Coach's
Column
Amanda Gooch
July 1, 2023
While you are all in a preplanning mode as we round out the end of an incredible summer, lets revisit what we learned during one of our past professional development workshops. During this particular workshop, we focused on parent engagement with Rhonda Meyers of Heartfelt Impressions Learning Centers. She helped us to really focus as a teacher or school in making outreach decisions to increase parent engagement. Here are just a few simple ways to promote parent engagement in early childhood education:
Educators can invite families to participate in activities such as accompanying the class with a hands on project or speaking at a "show and tell."
Other ideas include inviting family members to share special talents or visit the classroom at any time.
Educators can also offer getting-to-know-you meetings, make relationship-building home visits, and create welcoming spaces in the program and schools.
Hosting an open house, creating a parent board, and planning special parent engagement projects are other ways to involve parents (Popsicles on the Playground, Muffins with Mom, and Donuts with Dad etc.).
To learn more about how to get parents involved in preschool activities, click on the link below:
How To Get Parents Involved In Preschool Activities!
When we get parents involved in preschool activities we are providing an opportunity for simple interactions that are both meaningful and important in early childhood development for their children. We first learned about simple interactions from Dr. Dana Winters from the Fred Rogers Institute during our February professional development workshop. To recap, simple interactions are playful, respectful, enjoyable and rewarding interactions and experiences for young children. Simple interactions with children are an important aspect of early childhood education and are a building block for many skills including problem solving, social and emotional intelligence and self-regulation. Simple interactions provide opportunities for children to safely explore, test out, and try new things. By establishing these simple interactions through connection, reciprocity, and inclusion, we are developing positive relationships with young children and an opportunity for them to grow and thrive
Starting in September, Childcare Resources will be hosting an Early Childhood Educator Community of Practice. One of the many focuses of this group will be to dive deeper in our enhancement of these simple interactions and how we can help further our establishment of the practice. We will practice appreciative noticing and reflective wondering to understand the dynamics in the simplest interactions. We will also discuss how simple interactions weave together to form the basic building blocks of relationships in order to make positive developmental impacts. To learn more about Simple Interactions and the Fred Rogers Institute’s approach in examining adult-child interactions in everyday contexts, click on the following link:
More information will be coming out soon on how you can be the first to sign up for this limited availability community of practice.
Together we will start the school year off strong with Conscious Discipline.
Wishing you the best,
Amanda
