COVID-19 has brought about many changes including the way in which we are able to communicate with parents on a daily basis. Parents are now simply dropping and collecting their children, resulting in less face to face contact between educators and parents. This means that there is less opportunity for an exchange of information on how the children are progressing on a daily/weekly basis.
In response to this, Canavan Byrne has developed a brand new Parent Communication Pack that includes a range of resources to support both Educators and parents during this unprecedented time. It is worth noting that these are not intended to fully replace direct communication with parents. All the templates and forms can be printed and are also in ‘e-card’ version. This allows you to send to parents in different formats depending on the needs of your service and of course the needs of your parents.
An Introduction to the Parent Communication Pack from Holly in Canavan Byrne
The Tusla Inspection Tool now also requires Early Years Services to develop communication plans to keep in touch with parents during COVID-19. Inspection will be seeking compliance and evidence of the following:
- Has the service developed new methods of communication with and feedback from parents in light of COVID-19 restrictions?
- Has the service developed new methods for the exchange of information on play, feeding, sleeping, settling, preferences, nappy changing and developmental milestones?
The pack explains to parents how research has shown that working with Educators benefits the children by doubling their ability to learn. The child uses the same language, the same skills and learns the same concepts in the learning environment as they do at home. It is important that the parents are on board and understand why there is a need to continue the communication in the absence of face to face time.
There are four sections in the pack:
Section 1: Parent Fact Sheets - How parents and educators working in partnership with each other benefits children.
Section 2: Parental Developmental Prompt Sheets on a number of different topics (including Morning Routine, Let’s Read, Maths at Home, Art at Home, Learning to Rhyme, Bedtime Blues, Toilet Training and Healthy Eating to name but a few).
Section 3: Editable Parent Communication Templates (including a Sharing Certificate, You Did It Award, I am so proud of you Note, Child Learning Journal Template).
Section 4: Editable Parent Communication Log Form and Editable Parent Feedback Form
This new pack comes in downloadable format so once ordered you will receive an email with the link to the pack which you will then save to your Laptop/Desktop for future reference. We provide it as a master PDF document with everything included for convenient browsing as well as separate pages to easily print or email relevant documents to parents.
