top of page

Grace Miller’s 2018-2019

Room Parent Social & Fall Festival Meeting

DATE: Thursday, September 6th, 2018

 

TIME: 3:00 pm

PLACE:    Grace Miller Cafeteria (snacks served)

many_hands.png

Join us and learn how you can help our teachers in the classroom and on field trips! Download and complete the form. Please drop it by our

Room Parent Social or in the PTA Mailbox in the Office. 

Come and join other Room Parent Volunteers, Teachers and our staff.  This is a great opportunity to meet with the teachers and discuss the duties of the Lead Room Parents and Room Parents and to share ideas about upcoming classroom and school events. 

We will also be choosing this year’s 2018 Fall Festival booth! You don’t want to miss your chance to get the booth you want!   Thank you for volunteering and we look forward to sharing a cup of tea with you!

We understand this time may not be convenient for some to attend but we are trying to be sensitive to the teacher’s schedules and allowing them to get home as soon as possible once their day is done. If you can not attend but would like to be a room parent or co-room parent please fill out information below and return to your child’s teacher or front office.

Room Parent Coordinator,

Melissa Neal  

What does a Room Parent do? 

A room parent’s main task is to facilitate communication between other parents and the teacher, the school parent group, and occasionally school administration. This can vary widely from class to class, teacher to teacher, and sometimes even district to district. For the most part, as a room parent you’ll solicit donations (paper goods, snacks, decorations, etc.) from parents for classroom parties and events (usually based on a list from the teacher), collect money for teacher gifts during holidays and Teacher Appreciation Week in May, organize volunteers for the classroom for events or enrichment, and other tasks as decided by the teacher. As well, some room parents act as liaisons for their school’s PTA, attending parent group meetings and, potentially, helping generate support or interest in parent group efforts. (For example, room parents can help the PTA promote an event by reminding their parents of an upcoming program or fundraiser.)

 

Meet With the Teacher

Teachers’ expectations of their room parents vary widely. Some rely heavily on volunteers to pull together all events and parties; others have specific ideas and will ask parents to coordinate only certain parts. Either way, it’s critical to find out your teacher’s preferred way of doing things early on, and stick to it.

And don’t limit your communication to those types of emails. It’s a good idea to check in with your teacher periodically to ask whether she needs anything. More than once, I emailed my daughter's teacher to find she had been intending to contact me about an upcoming event, and she was grateful my co-room parent and I were being proactive.

 

Get a List

Without a doubt, your best resource during your tenure as room parent will be an up-to-date parent email list. Sometimes your parent group or teacher can provide this; other times, you’ll have to compile it yourself by sending a note around that asks parents to reply to your email. (Alternatively, depending on when room parents are chosen, you could provide a sheet on back-to-school night.) Whatever effort it entails early on is worth it; you’ll be grateful as the year progresses.

 

Play Fair

Email is a very convenient way to communicate with a group of parents, but there are a few issues you should be aware of. You may come across families who don’t use email; take the extra step to include them in communications by calling or sending a note in their child’s backpack. As well, smartphones make it possible for volunteers to reply almost instantly to requests. If you find that the same parents are replying over and over, it’s completely OK to give others a chance to participate. Some classes are fine with a first-come, first-served approach, but in other cases, a bit more patience is required.

Get To Know Your Co-Room Parent

Establishing a warm connection early on with your co-room parent, if you have one, is another important aspect of how successful your year will be. Sometimes you get lucky and are paired with someone whose style meshes with yours. If you’re really lucky, you’ll get someone who happily picks up the slack when you’re overloaded, and vice versa. But even in situations where personalities and styles differ, it’s important to learn to work together. That might mean coming up with a more formal arrangement to get things done—for example, you handle the Halloween event, the other room parent organizes the winter holiday party, and so on. Remember that you both checked the “yes” box in the first place because you care about your kids’ experience and want to help in the best way you can.

Being a room parent will allow you some perspectives and opportunities you wouldn’t otherwise have. You will have the satisfaction of knowing you helped a busy teacher organize a fun event, or gathered chaperones for a field trip. You will establish yourself as a reliable member of your school community. And perhaps best of all, you will have the opportunity to participate in your child’s school life in a special way. So check “yes” on the form—it’s well worth it.

bottom of page