It’s that time of year. The honeymoon, as they say, has officially ended (if there ever was one). Those sweet, wide-eyed students from the first day are now the ones careening off the lockers and trying everything in their power to test both your patience and your willingness to send them to the front office.

The negative behaviors may be in the process of becoming too much for you and the proper functioning of your class. You may already be tempted (or forced, depending on the severity of student actions) to “outsource” disciplinary action to your admin team. I understand. Your principals have the power to take serious disciplinary action, right? So why not loop them in sooner rather than (too) later?

But before we get that far, I will ask you the time-honored question of beleaguered assistant principals everywhere: “Have you called home yet?”

Ok, ok. Don’t press the back button or throw your laptop/smartphone across the room yet! Let me explain.

Parent engagement is a key part of our job. We teachers must call home to parents. It is our greatest and often least used tool in the constant fight against negative behavior and student apathy.

But why? Well, there are many reasons why we should–we’ll get to them all–but the most urgent reason is that we simply cannot put the disciplinary toothpaste back in the tube. Once we call the principal in or fire up the suspension system or start passing out detentions like pop quizzes, we transfer whatever small amount of power we have out of our classroom.

This is bad, by the way. So we should do what we can to avoid it, and the thing that we can do is call home.

A few prefaces:

Now don’t get me wrong. I know that parent contact does not solve all problems for all students. And I know it is difficult and time-consuming–and all too often impossible.

I too have been on the wrong end of the phone call with a parent high on drugs asking over and over again who I was and why I was calling her.

I too have been on the wrong end of the phone call where I am speaking English and the confused Spanish-speaking father on the other end only understands the name of his son’s school and begins shouting at me to speak with his son.

And I am well-acquainted with the various robotic voices of different phone companies telling me that “the number you have dialed is no longer in service.”

I get it. But just because calling home is often really unpleasant doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it. Teaching is often really unpleasant, but we still show up.

Where do we begin? (I’ll put it in list form because…who doesn’t like lists?)

1. Assemble a list of your 10+ “behavior problem” students. The ones you can already tell will present you and your class with an issue at many points throughout the year (as if they haven’t already). These are also the ones who you will normally have to track down a number for. Ask an administrator, and you should have contact info in no time.

2. Assemble a list of the 10+ kids you don’t know well at all. These are the students about whom, if pressed, you could only give the most basic of details.

3. For the sake of your sanity, assemble the list of your 10+ “best” students. Brightest, most creative, most entertaining. The ones with whom you have already established a great connection.

4. Now, the fun part: put a date next to all of those names. Make them all some time within the next month. 30-40 calls in one month may sound intimidating, but it shouldn’t be. Let’s be honest: half of those calls will get picked up. Maybe less depending on your school dynamics. So we’re looking at somewhere around 25 calls in a month. Certainly doable in an ideal world.

So why these students in particular?

The behavior problem students should be obvious. One can hope that these conversations will prove productive. Who knows? This may be your one shot at preventing a thousand problems down the line.

An engaged mom or dad or guardian on your side is the most powerful ally I have found in my short time in the classroom. There is no greater relief than when you hear from an admin or fellow teacher, “Oh, you should call mom. She doesn’t play around.” Or, if I’m being completely honest, there is nothing better than seeing a misbehaving student squirm as you go to call his/her parent. It is a sure sign that at least some small correction to that negative behavior is on the horizon.

The “kids you don’t know well” group is nearly as important of a list. Why? Because you must learn about these students before calling home. You cannot expect to hold a conversation that goes, “Hi, I am calling to tell you how Jimmy is doing in my class. Nothing really to report. Have a good day!” This will hold you accountable for getting to know students you normally would not connect with this early in the year.

And last, we have the pleasant conversations. This is to keep you sane. Maybe it’s just me, but there are few things more refreshing than bragging to a parent/guardian about how awesome their kid is. Enjoy!

How to make the call (for the negative situations):

So this might seem obvious, but here are a few tips that I have learned (the hard way) in my hundreds of calls home.

1. Be sure to ask “Do you have a minute to talk?”

If this is a student who is a behavior problem in your class, do you honestly think this is the first time mom is seeing the school’s telephone number show up on her iPhone? Don’t assume that now is a good time–or that you’re the first teacher call home this week.

Sure, you could say that a parent should always be ready to field a call from their kid’s school, but I don’t think it’s fair to assume you are not inconveniencing them and you’re likely to begin the call on a bad note by making such assumptions.

2. Always start with something nice.

Diving in with a list of complaints about the kid’s behavior in your class will result in a mildly defensive parent at the least and an aggressive, uncooperative parent at worst.

Don’t ever forget that children are ALWAYS at least a partial reflection of the people raising them, so the former’s slip-ups are inextricably linked with the latter. Ignore that at your own peril.

A “compliment sandwich” as it were is rarely an easy dish to create for your behavior problem students. But it’s necessary here.

Begin by talking about how funny or likable or engaging or interesting the student is. I’d prefer you not make something up here. If you say “I know Chloe is a born leader,” you’d better actually believe that Chloe is a born leader.

No kid is entirely devoid of redeemable qualities. If you disagree, then (sorry) but it might be time to take a break from the classroom.

3. Make it clear whose side you are on.

As a first-year teacher, I remember walking by another teacher’s room as she spoke to a parent on the phone. I knew the reputation of the student she was calling about. He was probably the most explosive student at the school–huge guy, over 6’2″ in the 7th grade, with a mean temperament.

He liked this teacher’s class and had been staying out of trouble for the last week or so. Then, that day, he had started a particularly nasty fight in her classroom. She’d been hit hard while pulling the two boys off of each other.

She began that phone call with, “You know, I just want to tell you how much I love Chris’s sense of humor. I just see so much goodness in him every day when he walks into my room.”

She could’ve easily started with, “Your son has a 16 in my class, and he’s one strike away from being kicked out of this school.” She’d get to all that stuff eventually. But that wasn’t what that parent needed to hear in that moment.

Mom needs to know that you are willing to forgive her son before she listens to you. Granddad needs to know that you are willing to pursue and support his granddaughter before he hears out your complaints about her behavior.

Maybe not at a conscious level, no, but I personally believe that parents/guardians are a lot like students. They don’t tend to respond well to people who don’t believe in them–or, in this case, their kid.

So what should you say? Let’s start with one of my favorite sentences in phone calls home about negative student behavior: “I don’t have to tell you that John is better than this.”

Here’s another version: “What he’s doing right now is just way below what I expect of him in this class.”

These are connecting sentences. These are inviting sentences. They ensure the posture of the conversation looks like this:

Teacher + Parent vs. Student Misbehaviour

Rather than this…

Teacher vs. Angry Parent + Student Misbehavior

Huge difference. So you must make it clear to the person on the end of the phone line that you are not calling to make your own life easier or to get their student in trouble. It must be clear that you are calling because you believe that looping in mom/dad is the best chance you have at supporting this student.

4. End with action

Don’t leave the conversation with “Alright. Your kid is struggling. We’ll talk later.”

Leave the conversation with something specific if possible. Giving the phone over to the parent so they can verbally destroy the student is fine, but make sure you and mom leave the conversation with a potential follow-up.

Examples:

“I can call you back at the end of this week to let you know how he’s doing.”

“Are you able to check his grades online? Let me send home some instructions to make sure you can see how her grades look.”

“Would you like me to reach out to a counselor to try to get a little more structure in his day?”

It doesn’t matter what it is, but it DOES matter that something happens as a result of your call.

Hope it helps!

P.s.

Translated Calls/Letters

I don’t have a massive amount of experience with translated calls and notes home. We have a great translator at my school, so I’ve never really had any issue with getting both positive and negative messages home.

I would suggest you find two things:

1. For positive notes home, find someone in your school by whom you can run rough Google Translations. It can be a super-super trustworthy student, but there is almost certainly a friendly Spanish-speaking teacher/parent volunteer in your world that can help with this relatively easy task.

2. Find your county resources for translated calls. Any school with any level of Spanish-speaking parents will provide this service, even if it costs on a per-call basis. Fight for your responsibility to communicate with all parents. No one will be able to push back against you for this kind of request, I promise.

If all else fails (trust me on this–it may sound a little out there), post what you want to say to the parent on Reddit’s education page, and some teacher out there will be willing to translate for you. You can then maybe sort of fumble your way through a scripted conversation with the parent. That’s the best I’ve got!