school management
There is an element essential to connecting the classroom to the home , and that is the parent .
Bringing it home
The importance of staying connected in a locked down world .
By Rochelle Borton
In multiple meta-analysis and research studies , highly respected education researcher John Hattie ( 2009 , 2018 ), ranked a range of influences and their effect size on student achievement .
At the top of this list was the studentteacher relationship and the effect of the connections teachers establish with students and families . It has become clear that we are in an era where strong student-teacher connections go beyond the physical classroom and are now extending into living rooms across Australia . That being said , it is vital that we continue to consider how to grow and build relationships and connectivity , even if it cannot be reinforced face-to-face .
In the past , phone calls , letters and parent-teacher interviews were described as common practice and some of the only ways in which school and home intersected . With the advent of digital communication tools , we have seen a marked increase in the opportunities for families to communicate with teachers . The use of email has created direct teacher and family connections . Increasingly , social media and commercial applications are used to further communicate and connect across school communities .
School administration , staff portals , professional learning suites and applications that support learning have embedded the use of technology in the classroom . School systems have also been agile in creating the digital platforms to support learning from home and to continue to provide rapid updates , information and connection to their school communities .
However , despite this agility and the supported use of technology to provide remote learning for lockdown , students , parents and carers are continually challenged by the difficulties of extending learning into their homes .
Many teachers have spent many hours creating videos , interactive online lessons and Zoom lessons with the expectation that students will have access to the digital tools to engage with this learning . The experience of remote learning during lockdowns has shown that teachers have innovated and been creative to deliver lessons and engage students . This , however , is not always utilised and accessed by all students , which must be considered as we continue to live in an unpredictable climate .
While teachers are applying the suite of digital tools to engage students , it is not always practicable or easily applied in the home . Many of the country ’ s current lockdown restrictions require parents and carers to work from home . This has placed time stresses on parents to support their child ’ s remote learning . Parents have to find the balance to manage family life , work commitments and remote learning , with some parents making the decision to accept hard copy work packages supplied for learning in preference to digital remote learning .
There is no question that parents and teachers are increasingly using a wide range of communication tools as they are gradually rolled out . We have seen that online learning has the ability to bring many elements of the classroom into the home . Further , online learning has been successful at maintaining at least some interaction between teacher and student , and therefore the ability to build on existing face-to-face connections .
While work packages provided as remote learning bring an element of the classroom into the home , they do not provide the same amount of critical interaction with the teacher . If we are honest , in both the ‘ digital ’ and ‘ analogue ’ remote learning worlds , there is an element essential to connecting the classroom to the home , and that is the parent .
It is clear that the relationships between students and teachers have an impact on student outcomes and achievement , however the age of remote learning and working from home provides us with an additional insight into the teacher-family relationship . The connection a family has with teachers during this time could strongly drive the success for a student to adapt in these changing times , or flounder and / or become overwhelmed and disengaged .
As schools , systems , teachers , students and parents adapt to remote learning , we must also consider how to change the way in which we innovate and communicate to ensure that every student has the same opportunity to interact with their teacher , build connections and bring their classroom into their living room . ■
Rochelle Borton is the founder and managing director of Eduinfluencers .
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