Communicating with students’ families can easily feel like “one more thing” on our to-do lists and can also be incredibly nervewracking. Even though we know how important it is to build a strong relationship with families, sometimes we just need a little help getting there. That’s where this resource comes in.  

PRODUCT SUMMARY:

This resource gives you access to everything you need to build a strong foundation of family engagement with your students’ adults. 

Firstly, you get access to a beginning of the year questionnaire to send out to your families to help you get to know them a bit better. This also shows families right off the bat that you care about them and their student. Did I mention that you get this questionnaire as a printable page or as a Google Form you can send out to your families? I’m looking out for you! 

You also get a second survey (again - digital or printable) to check in with your families about half-way through the school year to see how they’re doing and how their student is doing from the adults’ perspective. 

Next, you then get access to four different templates (plus an additional Google Doc version) of weekly newsletter templates you can send out to families. Each template comes with a preset guideline, so it makes the process of writing a weekly newsletter super quick. I use these every week and can get my newsletter done and sent out in under 10 minutes. I also  personally designed these templates to be aestetically pleasing without being visually overwhelming. You have a nice variety of four different styles too, so you can always keep your students’ home section of their folders looking fresh! 

Next, you get access to one of my most requested resources - a family communication sentence stem organizer to guide you through having tough conversations (or any conversation!) with students’ families. You don’t just get a printout though - you get access to a slide with 4 thought prompts to consider before making a phone call home, then you get an organizer broken down into 4 steps that can guide your conversation (and leaves you without anxiety!) You also get a print out of this organier that you can hang up by your phone at school for when those unexpected phone calls appear. And don’t worry - it’s super cute (and customizable!)  

All in all, this resource includes: 

• Classic newsletter template
• Neutral newsletter template
• Bright newsletter template
• Minimal newsletter template
• Customizable Getting to Know You Questionnaire (Google Form)
• Customizable Getting to Know You Questionnaire (Printable)
• Customizable Midyear Check In Questionnaire (Google Form)  
• Customizable Midyear Check In Questionnaire (Printable)
• Personalized Family Communication Thought Prompts
• Family Communication Sentence Stems 
• Family Communication Sentence Stems Poster   
• Editable Communication Sentence Stems Poster 

If you’re looking for other ways to make a great impression with your students’ families, check out these resources!  

STUDENT RESEARCH CONFERENCE PREPARATION 

This resource helps your students organize their reading, research, and writing into a research conference poster! These research posters are designed to mirror collegiate research conferences, and this resource provides you with the scaffolding and student graphic organizers (and more!) to get you there! 

STATE TEST PREPARATION 

This resource gives students a recap of a multitude of skills assessed on a standardized ELA test. Put this in Google Classroom, then have students work through the review tasks independently by picking what categories they want a review while you pull small groups! Or, send it home to families and be their hero!