How to Build Positive Relationships With Parents as a Teacher

Many parents worry about their child's well-being and academic progress. Feeling connected and informed can make all the difference. Some benefits of meaningful relationships with teachers for parents and guardians include:

• Sense of involvement: Many parents want to feel like participants in their child's learning journey instead of passive observers. Involvement strengthens connections with the school community and their child. Contributing to decision-making around improving their child's school experience can help them feel empowered.
• Skill development: As parents become more involved with their children's education, they grow their understanding of how their child learns and can support them better. They will also find strategies to ensure their kids complete homework and meet deadlines, as well as other skills they may not have developed otherwise.
• Insights: Having a relationship with their children's teachers can help parents gain deep insights into their students' well-being at school — socially, emotionally and academically.
• Community: Parent-teacher relationships can lead to connections with other parents and increased involvement at the school. These connections can create a sense of community and a valuable support network.
• Peace of mind: It can be challenging for parents to hand over the care of their precious children to strangers. Knowing their child's instructor helps parents feel secure in the teacher's ability to care for their child.

Benefits for Teachers

For teachers, building meaningful relationships with parents contributes to more than improved student academic achievement. It can enhance your teaching strategies and help create a thriving classroom environment. Here are some of the benefits of communicating and collaborating with parents:

• Understanding: Parent-teacher communication can fill in background information about the child's life at home, which helps you understand the student. 
• Teaching strategies: You can tailor your approach to individual students based on insights from parents. Input from the adults at home who know the student best can lead to collaborative, creative solutions. 
• Cooperation: Strong parent-teacher relationships allow both parties to address behavioral issues or implement supportive strategies, with a shared sense of responsibility. When parents take action at home to support learning goals from the classroom, it reinforces your teaching efforts, and improvement in the student's behavior and academic progress is more likely.
• Homework completion: If you make parents feel like part of the team, they're more likely to help ensure students complete their homework on time. Parental support helps students improve their study habits and increases accountability for completing their work.
• Respect and appreciation: Positive relationships with parents usually create more recognition and appreciation of your teaching efforts. Respect and gratitude can improve your job satisfaction. 

How Teachers Can Establish Cordial Relationships With Parents

Are you wondering how to build relationships with parents as a teacher? While it takes effort and care, cultivating parent-teacher relationships is well worth the time and energy. The relationships you build will serve you, your students and their parents throughout your time together. Educators can establish a positive foundational connection with parents through a few key strategies.

Be Warm and Be Yourself

It might seem obvious, but remember to smile at parents and students. Present yourself as someone approachable, friendly and warm. Impressions from brief early encounters can help shape the trajectory of your relationships. 

Being warm and welcoming is as important as being authentic. When you have conversations with parents, humanize yourself and share some of your interests or anecdotes so they remember that teachers are also human. Authenticity builds trust, and showing your true self to families will set the foundation for a strong relationship. 

Get to Know Your Students' Parents

As soon as you can, learn the names of your students' parents. Ask how they would like to be addressed and make sure you are pronouncing their name or surname correctly. Thoughtful communication is fundamental to building meaningful relationships.

Maintain a Kind and Professional Demeanor

While getting to know each other is key, teachers must balance being kind and understanding with maintaining a professional relationship with appropriate boundaries. Maintaining professionalism includes being well prepared for meetings, providing relevant, factual and useful information, and following up on any agreed-upon arrangements. 

Kindness demonstrates empathy and understanding, while professionalism is reassuring and builds trust. Parents want to know that teachers approach their child's education and well-being with care and competence.

Be Mindful of Cultural Differences and Language Barriers

Teachers should be aware of how cultural differences may impact communication styles and preferences. Various demographic and personal factors will influence your relationship with each parent — every situation is unique. Perhaps find a translator to help you deepen your communication with parents in their first language. Keep a calendar of special dates for multiple religions and cultures so you can send good wishes to families for Eid, Rosh Hashanah, Kwanzaa and other momentous occasions.

Create Clear Lines of Communication

Let parents know your intentions regarding communication. Establish what methods you'll use, such as email, phone calls, video conferences and in-person meetings. Clarity about communication makes parents less likely to miss updates and more likely to remain engaged.

You should also prioritize making parents feel included and valuable to motivate them to be involved. Ask for their insights and let them know their opinions are heard and appreciated. You can value parental input while still making decisions based on your professional expertise.

Make a Plan for Regular Check-Ins

A consistent approach with regular communication helps prevent miscommunication or surprises. The more parents and teachers stay informed about the child's school and home life, the easier it will be to detect issues early and provide extra support when necessary.

Encourage Parents to Volunteer

When parents volunteer in the classroom or during trips or events, teachers can get to know them better. Parents will also get to see their child interact with other classmates and learn about the flow of the school day. Another reason parents should volunteer is that it involves teamwork. It can deepen parents' understanding and appreciation of their child's teacher and vice versa.

Strategies for Communicating With Parents as a Teacher

If you're wondering how to discuss a child's development with a parent, it's a good sign. Teachers need to be conscious of how they navigate sensitive topics. There are many tips to improve teacher-parent communication, such as:

Share Positive Feedback Regularly

Share small and big wins as often as possible. It shows you care and can increase the praise your students receive at home. Even if you share a kind deed instead of an academic achievement, it will be meaningful to the parents and demonstrate that you're paying attention to their child. Building a positive rapport will make the conversation easier if you have to share a concern. 

Lead With Good News

If you do have to speak with parents about a concern, lead with praise about one of their child's strengths. Sharing good news first will defuse some tension and reduce the worry a parent might experience when confronted with an issue alone.

Make sure you are prepared for the conversation and carefully broach the concern after sharing one or more of the student's strengths. If possible, offer a potential strategy or solution to show you are optimistic that you will all be able to address the issue.

Listen Carefully

Parents may have insights into their children that significantly impact your understanding of the student. Guardians and parents likely know their kids better than anyone. Listening closely to details will demonstrate your commitment and care. It can help you gain new perspectives and shift the way you interact with your students.

Express Your Appreciation 

Thanking parents for spending their time speaking with you or acknowledging school-related efforts they've been exerting at home can go a long way. Noticing the positive effects of their actions can reinforce involvement and demonstrate you are paying attention and keeping their child's best interests at heart.

Use Tools Like Student Planners

When implementing the many strategies to build positive relationships with parents as a teacher, using carefully designed tools can make all the difference. Student planners are ideal for communicating with parents daily, or as often as necessary. Some planners allow teachers to write down assignments for each subject with notes and deadlines, so the parents can keep up to date with the student's workload.

Parents can learn to use the planner at home to collaborate with the teacher on monitoring progress. There are many types of planners and advantages to using them in your school or classroom:

• Facilitate parent-teacher communication: Students, parents and teachers can use a homework planner as an information hub so they all stay on the same page. 
• Improve organizational skills: Planners can help students develop organizational skills and good habits, and parents can monitor progress and deadlines, offering support where needed.  
• Build a shared sense of responsibility: When students or teachers write assignments and deadlines in a planner, parents can take on some responsibility for helping their children complete their work on time.
• Access convenient features: Some planners have spelling lists and reading logs, information about possible future careers and many other features to enhance student involvement and success.

Browse Student Planners for a Successful School Year  

Educators and administrators are often searching for innovative tools to support students. Success by Design creates student planners that are life-changing tools, going beyond homework diaries. Our planners include content written by professional educators to positively impact students' school experience and assist teachers. We offer planners for primary, elementary, middle and high school students, as well as religious planners and teacher planners. You can even customize the cover of your planners to add school pride. 

Browse our student planners and discover innovative ways to support your students and their parents.