highlights. Throughout the twenty-minute (or so) conferences, questions and conversation continue, goals are set, and promises and perspectives are shared.
I typically share my parenting perspective which is "50% academics and 50% passion." I believe that positive investment in finding and developing children's passion is what opens doors, builds friendships, and develops confidence over time. At fifth grade, passion-finding/building includes trying out extracurricular activities, talking/reflecting about passions, and giving students time to imagine, play, and investigate their interests. In real-time, passion building might include playing an instrument, time to draw or write, attending acting classes, traveling, sports, or gardening. Good attention to passions, both individual interests and collective pursuits, leads to care and attention with regard to academic development.
Of course we focus on academic development too. Students share a few examples of their best work in reading, math, writing, science, social studies, and/or reading. I share their academic "stats sheets" which, at this time, included a reading words-per-minute score, reading accuracy score, reading comprehension score, math facts level, and math skills/concept/knowledge levels. The overall review led family members, students, and I to set goals including SEL, Math, and Literacy goals. With those goals came instructional promises and suggestions.
For example, in some cases where students' accuracy and comprehension are strong, but the fluency lagging a bit, I suggested the use of One Minute Reader, and promised to introduce students to that reading app that includes lots of interesting articles and exercises that build fluency as well as vocabulary, comprehension, and accuracy. I also recommended reading engaging child-friendly poetry repetitively aloud to family members as a way to build fluency. Many students made goals with regard to writing skill and fluency. For those students I recommended journaling online or off, and I recommended back-and-forth parent/family member-child journals where the adult writes a paragraph daily and the child responds back-and -forth over time with all kinds of light and deeper topics and think. Mostly to write better, one has to write regularly. Of course reading and instruction help, and that's recommended and practiced regularly at school and as part of daily home study.
Executive functioning is always a big part of teaching and learning conferences. For some students, it's still a challenge to follow a positive routine in school and at home. When family members and teachers offer opportunities to take responsibility and follow fairly simple and supported routines, we can support goals in this area.
The portfolios include happiness surveys, student's reflections, and photos too. The photos, in many ways, display the joy in learning that students experience with our most playful and investigative learning such as working with kindergarten buddies, building STEAM structures, and making solar ovens.
I continue to enjoy having conferences during a one-week period rather than spread over many weeks as I find that the whole team is talking about the same topics with all family members. This gives the team a chance to really listen and think deeply about the collaborative program we foster with and for students. Family-teacher-student conferences are essential components of of a positive teaching/learning program, a component that helps us to teach well and support students' current and long term success, contribution, and happiness. What other ideas and thoughts would you add to this reflection as I continue to think of this integral element of the teaching/learning year?
