A Parent’s Guide to a Teacher Conference

I love going to my kids’ school. I love seeing the parents of my kids’ friends. I love seeing my son’s construction paper mask hanging in the hallway and I love the periodic concerts each grade does every year.

I have thoroughly enjoyed . While the teachers and administrators are top notch it is the level of parental involvement that is truly astonishing. It was a testament to the community’s support of a school to see hundreds of parents take time off work last month to watch the ten-minute Halloween Parade in the school playground as every child filed past showing off their costumes.

This week we had parent/teacher conferences. I look forward to this every semester. I am fascinated by the observations that teachers have of my kids and I am truly curious to know their view on how we as parents can best help their academic and social development.  

Even so, I have my own nightmares on how these sessions could go.

I have fears of the teacher asking us to sit down as she goes to a safe hidden under her desk. There she extracts a huge portfolio from a file entitled “Problem Kids,” and on the cover is our son’s name. She then sits down across from us and places her fingers on her temples and rubs for two minutes in silence before beginning with this sentence: “Mr. and Mrs. Zillman, we have a problem.”

She then launches into stories of our son embezzling illegal candies into homeroom while creating an underground black market, selling the said goods for Pokemon cards, Wolf Pack tickets and other favors he could barter. All the while she begins pulling out spelling tests with doodles of nuclear holocaust scribbled across the front and art projects depicting the school on fire with a giant dinosaur extinguishing the said blaze through urination with astounding anatomical accuracy.

The conference ends with the teacher hyperventilating because of a panic attack and my wife sobbing in her chair as the paramedics take the teacher away while the rest of the school staff shake their heads at us and whisper “That’s the parents of that Zillman boy.”

This hasn’t happened yet, but given the type of student I was in school I believe it is only time before I get a taste of what my parents endured for my sake. I always felt growing up that my parents had formed a criminal partnership with the teachers of my school to uncover every mischief and act of irresponsibility I had up my sleeve.

I never once heard my parents side with me over my teachers, even if they agreed with me. I always believed that the teachers were my parents allies and co-conspirators and never more so than on parent/teacher conference night.

That said, I find that many parents find it challenging to hear opinions and observations about their child from a teacher. This is a euphemistic way of saying that some parents are insecure, defensive and immature during these conferences. I think that because parents understand how much their child reflects upon themselves they hear critique of their child as a personal attack or failure upon them.

Therefore, I have drawn up some guidelines that I believe will help make these parent/teacher conferences more productive. Essentially, these are some things I believe parents must concede before they walk in the door to their conference.

1.  This isn’t about you. This is a time for you to learn about your child and what a trained professional is seeing from them eight hours a day, five days a week. Once you’ve learned what they are seeing, then you can collaborate on what to do next.

2. You child isn’t perfect. Everyone knows it. Everyone sees it. And yes, those problems most likely stem from your parenting. Yet, the fact that this is a simple truth for everyone means that there isn’t any cause for defensiveness. We’re all in the same boat.

3. If the teacher says your child did it, they probably did. There is no use blindly defending your child from a teacher’s observations just because your child is telling you that the teacher is wrong. You lied in the same way when you were a kid, is it so hard to believe they would do the same? There is no incentive for a teacher to make this stuff up. It’s not fun telling you any of it.

4. Your child acts differently at home than they do at school and it’s not the teacher’s fault. I’ve heard parents use the line of reasoning “They don’t act that way at home. Only in your class, so it must be you.” That’s asinine. If they act differently away from the home it has something to do with the way you train your kids, not the way the teacher does.

5. Ask the question, “What can we as parents do better to help our child?” Then prepare to listen humbly to the answer. It’s silly not to get input from the person that likely sees more of your child than you get to during the week. Teachers have profound ideas of how to help your child- they were educated to answer this question with thought and deliberation.

6. Not every teacher will be falling all over you to compliment your child. Some years it will seem that the teacher loves your child, and others it won’t. The healthy development of your child requires both personalities in their lives. Kids who grow up thinking that everyone thinks they're awesome are usually self-centered, un-compassionate, cruel and narrow minded. It’s likely that the teacher that gives the least amount of praise may be the one that forces the most personal growth from your child. Accept such personalities as you accept the seasons, they are necessary to a healthy environment.

7. If you have a speech prepared for your child’s teacher based on the movies Patton, A Few Good Men or Braveheart then you should simply stay at home. You aren’t going to help your child by blasting their teacher. You will only reinforce unhealthy behavior in the child while also alienating yourself from the person best positioned to help them flourish.

I love my kids. But they ARE annoying, loud, argumentative and forgetful. There is no use getting all riled up because a trained educator is pointing out some of the same things I complain about already. I am glad I have another conspirator to help shape my kid’s future and make straight their paths.

And if they ever do pull out that secret file and say “Mr. and Mrs. Zillman, we have a problem” I’ll simply smile and say “My folder was WAY bigger when I was kid. Everything is going to be alright.”