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Bridging School and Home Through Family Nights

Ready-to-Use Plans for Grades K-8

By: Diane W. Kyle, Ellen McIntyre, Karen B. Miller, Gayle H. Moore

Improve student achievement through academically focused family nights!

The more a parent takes part in his or her child's schoolwork, the more likely that child will succeed academically. This resource offers all the information, materials, and resources for planning and implementing events that increase family involvement. Drawing on experience and research, the authors include information on adapting events for special populations, issues on providing food and incentives, and cost-saving ideas. Chapters provide event procedures, needed materials lists, connections with national standards, and numerous reproducibles, including:

Invitations
Agendas
Sign-in sheets
Evaluation forms
Activity worksheets
Handouts
Overheads

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Product Details

Grade Level: K-8
ISBN: 9781412914673
Published By: Corwin
Year: 2005
Page Count: 192
Publication date: May 11, 2015

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Description

"Bridging School and Home Through Family Nights is a handy book that practitioners can readily pick up and select activities, ideas, and themes for including families in the learning process. This practical book offers thirteen self-contained units full of activities, sample invitations, agendas, charts-everything a staff member needs to plan a successful event."
Susan N. Imamura, Principal
Manoa Elementary School, Honolulu, HI

"The useful content, reader-friendly tone, and easy-to-understand style speak directly to teachers and school staff responsible for parent involvement activities. The family nights can be used as a series of yearlong family activities or school staff can pick and choose the family nights that fit their academic focus."
Michele R. Dean, Principal
Montalvo Elementary School, Ventura, CA

Improve student achievement through academically focused family nights!

Research confirms the link between family involvement and academic success. Yet, as student populations become increasingly diverse, educators face a daunting challenge in establishing close connections with families. Bridging School and Home Through Family Nights: Ready-to-Use Plans for Grades K-8 offers all the information, materials, and resources for planning and implementing events that build effective relationships. Drawing on their own experiences and extensive research, the authors include information on adapting events for special populations, issues around providing food and incentives, cost-saving ideas, and additional resources.

Each of the book's thirteen family night chapters is a self-contained unit that provides event procedures, needed materials, connections with national standards, and numerous reproducibles, including:

Invitations
Agendas
Sign-in sheets
Evaluation forms
Activity worksheets
Handouts
Overheads

Productive family night experiences offer an enjoyable and meaningful way for schools to reach out to families and get them involved. This book is appropriate for K-8 teachers and principals or anyone in the school or district responsible for family events.

Author(s)

Diane W. Kyle

Diane W. Kyle is a professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning at the University of Louisville. She has coauthored Reaching Out: A K–8 Resource for Connecting Schools and Families and Reflective Teaching for Student Empowerment: Elementary Curriculum and Methods, coedited Creating Nongraded Primary Classrooms: Teachers’ Stories and Lessons Learned, and published in such journals as Language Arts, Peabody Journal of Education, Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk, Education & Equity, Teaching Children Mathematics, and Elementary School Journal. Her most recent project, codirected with Ellen McIntyre, is “Sheltered Instruction and Family Involvement: An Approach to Raising Achievement of LEP Students,” funded by the US Department of Education. She also codirected with Ellen McIntyre a research project, “Children’s Academic Development in Nongraded Primary Programs,” funded by the Center for Research on Education, Diversity, and Excellence (CREDE) at the University of California at Santa Cruz.

Ellen McIntyre

Ellen McIntyre is a literacy professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning at the University of Louisville, where she teaches courses on literacy research and instruction and studies children’s development in light of instructional contexts. She has published extensively, having coauthored Reaching Out: A K–8 Resource for Connecting Schools and Families, coedited Classroom Diversity: Connecting School Curricula to Students’ Lives, Balanced Instruction: Strategies and Skills in Whole Language, and Creating Nongraded Primary Programs, and published in such journals as Language Arts, Research in the Teaching of English, Journal of Literacy Research, and American Educational Research Journal. Her most recent project, codirected with Diane Kyle, is “Sheltered Instruction and Family Involvement: An Approach to Raising Achievement of LEP Students,” funded by the US Department of Education. She also codirected with Diane Kyle a research project, “Children’s Academic Development in Nongraded Primary Programs,” funded by the Center for Research on Education, Diversity, and Excellence (CREDE) at the University of California at Santa Cruz.

Karen B. Miller

Karen B. Miller has taught elementary school for more than 20 years in grades 1–4. She currently teaches at Roby Elementary in Bullitt County, Kentucky. For two years, she participated as a teacher-researcher on the study, “Children’s Academic Development in Nongraded Primary Programs,” funded by the Center for Research on Education, Diversity, and Excellence (CREDE) at the University of California at Santa Cruz. Making family visits during this time enabled her to learn more about the students in her classroom and to make connections in her instruction, often through Family Nights she planned and implemented. She has coauthored Reaching Out: A K–8 Resource for Connecting Schools and Families and presented for several years at the National Reading Conference. In addition, she has served as a teacher leader for the Kentucky Reading Project and Project READ Early Intervention, in which she has provided intensive professional development for teachers on literacy and family involvement. She also has presented at the National Reading Conference on home–school connections.

Gayle H. Moore

Gayle H. Moore recently retired after teaching elementary school for 31 years at grades K–8, including 9 years in the nongraded primary program at LaGrange Elementary in Oldham County, Kentucky. Throughout that time, she participated as a teacher-researcher on studies related to the nongraded primary. She has coauthored Reaching Out: A K–8 Resource for Connecting Schools and Families, a chapter in Creating Nongraded Primary Classrooms: Teachers’ Stories and Lessons Learned, and articles in Language Arts and Peabody Journal of Education. She has presented at conferences of the American Educational Research Association, the International Reading Association, and the National Reading Conference. Most recently she has participated as a teacher-researcher for the study, “Children’s Academic Development in Nongraded Primary Programs,” funded by the Center for Research on Education, Diversity, and Excellence (CREDE) at the University of California at Santa Cruz. For three years, she made family visits to the homes of her students, learning about the families’ knowledge and using it to make instructional connections. She also planned and implemented several Family Nights, one focused on mathematics. Her subsequent classroom activities are described in an article in Teaching Children Mathematics.

Table of Contents

Preface

About the Authors

1. Getting Families Involved in School Through Family Nights

2. Scrapbook Family Night: Preserving Memories in Words and Pictures

3. Books, Books, and More Books: A Reading-Focused Family Night

4. Meet Our Pets Family Night

5. A Morning of Family Fun With Math

6. Sharing Family Stories and Traditions Night

7. Game-Making/Writing Family Night for Developing Writing Skills

8. Pajama Party Family Night: A Reading Event

9. Meeting Famous People Through Biographies Family Night

10. Sharing Hobbies, Talents, and Interests Family Night

11. Poetry Family Morning

12. Making Science Fun Family Night

13. Fun With Language: A Family Night of Riddles, Jokes, and Cartoons

14. Health and Wellness Family Night

15. Next Steps: Getting the Most Out of Family Nights

Resource A: Reproducible Planning Guide

Resource B: Reproducible Sign-in Sheet

Resource C: Helpful Web Sites

Resource D: Spanish Translations of Invitations

References

Index

Reviews

"The authors suggest that Family Night benefits include increased parental participation, stronger partnerships, and better teaching/learning in the classroom. This book is recommended to anyone interested in improving students' academic achievement through parental involvement."

Principal Navigator, March 2007

Other Titles in: Administration & Leadership | Principalship | Teaching Methods & Learning Styles

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This book is not available as a review copy.