Parent-Teacher Conferences

I observed a few parent-teacher conferences this week at my 4th grade main placement, and there were many aspects I had overlooked going into the process. First, the conferences my teacher held included both parents, the student, me, and the master teacher. Every conference included both parents, which I did not expect (and know I should not expect for every student), and I also did not expect the student to be present at parent-teacher conferences. The conferences were also not just an assessment of the student, but an assessment of the parents as well.

"Jimmy" excels in math, but the problems he misses are almost always due to his tendency to not fully read the question being asked. My mentor teacher pulled out a quiz from earlier in the year, where Jimmy had answered a 3-part question: trapezoid, hexagon, rhombus. The question asked which of the following are a trapezoid, hexagon, and parallelogram. The teacher brought a few similar missed questions to the parents attention, and they discussed placing an emphasis on Jimmy taking his time and fully reading through questions.

Jimmy is behind the curve in his reading and writing skills, but the improvement he has made over the last year has been much higher than his classmates. My mentor teacher praised both Jimmy AND his parents for the tremendous improvement, because the improvement is a family process.

The parent-teacher conference with "Ralph" also showed me how these conferences are not only an assessment of the student and parents, but also the teacher. At the end of the conference, my teacher would ask the student to wait in the hall for a few minutes while we discussed a few more points with the parents. Ralph's parents asked if my mentor teacher could help Ralph when it comes to social awkwardness. Ralph is the kid who sees bullying out on the playground and reports it to the teacher. There is nothing wrong with this, but he has been called a tattle-tail. Ralph does not see anything wrong with tattling on bullies, but 4th and 5th grade is when a lot of students let bullying happen by shutting their mouths. His parents are concerned that Ralph's high moral fiber will cost him friends in the next few years, but do not know what to do. They asked my mentor teacher to try and impress upon Ralph the social aspects of his decisions.

This was a very weird conversation, because it seemed like the issue Ralph's parents were concerned with will solve itself over time. Some kids choose to always tell the truth at the expense of being friends with some of their classmates--and they make friends who value that truth-telling trait. Other kids are more concerned with the social aspect of school and would rather make friends than report bullying. In this case, it seems like Ralph's parents are concerned with the social aspect, but Ralph is not. My mentor teacher said he would try to make sure Ralph understands what his actions mean in the eyes of his classmates, but I'm very interested to see what, if any, changes he will make in the classroom. I doubt he will change much, but I think it was important for him to tell Ralph's parents that he understood their concern.