Linking+Home-School-Community


 * Linking Home- School- Community**

Studies have shown strong connections between student engagement and achievement. For students to be engaged in their learning they need to be able to connect to the content they are learning to their own experiences. The Early Years Learners Research Project advocates a "Whole school approach around nine beliefs and understandings about the teaching of early years literacy" (Bickley 2004). One of these beliefs is importance of connecting home/school/community links. This connection is vital to creating a meaningful learning experience for the students. These connections can be created through understanding the students ‘funds of knowledge’, prior experiences (virtual backpack) and with parent involvement. **Prior knowledge.** Every student comes to school with their own set of unique experiences. In our classrooms we have had students with differing socio-economic backgrounds, family structure and issues, medical backgrounds, cultural background, abilities/disabilities, prior learning experiences and opportunity for learning outside of school. As teachers we're presented with these students and asked to direct them to meet benchmarks and standards. The most effective approach to making this achievable for the teacher and the student is to create a teaching approach that encompasses students’ prior knowledge and experiences. By relating learning to what students already know, we can build on this knowledge whilst making a meaningful connection. As teachers we “recognise that family and experiences with literacy before and beyond the classroom contribute significantly to progress in literacy acquisition and mastery.” (Bickley, 2004, p. 8). **Parent/caregiver involvement** Raban, Brown, Care, Rickards and O’Connell (2004) state that "Families have the first and most enduring impact upon children's health, development and wellbeing". Involvement of parent and carers in students schooling is integral for positive links between home and school. As future teachers we need to value and encourage parents input into the school environment to ensure links between home and school are consistent and parents perceptions of school are positive. Learning can be reinforced outside of the classroom with the involvement and assistance of parents. Students will feel that learning and education is important with the support of parents/caregiver. At home the students can be engaged in ‘incidental’ learning; learning that is unintentional (e.g. reading around them- food packaging, street signs, shopping) but that still supports the learning that they are undertaking in a formal setting. **Funds of knowledge** Students come to school with vastly different life experiences, cultural backgrounds and academic abilities. These ‘funds of knowledge’ are immense resources that teachers should utilise within the classroom to create an inclusive learning environment. Student ‘funds of knowledge’ give teachers a detailed insight to students’ lives and how you might be able to use these ‘funds of knowledge’ within the classroom. Moll et al. (1992) in Hill (2006) describes ‘funds of knowledge’ as “the tools, strategies, and activities that families engage in to live their lives” (2006, p. 57). Student ‘funds of knowledge’ may include: - Books, digital camera, environmental print, food, games, internet, junk mail, library, movies, newspaper, restaurants, supermarket & shopping, conversation, vocabulary, video, zoo and nature. (Hill, 2006, pp. 58- 62). - Making use of purposeful reading and writing tasks that connect to students prior understandings and where possible interests. - Show and share opportunities where students can present an item or story of their interest to their classmates - Parent meetings- individual/group - Letters home - Parents helpers in the classroom, making use of parent knowledge and educating them through programs such as The Parent Helpers program and Developing Literacy Partnerships - Photographs to document lives outside of school - Shoe box - Star of the Week - Exchanging knowledge between home and school through take home readers and diaries - Helps for “parents more knowledgeable about what happens in school, and help teachers understand more about children’s out-of school lives.” (Hughes et al, 2007, p.1) - Developmental Play has various benefits when used effectively in the classroom. Research by Raban, Brown, Care, Rickards and O’Connell (2004) shows us that "Pretend play has been found to have structural and developmental associations with language". In prep classes we have seen developmental play used to engage students in literacy to create meaningful learning experiences integrated with literacy.
 * Recommendations:**