TPC Student Sheet

Last year before Parent / Teacher Conferences I got to thinking about how I conduct my conferences. Typically, I would print a grade sheet for the student, give it to the parents, and start talking about the student’s performance in class. And really, it was fine.

But I wanted to do more.

Last year was my first time going to Parent / Teacher Conferences as a parent and I really liked that my daughter’s teacher took the time to tell me about what she was doing well in class and how she was contributing to the class environment. I think that by my tendency to focus on the grade sheet in the past, we skipped past everything to look at missing assignments, low test scores, etc. and ended up focusing on the negative. And I didn’t want to because obviously our students are so much more than that.

In order for me to start my conversations the way I wanted to, I created this document last year.

For each student I highlighted strengths, some suggestions for growth, wrote the overall grade, and then gave some upcoming important dates and helpful websites. While it looks like a lot of work, it’s really just a template so all I have to change for each student are the individual comments and grades. For all of my conferences last year, it took less than half an hour to prep and in the end, it was well worth it.

Having already collected my thoughts and purposely focusing on the positives first, I started my conversations that way. I really liked saying productive, kind things about my students and I know that as a parent I like hearing nice things about my daughters (because like all parents, I work really hard on them!). I think that it helped me set the tone that I wanted for conferences and in the end I was really happy with the outcome.

What do you do to facilitate successful conferences? Share your ideas in the comments section so that we can all learn from each other!

In case you are interested in borrowing my form, follow this link to make a copy.  

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