Children whose families have meaningful relationships with their teachers are better equipped emotionally to participate in early learning experiences. These meaningful relationships will also help children learn to develop effective communication strategies, problem-solving techniques, and overall positive social skills. Family engagement in a preschool setting also provides numerous benefits for the families, teachers, and programs. In this course, we’ll explore how to foster those meaningful relationships and create a truly welcoming environment for both children and families. We’ll also investigate methods of establishing effective two-way communication with families, how to collaborate and share knowledge, and how to provide opportunities to engage with families as decision makers.

Learning Outcomes

• • Implement strategies to create a warm and welcoming environment for families.
• • Enhance your learning environment with diverse materials and intentional teaching.
• • Communicate with families through consistent two-way communication and become more aware of your word choice, verbal and nonverbal communication styles, and how often you communicate.
• • Recognize the benefits of home visits while exploring strategies to make these visits meaningful to the families and children and implement additional ways families can share their knowledge and information with providers.
• • Empower families to see themselves as teachers and learners by collaborating with them to plan family workshops, problem-solve together, and explore educational topics with their children through the use of multiple intelligences.
• • Include families in their child’s educational decisions and explore ways families can be part of the discussions about policies and procedures.
• • Create a variety of networking systems within your program to support families and becoming familiar with local, state, and national organizations that can support families.

These strategies are job-embedded and will need to be implemented in your program.