10/23/08
Parents, If your 7th grader is not progressing as well as you've seen them do in the past, please consider looking at my posting from 10/21, entitled "Communication Tools Already in Place."
Also, one of the things I often say to parents when they tell me "My child has never done this before" is, "They've never been in 7th grade before." I'm not being disrespectful when I say this; I'm being honest.
Please be sure to read the How to Survive Middle School piece in the lefthand sidebar and anything else posted there under Articles for Parents or under Important Information. There are many helpful pieces of information for parents of 7th graders there and I invite you to read as much as possible.
If you are requesting a conference, please know that I'll ask if you've seen the communication tools mentioned on my posting on 10/21 and if you've spoken with your 7th grader. If you've not seen any of these tools, please come up to MMS and look in their locker or have a consequence so they will bring these items home each day. Please go through the list of suggested items on this posting from 10/21 to see if your 7th grader is using those communication tools.
We all work very hard at this grade level to help students become more organized and manage their time better. We say pretty much the same things in all our parent conferences. I'm not taking away the importance of a parent conference by any means but it usually boils down to us saying that if students do the following things, they can be successful.
- Pay attention in class
- Bring their supplies and assignments to class each day
- Participate in class and ask questions when they don't understand something
- Stay for tutorials when they need to
- Turn their work in on time with their name on it , done correctly
We really don't have a magic formula, other than the items mentioned above, as far as making sure students succeed. These are standard kinds of practices we expect each day and we are there for our students when they need redirection. Thanks for doing the same from a parental perspective.
In our experience, students who already maintain these kinds of academic habits tend to have positive results.
We do care about all of our students and we want them all to be successful academically. Thank you for helping us from home as much as you can as well. We do appreciate that and it does show when parents are informed and involved.
