Problem Statement
Nowadays, communication processes between local school districts and the community are not of good quality, and there is a considerable division that exists between educational leaders and community residents. There are many misconceptions with parents when the time to understand the current curriculum comes, but the community is not aware of the changes which happened to the existed educational policy. At the same time, students are growing more distant from their household caretakers at the socio-cultural level, therefore knowledge about what is occurring in school is not being effectively spread between students and parents. For example, in Saudi Arabia, this type of communication is not strong enough to promote appropriate education: it is hard to define the time when both educators and parents are free and ready to share their ideas and suggestions. This is why educators need a kind of quality forum with the help of which it is possible to discuss new ideas, present their curriculums, knowledge, and experience, and be able to understand what may drive community lifestyle and solve numerous misconceptions about the school’s curriculum.
Why the Problem Is so Important
Education should be evaluated as a cycle that is dependent on the actions and communications of students, parents, and educators. Effective teaching is more than just the typical ABCs of basic foundational skills development. There is a psychological edge in the presentation of materials that should be geared around the current cognitive development of students in their current age bracket. Parents do not understand the concepts behind the modern curriculum that are in line with human relations theory and psychology; therefore they do not understand the individual instructor and their goals within the classroom. Without a forum that aims at improving communications, only students may benefit from such a humanistic teaching style, still, parents and community residents cannot get a chance to understand the educational system offered. There is an old management theory that incorrectly states that individuals need to be controlled before they will put forth discretionary effort (Fullan, 2008). Educators understand that each child has their learning styles and responds differently to imagery or auditory lectures. Parents argue with teachers about the grades that are given and believe that it is the product of an inferior curriculum in case the results are not as successful as it is expected. However, the truth is that parents do not understand the complex dynamics of teaching and need to be educated about modern teaching methods. Failure to understand these ideals represents a failure to assist children in improving their retention levels. This is why it is very important to address the issue of communication between schools and communities to promote appropriate cooperation between teachers and parents and improve students’ behavior at schools, their readiness for classes, and their presence.
Addressing the Problem in Literature
What is required is a new communications system that links students, parents, and teachers, or other interested parties within the local community. However, there is no single method of improving communications due to diverse lifestyle and ethnic profiles in the local district. Some students live within collectivist households where group welfare and strong family connections are present. Other students are from more progressive households where individual needs are recognized and supported over group importance (Blodgett, Bakir & Rose, 2008). The changing patterns of the household demographic need to be understood before an effective program can be put into place to improve communications between all of these parties.
It is necessary to understand the fundamentals of leadership before the program can be described effectively. “Leadership fails because individuals believe leadership is something psychological rather than spiritual, as having to do with persons rather than ideas” (Sergiovanni, 2008, p.3). Teachers are often referred to the local community as leaders, however, a lack of knowledge about the complex role of an educator as an ideas-producer leads to ongoing debates about the quality of what is being taught. Teachers recognize their role as behavioralists and include these elements into the classroom, but still, they have to deal with a lack of community-level knowledge about the chosen functions.
In an organizational environment, there are three types of people, known as As, Bs, and Cs. A-type representatives are filled with passion and commitment, while B-type is characterized by poor passion still a number of good personal qualities. The C-type people are ineffective and defined as non-performers (Fullen, 2008). When teachers are working with students, they have tools at their disposal in order to identify certain students who are in need of more motivational tools. Since parents’ knowledge of their children is not as effective as it should be in accordance with the chosen lifestyle level, the motivational or ABC personal traits of their children are unknown. The teacher understands thorough assessment of which students are A-type students and work consistently to mold positive lifelong learning and self-management lessons. Parents need a system to understand the ABC dimensions of their children so that they can better relate to educators and assist in the learning process.
Many parents believe that the traditional elements of learning provide young people with the necessary power and knowledge that may help to run the world successfully (Palmer, 2007). Community members with a strong value system related to education fear by means of more progressive learning programs. “People often lie in an effort to deny their fears” (Palmer, 2007, p.57). Whenever the school promotes parent/teacher interaction, parents are plagued with concerned citizens that constantly question the integrity of education being provided. What is really important in this evaluation is a fear-induced value system by means of which parents cover their truthful concerns with direct attacks against teachers’ competency. In reality, parents are fearful of the more behaviorally-involved portions of learning since they are unfamiliar with it and it represents a departure from traditional approaches. The achievements of Jeri LaBahn (1995) show that the vast majority of parents are not eager to participate in their children’s school activities as they believe they are unwelcomed at schools. To destroy such false attitudes to schools, it is crucially important to work with parents and provide them with clear explanations.
Involving Key Stakeholders for the Program
Students are not the problem in this scenario, still, it is very important to involve a number of teachers and community citizens who may influence the development of the process. The first requirement is to establish a school website that offers information about the modernized learning curriculum. Samples of student learning surveys and profiles such as Kolb’s Learning Styles Inventory should be available so that parents may understand the complex role of teaching in today’s society. There should be fundamental learning about ABC personality types and how teachers try to motivate students using individual performance and talent. The attention to the technical support can be used as well to allow a kind of periodic upgrades of content materials over time. It represents virtually no budget problems since these systems are already well-defined in the chosen district. Appropriate communication between educators and IT support during which educators are able to get the necessary amount of knowledge is all that is needed to change the education process.
As parents are more interested in activities in case the content is interactive, communications should take a stakeholder’s point of view and bring parents’ interests into the classroom. This program should include different learning material that is delivered to parents periodically, surveys or parent-focused learning inventories, and student’s achievements in a particular sphere. By creating an inclusive environment where parents can gain more knowledge of learning approaches and psychology, parents will have a better understanding of how their children’s learning process is shaped. This can be controlled at little cost in the classroom by the efforts of the teacher to develop a scale or refer to the one that is currently in use. Then, it is necessary to deliver these materials via the student to the parent’s environment and wait for the reactions. It should serve as a spotlight tool with direct delivery so that when parent/teacher conferences arrive, the educator can have a parent knowledge file available for reference as a starting, common ground in discussions.
The Benefits of the Plan and Identification of People who May Rely on It
Simon (2009) identifies that human beings cannot concentrate on more than one thing at the same time, therefore being essentially serial. All of the literature being produced by the schools today, over-complicated or confused messages by overwhelming parents and community with knowledge materials are observed. The main problem is the over-production of parent-focused education information that may easily detract from quality understanding and retention. The main benefit of the website is that it can allow parents to access the information on their own personal schedules and search for information specifically suited to their search parameters. By allowing parents to control the number of communications, it avoids improper decoding of the message being delivered.
Parents need to understand the ABC dimensions of their children’s behavior, their learning styles, and their achievements and to define the reasons why teachers take various approaches to young people. The production of the in-class surveys and skills inventories for parents will also help them to identify their strengths and weaknesses, perhaps realizing where some of their student’s lack of motivation is created. It will serve as an emotional intelligence learning lesson for parents without causing budgetary problems and still give parents control over learning and communications.
The overall goal of the project is to improve communication between the community and teachers and deprive teachers of the feeling of being accused, as they often are because of inabilities to understand student needs. The program should be stewarded by senior-level school administration and consultation with individual teachers who will guide the website content. Because the Internet technologies are stable in the chosen district, the offered idea to create a website represents a long-term plan with the help of which teaching can be more interactive for diverse community citizens and avoid overwhelming capabilities from students, teachers, and parents.
The success of the Plan
To determine its success, senior administration can conduct temporary parental surveys without teachers’ participation. Several questions are asked regarding the quality of parent/teacher relationships and improvements are indicated in the student learning process. Such steps may become a kind of quantitative measurement tool that identifies the gaps in the program and areas which require some adjustments. The long-term strategy aims at increasing knowledge about leadership and the psychology of modern teaching by helping parents to identify the educational process as well as the needs of their children. Its success will be also measured by teachers’ surveys where misconceptions that are still present in the parent/teacher interaction should be identified. If teachers follow this program, make the effort to maintain a knowledge file, and improve website content, they have all chances to improve the relations between the community and the educational system and define other possible steps which may be taken in the future to contribute the sphere of education.
List of Reference
Blodgett, J., Bakir, A. & Rose, G. (2008). A test of the validity of Hofstede’s cultural framework, The Journal of Consumer Marketing. 25(6), p.339.
Fullan, Michael. (2008). The Six Secrets of Change – What the best leaders do to help their organizations survive and thrive, John Wiley & Sons. Web.
LaBahn, J. (1995). Education and parental involvement in secondary schools: problems, solutions, and effects. Educational Psychology Interactive. Valdosta, GA: Valdosta State University.
Palmer, Parker J. (2007). The Courage to Teach: exploring the inner landscape of a teacher’s life. John Wiley and Sons, Inc. Web.
Sergiovanni, Thomas J. (2008). Moral Leadership: Getting to the heart of school improvement. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Web.
Simon, H. (2009). “What can the scientist who presents learn from Herbert Simon (Part 1). Web.