Student-Led Conferences November 24th and 25th, 2016

The Reporting to Parents Process includes the progress report card, student-led conferences and ongoing parent/teacher communication as a format for reporting on the progress of our individual students.  Teachers include ongoing diagnostic, formative and summative assessments to provide information about student needs and to direct instructional strategies.  Ongoing communication with the teacher takes many formats – daily signing of the agenda, a telephone conference between the teacher and parent, and the teacher or parent setting up a parent/teacher meeting to discuss areas of student needs and strengths. 

The Student-Led Conferences provides an opportunity for students to take responsibility for their own learning.  Providing students with chance to talk about their learning with peers, teachers and parents provides students with an opportunity to plan for and take responsibility for their next steps.  Student-led conferencing effectively engages parents and provides meaningful involvement in the school and in their children’s education.  A successful conference depends on much organizational work over a period of several months, all of which should be seen as a part of the ongoing classroom program.  The teacher’s role in the student-led conference process is to plan the process, model, support and facilitate to make the parents feel comfortable and allow the students to be successful.

Benefits to Parents are as follows;

ü  Parents gain a better understanding of curriculum expectations, learning skills, assessment criteria and the individual students’ progress

ü  Parents are responsible for helping set the growth plans

ü  Parents get an opportunity to reflect on their child’s education

ü  Parents discuss their children’s progress and expectations in the parents’ first language

Benefits to Students are to take responsibility for their own learning as follows:

ü  Students incorporate self-reflections as an ongoing part of their classroom program

ü  Students become empowered, learn how to explain their own thinking and become active participants in their own learning by taking ownership and communicating their progress

ü  Students play major roles in developing goals for personal growth plans and then must follow through, monitor and achieve those goals

Three or Four sets of parents and children will be assigned to each time session. Please bring your child without siblings to allow for your child to share their learning with you. The SSC and ESL student-led conference will be conducted in their homeroom.  If you have specific concerns that you would like to discuss alone with your child’s teacher, please express your needs with your child’s teacher after the student-led conference.  A separate interview may be warranted.  If you are unable to attend the student-led conferences and would like to speak with your child’s teachers, please indicate on the form or contact them at the school to make an alternate arrangement. 

Notes are going home Monday November 7th to help us in our endeavours to best accommodate your family’s needs.  Please indicate a first, second and third choice of times and return the form to your child’s teacher by Monday, November 14^th, 2016. Where possible, our teachers will collaborate around sessions for siblings.  Homeroom teachers will provide you with a confirmation once all is organized.  Thank you.