Welcome to Lincoln Elementary School’s Parent Presentation!

1. Welcome to Lincoln Elementary School’s Parent Presentation! The Importance of Community Partnerships

2. How To Create Relationships Within the Community Relationships are the heart of every community. They are vital in assisting communities to thrive because supportive relationships help build them when individuals come together. In order to organize activities, support a cause, help a business succeed, build a playground, and even help the local school; good relationships are needed to help accomplish specified goals. Furthermore, these relationships that we build can have an impact on our children in some distinct way. To provide support to your local community, we should come together and try to build relationships because they all can help the community in some special way. There are several ways that relationships can be created in this community, these include: • Give a smile or just say “hello”. Just by being courteous and open to others, we can begin the formation of building relationships within our community. • Volunteer for any school, agency, or organization that needs help. This can help others get to know you in the community. Plus, volunteering will give you the opportunity to build relationships when you lend a helping hand. • Go to different functions within your community to build relations, such as, a picnic or school carnival. • Get involved with clubs, school functions, even PTA at Lincoln Elementary. By making yourself become a part of something you can build relationships and help make a difference. • Donate to local organizations that need supplies or funds to operate. By donating supplies and funds, you will build relationships through your contributions. Not only are you helping others provide for those in need, but you are also supporting a new relationship (Community Tool Box, 2013).

3. How To Sustain the Relationships You Create After relationships have been built, it is best to try to preserve them. There are several ways people can sustain the relations they create: • By being attentive and appreciative to those you have formed a relationship with. • For many communication is the key. Try to communicate often and openly with others. • Give more to those that are in need, because helping others can help sustain a relationship. • Be a loyal companion by supporting those that need support and someone to lean on (Community Tool Box, 2013).

4. Partnerships Can Help Influence Learning and Development

5. Early Childhood Stage of Development Here at Lincoln Elementary, children begin to attend school at the preschool level. This is considered the Early Childhood Stage of Development, which ranges from 2-years-of-age to 6 years-of-age. Throughout this stage, children become more leaner and longer, they are more refined in their motor and social skills, children are more independent, and they have more control of themselves and their behavior. As development blossoms, children in this stage gain and maintain the skills that they need to be successful (Berk, 2013).

6. My Role As a Child Development Professional… • As an Early Childhood Professional, it is my goal to guide and support the learning a development for each individual child. • Through implementing various activities and resources, every child that I interact with will have the chance to experience opportunities that will influence social/emotional, physical, language, and cognitive development. • For my role I will participate in : 1) Being a guide, supporter, and nurturer of your children. 2) An active listener to your child’s concerns. 3) A participant in their play. 4) A committed teacher that will provide your child the skills and knowledge they need to be successful. 5) And, someone that parents, friends, and others in the community can come to for advice or additional information.

7. Rationale Regarding This Parent Presentation There are several reasons as to why I have decided to provide this parent presentation. These include: • This presentation gives you the opportunity to understand how partnerships in the community can impact your child’s learning and development. • Parents will be able to see what they can do to make a positive impact in the community, and that it is vital to act as a supporter and nurturer in their child’s development at home and school. • This presentation also gives me the opportunity to help parents comprehend the level of development being addressed, and helps me to provide insight to parents on how they can assist their child, school, and community. • Furthermore, it is my honor as a child development professional to assist you with any concerns you have, and to provide you with any additional resources and information that you may need.

8. How Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory Identifies How Families, Schools, and Communities Are Connected! Urie Bronfenbrenner developed and implemented the Ecological Systems Theory. This theory helps determine what influences within the environment affect human development. This theory has identified five distinct levels that are involved with affecting a child’s development, however, I will discuss the mesosystem due to it’s relevance regarding community partnership. The mesosystem is the second level in this theory, and it considers the interactions of different entities of a particular individual or child, and how these interactions can impact development. This level also helps identify how each entity within that level is connected to one another. For instance, this level includes interactions between the family, school, and community; which means that if interactions between any two entities is negative, than development may be adversely impacted. Furthermore, say if a teacher and parent share ideas and agree on reaching specific goals. This interaction can help influence a positive impact on the child’s development because these two forces are working together. Since, these connections are closely related, it is vital that we all consider what actions we can implement to create positive development ( Education Portal, n.d.).

9. Epstein’s Types of Involvement Type 1 Involvement-Parenting This type of involvement consists of when teachers and other professionals assist parents with learning new techniques and skills pertaining to parenting their child. Teachers should provide parents resources and materials to share ideas and provide support. This type of involvement can help support learning and development by giving parents the training and education they need to understand how their child learns and develops. With the skills parents attain, they can promote and enhance their child’s abilities at home (Epstein, n.d.). Here at Lincoln Elementary School, the library has now opened a new Parent Corner, so that parents can check out and view videos pertaining to parent training and education. Within the Parent Corner, there is also a abundance of parenting books and other resources Information is also available in Spanish as well.

10. Epstein’s Types of Involvement Type 2 Involvement-Communicating Communication is the key to success. Parents need to learn to understand how their child is learning and developing. Through weekly folders, memos, conferences, and other communication styles; parents and teachers can work together to promote learning and development. For instance, learning and development can be influenced when weekly folders are sent home to show what the child knows, what they are learning, and to promote learning when activities are sent home in the folder (Epstein, n.d.). In the preschool program here at Lincoln Elementary School, teachers are now sending weekly folders home to promote language development by implementing a weekly reading log, so that parents can writedown the titles of the books they have read to their child that week. We encourage that parents read books that support the language of their culture!

11. Epstein’s Types of Involvement Type 3 Involvement-Volunteering Volunteering can help influence learning and development. Classrooms that have volunteers have the opportunity of providing children the chance to build their social and language skills by interacting with others, rather than their peers and teachers. Volunteers also make it possible to help children learn concepts and other skills that volunteers can share (Epstein, n.d.). As of now, the Parent Volunteer Program has just re-opened! Today we are accepting applications, and we are hoping that we can gain the volunteers to help the preschool classrooms out here at Lincoln Elementary School. We welcome and encourage all parents to apply, so that we can work together to promote learning and development!

12. Epstein’s Types of Involvement Type 4 Involvement- Learning at home Through providing ideas and information to parents about different activities and assignments, learning and development can be promoted. With this information, parents are equipped with the tools to extend the learning and development process at home. The activities that will be supplied will enhance the learning of concepts regarding letter recognition, number recognition, and color recognition (Epstein, n.d.). Lincoln Elementary School preschool teachers will now supplement activities pertaining to these concepts at the beginning of each week, so that parents can work with their children at home. These homework folders will be turned in every Thursday for grading, and homework will be reassigned every Monday.

13. Epstein’s Types of Involvement Type 5 Involvement-Decision Making To help assist with learning and development, school and parent organizations are a vital influence. Through these organizations, parents and staff can help make decisions that will impact curriculum, other activities, classroom functions, and classroom procedures. Essentially, what decisions are made will have an impact on what a child learns, which will reflect on development (Epstein, n.d.). The Preschool Partnership Club at Lincoln Elementary has begun for the new school year. Parents and caregivers are all welcomed and encouraged to apply for club positions. We also need bilingual individuals to help us in translating information and ideas to some of the parents at Lincoln Elementary. Please contact Mrs. Garcia in room 9 for further details.

14. Epstein’s Types of Involvement Type 6 Involvement-Collaborating With the Community Through recognizing and incorporating sources and aid from the local community of Gilbert, Arizona; our school, it’s programs, families, and children’s learning and development will thrive. By implementing these resources within the community, parents can learn about different activities and supports that will help influence learning and development (Epstein, n.d.). The preschool program has now incorporated a community activity board that parents can view upon entering the classroom. This activity board displays local community services that are available, new activities that are going to take place, and this bulletin offers the information in Spanish and English.

15. References: Berk, L. E. (2013). Child development. Boston: Pearson Education. Community Tool Box. (2013). Section 7. Building and Sustaining Relationships. Retrieve from http://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/leadership/leadership-functions/build-sustain-relationships/main Education Portal. (n.d.). Bronfenbrenner's Ecological Systems Theory of Development: Definition & Examples. Retrieved from http://education-portal.com/academy/lesson/bronfenbrenners- ecological-systems-theory-of-development-definition-examples.html Epstein, J. (n.d.).  Epstein's framework of six types of involvement. Retrieved from http://www.unicef.org/lac/Joyce_L._Epstein_s_Framework_of_Six_Types_of_Involvement(2).pdf Positive Behavioral Interventions & Support. (2014). School, Family, and Community Partnerships. Retrieved from http://www.pbis.org/family/family_partnership.aspx