Kindergarteners and Their Families
Kindergarteners are embarking on their actual journey into formal schooling and “the quality of interaction between a child’s kindergarten teacher and family helps to form a family’s overall connection with school” (Copple & Bredekamp, 2009, p. 253). In this way, the teacher is helping to establish a family’s relationship with school for many years to come. Parents may feel reluctant to come to school now, finding school policies intimidating or remembering—more clearly now—their own unpleasant experiences as children. (See Field Notes 8.2 for an example of this.) Thus, it is important for teachers to “solicit parents’ knowledge about their children and input about their goals and concerns” and then “use this information in ongoing assessment, evaluation, and planning” (p. 252).