Part of Leading the way for change for me was finding ways to support parents in their child's education, and how to help them create these experiences at home. Through two family engagement workshops we provided caregivers with supports at home that they can provide their children to increase language development and early literacy. In my work in the class teachers as leaders ECI 508 in reading Best Practices of Literacy Leaders p. 320 discusses the importance of school to home ties, and the importance of the relationships teachers build with parents. When completing the needs assessment activity for this course I discovered that parents wanted more support with read a loud at home, and print concepts. I worked to develop parent workshops that could give parents tools and information to support this need at home, and build a stronger relationship at school.
Activities include:
Activities include:
- Read Aloud - modeled activities, and materials to support this at home.
- Great resource for Information on reading in your first language can be found here through Colorin Colorado.
- Print Concepts
- Example of Print Concept Bingo provided to parents
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Another key factor for leading for change is through the use of effective Professional Learning Team's. DuFour 2012 discusses the importance of the work of a PLT and the value it can add to a schools work. Big Idea #2 Creating a Culture of Collaboration became extremely important to me, and my work as a leader for our dual language students. With this in mind I have worked hard to establish a collaborative community at my school that works closely with our Dual Language support team from the Office of Early Learning, Administrators at our building, pre-k team members, and senior administrators. Through implementation of a collaborative PLT we all meet to discuss students strengths, weakness, and strategies that will improve their education experience and outcomes.