There is one annual activity that teachers either love or hate.
I’m gonna be honest, I absolutely love them, and you may absolutely hate them, and that is totally okay.
If you like them, I’ve got an idea that is going to bring them to a whole other level, and if you dislike them, this idea is going to shift your mindset on them.
So what is the thing that we either love or hate?
Parent-teacher conferences.
Now, I don’t call them parent-teacher conferences.
I call mine raisin reunions.
Because as we know, a lot of our students don’t live with their parents.
They might live with a parent, a step-parent, a grandparent, an aunt, an uncle, a guardian.
So I call mine raisin reunions, because whoever is raisin that kid, I want to see them in my classroom and I want to make it more like a reunion and less like a conference.
I am going to give you the exact framework that I use.
And spoiler alert, there is somebody very special sitting at the raisin reunion table with us.
And it might not be the person that you expect.
*This blog post was downloaded from the audio transcript of the This Teacher Life podcast. To listen to the audio version go here
I wanted this idea to be very proactive, because I know that for a lot of us, conferences are going to be happening soon.
AND PS- I have already prepped ALL THE DOCS for you.
When you are done reading about this idea, get the resources here
If you started in August, it is likely that you have conferences somewhere around first quarter, which I think is awesome.
Students have been in our classroom for a while, we know them on a life level, we also know them on an academic level, and we get to invite their raisins into our classrooms, and have some time one-on-one and say, hey, here’s how things are going.
It’s an incredible reflective activity.
But in my opinion, we can structure it a whole lot better, so it is way more reflective, so we can get the results and the momentum for the entire school year.
Now, if you are on a non-traditional schedule, maybe your conferences aren’t within the next month or so, but there is likely a time, and for some schools multiple times throughout the year, where you’re going to have some sort of open house.
You’re going to have an opportunity for loved ones, raisins, parents, grandparents to come in and ask the question, so how are things going for my kid?
How are things going for my grandchild?
And I think that as teachers, sometimes this can cause us to have a little bit of anxiety a little bit of stress because it kind of feels like we are put on the spot.
And so I am somebody who is very, very pro communicating with raisins proactively.
Like I’m very for this.
I send out a weekly email.
I am not afraid to pick up the phone and call raisins with kids.
I am one of those people who it is likely when they come in for my raisin reunions, we have spoken, communicated, emailed multiple times, okay?
So with that said, how can you create the most effective conferences of your entire career?
What I want to talk about in this episode is how I structure mine.
Because here is a big, big thing that I get questions about a lot.
Last October, after I did my conferences, Instagram was blowing up and people were like, I want to know more about your student-led conferences.
That’s right, teacher friends, I said it.
They are students-led conferences.
I know in a traditional setting that parents come in, raisins come in and sit down at a small table in our small chairs, especially if you’re a kindergarten teacher, you have to literally bring in normal size human chairs because six-year-olds aren’t sitting at the table with you, adults are.
And so then they’re like, okay, so how’s the reading going?
How’s the behavior going?
Do you feel like they’re on track?
And they ask incredible questions.
And I think that’s great.
But I don’t teach kindergarten, I don’t teach elementary.
But even when I have taught upper elementary, student-led conferences is something that I believe in.
And in my opinion, and I think this has some wiggle room, but in my opinion, I think in grades third through senior, a student-led conference is a really great strategy.
What I mean by that is, it’s me at the table, it’s the raisins at the table, and it’s the kids at the table.
We are at the table together.
Because I think at that age, we have to get kids taking some accountability for their learning.
Some accountability and saying, yes, I want to celebrate with all of the successes that you have had so far this school year.
To also take accountability for like, I want you to acknowledge some of the struggles that you have had, and it’s okay, but I want us to all be at the same page.
We have all had that phone call home or that conference where it’s like, whoa, whoa, whoa, that’s not what they said.
That’s not what they communicated with me.
That’s not the story I’m hearing.
That’s not the vibe that I’m receiving.
And it creates this weirdness because it’s like, is your student lying?
Sometimes as a teacher, it feels like that the adults think that we are lying.
And I’m like, I would have no reason to lie to you about this.
But parents, God love them, they want to take the team of their kids a lot of time.
And you can’t blame them.
But when we are all at the same table at the same time, and we can come together for a specific mission and have a productive conversation.
And sometimes that productive conversation is also a productive struggle, because there is some dishonesty that has happened.
A kid has said, well, no, we never have homework.
And then it’s like, well, maybe that’s actually not true.
We’re like, no, they never tell us to write in our planner.
That’s not really true.
And then all of a sudden, we can get on the same page.
I want to be very clear.
A student-led conference is not about a gotcha in front of parents.
That’s not what it’s about at all.
It is literally saying, can we have a raisin reunion?
Can we all come together and can we sit at a table together?
And can we share a little bit of old man candy?
Because you know I’m busting out my old man candy dish for this blessed occasion.
But can we all come together and be on the same page, be on the same team and have a reflective reunion together?
Now, this doesn’t just happen.
There does need to be a very specific structure.
And I want to tell you about what I do prior to the raisins ever coming through the door.
Because the week before raisin reunions begin, the way that it works in my school is we have two nights where they can come in.
So we open up our school from 430 to 7 on two different nights.
I believe this year it’s going to be like a Wednesday and a Thursday.
So a Wednesday night and a Thursday night they can sign up to attend.
I try to be proactive and about a week before the raisin reunion, I actually have my students do a little prep work.
I have a document that I give to students and I actually want to walk you through exactly what is on that document because I don’t want this to be this awkward moment where the kids are leading the conference, but they don’t know what to say.
And then all the raisins look at me and like, well, why don’t you start talking?
You’re the teacher.
We want to hear from you.
I want it to be a shared conversation.
So about a week before, I hand my students a document and we fill this out in class.
And the very first question on the document is, overall, I would rate this school year so far a blank on a scale of one to ten.
I have them numerically rate the year so far.
Overall, not just my class necessarily, not just like the school food, not just recess, but overall, what would you rate the school year so far on a scale of one to ten?
Now, I understand that you might be thinking, well, one kid’s eight is not another kid’s eight.
A two to one kid might be not a two to another kid.
I totally agree, which is why the next question is, I gave that number because.
So then kids are taking that number that they’ve numerically processed, right, on their timeline, and then they are describing why.
Like, why did you rate it a seven?
Why did you rate it a 10?
And it is so cool to listen to the raisin say, oh my gosh, I didn’t know you thought that.
Or like, oh my gosh, I would have not known that.
Or, oh my gosh, honey, I didn’t know that.
Like, it is so interesting because it’s a simple, yet substantial question that opens up the door to a lot of conversation.
And then you’ll notice we have not talked about grades yet.
We haven’t talked about grades yet because that’s not even the first thing that we talk about.
We do the number, and then I actually asked the kids what a specific personal goal that they have for second quarter is.
Personal goal, not about school.
Like, I don’t want to hear about grades.
I want to know what is a personal goal that you have for a second quarter.
Something about sports, something about friends, something about one of your interests, and they document that.
Then I ask for a specific academic goal.
What is something that you would like to achieve?
And it doesn’t even have to be for my class.
It could be for another class.
This year, I teach exclusively seventh and eighth grade, so I teach exclusively middle school.
But if you were doing this with a fifth grade class, your fifth grade family, you could have them set an academic goal for a specific class that you’re teaching, right?
So they set two goals, a personal goal and an academic goal.
Then we get into grades.
And it says, my current letter grade in science is A, this.
Here is the percent, not just the grade, not just an A, not just a B, which don’t even get me started on A’s, B’s, C’s and D’s.
I’m just so against it.
But I think the percentage speaks a little bit more.
So here’s the letter grade, here is the percentage.
And then this is like one of my very favorite parts.
Here are two very detailed reasons why I earned that grade.
Earned, capitalized.
Earned, italics.
Earned, underlined.
Emphasize the earned.
Because I think sometimes there is this belief that we give kids grades.
They gave me a B, they gave me a C.
I hate to be that teacher’s like, I didn’t give that to you, you earned it.
But I do think if we’re all at the table together, this is an accountability piece.
Here’s what you earned.
Maybe you earned a 100%, you earned an A plus.
Maybe you earned a C minus, but you earned that.
And then you’re gonna describe two detailed reasons why you earned that grade.
And here’s the thing.
It is so refreshing how honest kids are about that.
They will be like, well, because I bombed one of the tests, I didn’t study for it at all.
Or because I pay so close attention in class and I take really good notes.
They give detailed reasons why their grade is either really good or maybe why their grade isn’t so good.
But then at least we have something to work off of.
There’s not this awkward silence at the raisin reunion.
Have you ever been to a family reunion and you’re looking around at who is there and you’re like, I didn’t even know that person was in my family.
This is weird.
Or like, I didn’t, I haven’t seen that third cousin since we were seven.
I don’t even know what we would possibly talk about.
Like sometimes a family reunion is weird because you have no idea what to say to each other.
But thank the Lord, it’s a potluck.
So you can go get Aunt Cynthia’s, you know, macaroni casserole and that at least breaks the ice.
So do I have food at my raisin reunion?
Yes, I do.
I got that old man candy.
We got the butterscotch’s, we got the lemon heads.
We got the root beer barrels.
We maybe got some Hall’s cough drops in that little dish as well.
So do we have some food per se to break the ice?
We do, but we also have a reflection that the child has already filled out.
It is likely that after the kid has gone through that with their raisin, the raisin looks at me and says, well, that makes a lot of sense.
Or they look at me and they say, you know, I was gonna ask about what happened on that test, or I was gonna ask about how I can challenge my child more, but now that I’ve seen that goal, I have a roadmap.
Or now that I see that they bombed that test, that makes more sense.
And it’s not us again throwing the kids under the bus, it’s we’re all at the table together, and now we can strategize.
Now we can ask more specific detailed questions.
A raisin reunion is about a reflection.
But when the kid has already done the reflecting, it creates a far more productive conversation.
And conferences should be about having great conversations, not about blaming people, not about questioning whether or not the kid is a good student or you are a good teacher, but no, it’s about saying we’re all here together, let’s effectively reflect.
So that is the structure.
And I am telling you, I’ve been doing student led conferences for my entire career, my entire career.
There was one year during COVID that as we remember, conferences got all out of control and like it just, it wasn’t a thing.
So then what did I do?
I pivoted it to virtual conferences.
You maybe did that as well.
You pivoted to a virtual conference and a parent or a raisin showed up virtually in a Google Meet or in a Zoom.
Guess what?
I have now opened that up to an option.
There are some raisins that because of schedules, because of cars, because of the cost of gas, aren’t necessarily willing or able to arrive to the school.
But we have the technology now.
Kids literally have the technology to say like, hey, mom, dad, grandpa, we can do this via Google Meets.
We can do this via Zoom, via my school district issued device.
Are you willing to have a raisin reunion virtually?
And because the kid is leading it, the parent who might not feel comfortable on camera or the grandparent who might feel uncomfortable on camera because they don’t know how to use technology, they got the kid sitting right next to them being like, oh, no worries, I can show you how to do this because we are doing this together.
It de-stresses the kid because their adult is there and it de-stresses the adult because their child is there.
We have to remember that a majority of our raisins likely didn’t have a 10 out of 10 school experience.
We have to recognize and respect the fact that a lot of our kids’ raisins don’t want to come to conferences because when they had a conference, they got scolded.
When they had a conference, they got scared.
And now they’re concerned that the exact same thing is going to happen to their own child.
Raisin reunions with reflections that were proactive solve nearly all of this.
So when it comes to these conferences, we now have a new name to kind of de-stress and de-escalate the situation.
It’s a raisin reunion.
You now know the proactive structure, so it’s not awkward or weird, and your kids know exactly what to talk about at the table.
You’ve got those reflection questions ready to go.
But the big question now is, okay, but how do we actually get these raisins to come?
How do we get them to sign up and then show up?
Well, one thing that I’ve been using for the past few years is a super simple website.
It’s completely free, and it’s very easy to get signed up, especially if your school uses the Gmail or the Google platform.
And so I use what’s called Calendly.
This is not sponsored.
This is not like anything other than this is what I use, okay?
And I just want to tell you about it.
But you can literally go to Calendly, calendly.com, and you can create a free account, doesn’t need a credit card, nothing like that.
And what I do is I create 15-minute time slots.
Now, I know that you can send slips home, and that’s fine.
If you want to send slips home, you can do that as well.
But I’m already sending a weekly email to Raisins.
So about a month before, so like literally right now, because mine are coming up in about a month, a month before, I start talking about the Raisin Reunions and how they’re student led.
Like your child is going to come with you, and it’s going to be great.
It’s going to be like a party.
And I start dropping that kindly link in, and I set them up for 15 minute segments.
I ask for their name.
I ask for their email address.
I ask for their phone number.
I tell them exactly where I’m located in the school, so there’s no stress of like, oh, where am I going?
The kid is going to be with them, but it makes them feel a little bit better if they know like my name, my classroom number, that kind of thing.
Fun fact, my school doesn’t have classroom numbers.
We have the alphabet.
I am room K.
I taught room 205 for 10 years, and now I’m in room K.
Isn’t that awesome?
Okay, nonetheless.
So I give them some directions on how to get to my classroom.
Again, just to de-escalate the situation a little bit to make them feel more comfortable.
But these Calendly links then help me see exactly who is going to be coming and those timeframes.
Another thing that I like to ask in advance on the Calendly link is, is there something specific that you would like to celebrate or that you have a concern about?
Both of those, not just concerns.
Is there something specific that you would like to celebrate with your student that night or a concern that you have that night?
I don’t want my kids to be surprised about the conversations that are going to unfold at the table.
You know who else doesn’t want to be surprised?
Me.
I don’t want to be surprised.
I don’t want to be like, whoa, didn’t see that coming.
Or I don’t have the data or the answer that they’re looking for.
Like, I want to make sure that when they walk out of my classroom, that they get what they need as well.
So if I proactively ask, is there something you want to celebrate or something that you’re concerned about, and I can take care of that in advance or just have it on my radar, I’m going to absolutely ask that in one of the Calendly questions.
So here’s the thing.
The way that Calendly works is because we are an iPhone world, we are going to automatically link with their Google Calendar, or they’re going to get a ping in their inbox saying you have signed up for something.
So even if they don’t use Google Calendar, it syncs to an iPhone calendar and it sets up a reminder for them.
That’s a huge win.
You can also set up an automated email 24 hours in advance or 48 hours in advance to let them know, like, hey, don’t forget you signed up for 6 45 p.m.
on Wednesday night.
And here’s one of my favorite things is Calendly is a Google product or at least they partner with Google.
So you can also use Calendly for virtual conferences.
It generates a Google meet link that they can click on if they want to do a virtual conference.
Here’s another thing.
We understand that sometimes things pop up or parents get nervous.
Guardians get nervous and they want to cancel.
So let’s say hypothetically, they had a scheduled in person conference with you on Wednesday night.
And Wednesday afternoon, they’re like, it’s just not going to work.
Our car’s not it’s our car’s not doing well.
No problem at all.
That link that you signed up for actually already has a Google meet link embedded in it.
Why don’t you and your son or daughter or grandson or granddaughter or your niece or nephew, right?
Click on that link and I’ll still meet you at 645 because I’ve already blocked that special time and I was really looking forward to meeting with you.
So no worries at all.
We’ll just do it virtually.
And it takes no extra work for you or for them to make that happen.
It is the ultimate backup plan.
Holy shit.
Is this not the greatest framework ever?
You’ve got a new name for it.
They’re going to set out, you know, a little potluck of candy.
You’ve got a reflective question.
The kids are coming to the table.
And you now have a structure and a system to get them signed up.
You also have a backup plan if they try to back out.
I am telling you, you are going to have the most effective conferences of your career if you do this.
Is it potentially going to still be stressful?
Is it potentially going to still be a little hard based off of what could unfold?
Absolutely.
But every single time that I have followed this structure, IT WORKS!
And here is some good news, I actually have all of these documents ready for you to use too
You can go right here to get the whole Raisin Reunion system
Happy Conference Season!
PS- If you love ideas like this, save yourself time and download all the documents here