Schools have a routine where everything was taken care of by the teachers backing the children. However, parents took part in checking whether the given homework was completed or not. If you were a parent of a school-going child decades ago, the need for your contribution is a bit less and sometimes not mandatory. But as the education pattern is changing, virtual learning has become common.

Schools are taking measures to engage parents in the child’s daily activities and assignments to complete. Everything is being maintained in the school diaries which parents are made to check and sign while sending the child to school the next day. Many studies and educational surveys revealed that this communication increase led to marked improvements in students’ academic progress.

How And Why Technology Is Essential Even For Parents Now!

After covid-19 the pandemic, things changed a lot and people have to get into the new routines. During the pandemic outbreak, schools conducted classes online and all the communications were carried out on some platforms or applications or software. This made parents gain new insights into kids’ schooling and education.

In most cases, parents are with their extreme schedules and couldn’t always make it up to attend the child’s PTA meetings or get the least time to directly interact with the teachers. Hence schools have introduced special programs like online parent-teacher communications via zoom calls, Google calls, Learning management systems, etc.

Being Tech-Savvy Is The Need Of The Hour For Parents

While we are figuring out to improve the effectiveness of communication between parents and teachers, we made it necessary for everyone especially parents to adapt themselves to the technology like basic learning environments and software. This practice is necessary for both teachers and parents to ease the process for the kids. So, let us have a discussion on how this can be achieved cumulatively.

1.    Technology brings the parents close to the classroom –

Digitally aided parent communication brings all parents, teachers, and kids closer together. Moreover, this communication makes the parent engage in their child’s classroom activities and they feel valued. Technology helped parents to fill the gaps they have in child’s education. Many options like internet conferences or video recordings from PTAs help parents to know the school scenario of the kid.

In fact, schools are providing many communication channels like Emails, dedicated web pages, E-Portfolios or Learning Management Systems, and the most user-friendly mobile applications. These easy-to-use channels make a lot of difference demanding the parent to explore more into them.

Let us look deep into how these platforms are helping parents to maximize their vision of their child’s education.

Emails –

Harvard Graduate School of Education says that Emails are one of the effective channels if composed precisely to the updates to share with. Email is the traditional yet the best and immediate source of communication. Teachers can drop anything from administrational changes, curriculum updates, school events, child performance reports, and the list goes on.

This requires the parent to get into the basic email operations which help them be in the loop of the communication and help the child to compete with co-students.

Learning Management Systems –

Post pandemic, Learning management systems have become the backbone of almost all schools. Right from everyday schedules of teachers and classes to class notes to observe by the student, class test schedules, after-test scores, and feedback, and everything is just added to the software.

The parents will be provided access to these with respect to the child and they get notifications to make the communication more quick and spontaneous. Parent interactive sections are also provided to share their response is also provided.

Mobile Applications –

Few schools have developed mobile applications for parents to sign in and check the reports and schedules of their children. Some of the specific mobile applications like Remind and ClassDojo are introduced to make communications easier as in mail.

Tools To Boost Parent – Teacher Communication

From our past experiences and ongoing scenario, we have observed a few aspects from all parents, teachers, and students.

1.    Parents wonder less about what is actually going on at school

We noted that in some cases, parents less concentrate on detailed activities of children at school and what they are getting home to do. But, parents’ at-home conversations about the child’s schoolwork are an add-on to their overall academic performance and interaction.

2.    Teachers need to gain more time for constant interactions

Believe it or not, make maximum direct communications with parents. This makes the constructive and informed communication in which you talk about N more things that may not be conveyable on mails or phone calls or other communication channels.

3.    Children make it their responsibility to learn on their own 

With clear support from both parents and teachers, children understand why it needs them to be more active and perform well in their academics and co-curricular.

Here are a few ideas and tool recommendations to help kick off a positive parent-teacher dialogue:

Send immediate and up-to-date information to anyone with Remind Application.

Start conversations individually with parents using Seesaw.

Use online grade books like ThinkWave.

Start writing classroom blogs for parents using Edublogs.

To Sum Up,

So, we say that being technically advanced brings a lot more benefits to kids to be more interactive and proactive.

The post Ways For Parents To Stay Updated On Using Technology! appeared first on Walkertown School.

Schooling lays the foundation for one’s life. A strong foundation in the early years helps the child develop as an individual. It is important to choose the best school for kids in the primary section as the primary years lay the foundation for a good education.

There are many factors to be considered while looking for the child’s school admission and we have listed a few of them.

Things to Remember While School Admissions

School Campus and Facilities

School is like a second home to children and it’s essential to make sure the campus of the school is well maintained. The school ambience, the colours, the furniture, play area, and classrooms have to be child friendly to make them feel comfortable. Parents have to check all the facilities provided by the school are up to the mark or not.

Skilled Teaching Staff with Quality Education

Students learn, communicate, spend time with the teaching staff the maximum amount of time in school. So, making sure the teaching staff are skilled and talented enough to educate the kids should always be on top priority for parents. A school can be rated as best only if quality education is provided with skilled teachers.

Syllabus and Curriculum

The curriculum has become one of the important factors over the years while choosing a school. The education board, SSC or CBSE, or ICSE, which one to choose? Which has the best syllabus to gain knowledge? These are the common questions of the parents. Check out our other blog to know which syllabus is the best.

Location and Budget

A school near home is a better choice for students in primary sections as the travel time will be reduced and parents will be able to reach soon in case of any emergency. Also, a parent has to keep in mind the budget/amount they are willing to spend for child’s schooling and accordingly has to choose without compromising quality education.

Safety and Security

Due to COVID-19, student’s safety is high priority to any school. All schools have to follow the safety precautions and provide maximum security to make sure everyone is healthy. Here no negligence or irresponsibility can be entertained. So, every parent needs to check the hygiene levels, sanitisation process while visiting the school.

Apart from Academics

School isn’t just mean for academics, but for overall growth of the students. Especially, children from primary sections need physical, mental growth as in learning emotional, social, creative skills which will eventually be a part of their character as a person. So, what else a school is offering apart from academic is what a parent needs to look out for.

Now with the advancements, e-learning has been adopted to use the best of technology in school that will help students more interested in education.

These were the few things to remember while school admissions for primary sections. Did you find it helpful? Comment and tell us. Stay tuned to read on more blogs!

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