Partnering with Parents: Training through Newsletters

As a principal or teacher, you know that family education is a crucial factor to a child’s ability to fully engage in learning in any context. CIRCLE has developed several series of short articles.

Communication and Cooperation February 18, 2019

As a principal or teacher, you know that family education is a crucial factor to a child’s ability to fully engage in learning in any context.  You wish you had more hours to invest in parent training, but you realize how few busy parents would prioritize attending any workshops.

The good news is that the Curriculum and Instruction Resource Center Linking Adventist Educators (CIRCLE.adventist.org) has developed several series of short articles, ready to print in color or black, or include the URL in an email or your newsletter to parents.  Consider sending one newsletter out per month, working through one series in a year.

Why Adventist Education?
Help parents understand and value the special character of Adventist Christian education through this series of ten concise articles. Seasoned Australian Adventist education leader, David McClintock, weaves truths through memorable examples. Titles includes: The Special Character; An Eternal Focus; Curriculum Emphasis; Home, School and Church Working Together; Reflecting God’s Grace through Discipline; Service Learning; The Big Picture; The Difference for Your Child; The Spiritual Nurture of Your Child; and The Teacher as Role Model.

Character Education
Adventist child psychologist Donna Habenicht shares key insights on teaching Christian values in a series of ten one-page articles with titles: Teach the Values, Begin with God, Grow in God’s Garden, Live the Values, Mind Games, Peer Pressure, Protect Your Child’s Mind, Right and Wrong, Self-Respect and Confidence, and Teach the Values.

Health Education
Christine Gillan Byrne, Christine Wallace and Rosemary Bailey provide practical health tips to inspire parents on topics such as healthy breakfasts, good nutrition, exercise, food choices and habits, and sleep.

Nurturing Real Growth
David McClintock unpacks key principles to redemptive discipline through stories from his experience as teacher and principal. The sequence of ten one-page newsletters will be equally valuable for teachers and parents with titles: Be a Good Listener, Take the Time to be Fair, Admit When You are Wrong, Treat all the Same – But Differently, Look at the Context, Let the Natural Consequences Reign, Keep Things Simple, Model Repentance, Send Consistent Signals, and Accept the Individual not the Behavior.

Parenting Teens
We asked Adventist family therapist Susan Murray to write a series of ten articles for parents of students in the adolescent years. Topics range from self-worth, supporting your child, preparing for boarding school, detecting at risk behaviors, words and actions that build positive faith perspectives, gender identity, talking to teens about harmful substances, cheating, and lying.

Keeping Children Safe
In this series of six ready-to-share articles, teacher Rosemary Bailey explores how to keep children safe by reducing their participating in behaviors that put them at risk physically, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally.  Topics include parent roles, monitoring, family meals, and building faith through mentoring.

Parent Inspiration
These 2-page newsletters feature ways to increase home-school partnerships, academic skill tips, resolving conflict, homework help, test taking, character development, and growth mindset.

Contribute to these themes or others by freely sharing your articles, podcasts, videos, or presentations through circle.adventist.org.  It’s easy to submit articles online, anytime, in your language.

Author

Glynis Bradfield

Serves as the Director of Distance Students Services at Andrews University, USA. Coordinating circle.adventist.org, she has enjoyed finding and sharing resources that help Adventist educators around the globe continue the teaching ministry of Jesus Christ. Serving as a missionary multi-grade educator in three countries in Africa honed skills in comparative education and assessment, prompting her doctoral research developing the GDI, an assessment of spiritual growth.

    2 comments

  • | March 8, 2019 at 5:58 pm

    Dear Team,
    Praise God for the opportunity for parents to be educated on education and be part of this awareness. It is important to actively involving parents by educating them individually through this mode of education. Particularly at such time when there is so much distraction yo divert our attention on our young children.
    God bless
    Gimana

    • | March 10, 2019 at 7:05 pm

      Thank you for your excellent comment, Gimana! Happy you enjoyed this subject.

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