5 Ways to Improve Parent Teacher Communication to Support Children With Autism

Welcome back to the STAGES Learning Newsletter!?

Our bi-monthly newsletter provides you with everything you need to help grow the capacity to support the autism community.

Effective, frequent communication between parents and teachers is vital for the success of children with autism, but misunderstandings can lead to confusion and frustration for both adults and the child. Today, let’s look at 5 ways that parents and teachers can build their communication skills to support students with autism.

1. Establish Communication Preferences

Communication is the key to a successful parent/teacher relationship. Working together to communicate effectively is the springboard for the student’s success. Without open communication and an understanding of what to communicate, parents and teachers cannot efficiently work together to support the student.

Communication is a two-way street meaning the communication should be flowing from both sides. The teacher should inform the parent of successes, struggles, behaviors, or upcoming important information; while the parent should communicate changes in home routines and schedules, struggles with homework, and upcoming appointments.

To be sure the communication is flowing smoothly along the two-way street, it is crucial to voice communication preferences and requirements right away. Together the parents and teachers should discuss their communication preferences (phone or email) as well as what type of communication is necessary. If the student with autism also has a behavior plan, it is likely challenging behaviors will occur at school. Together the parent and teacher should determine the best way to communicate these behaviors including what happened before and after the behavior occurred.?

-> Here is a free download of our ARIS Curriculum Student Behavior Report Home Communication Sheet .

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It is also important to remember the private providers that may be supporting the child outside of the school day. These specialists often know the child well and can help answer questions, provide suggestions or tools, and a history of the student’s progress. If the parents and teachers feel it is necessary to communicate with the outside providers, it is important to have a release of information document on file to allow for the conversations to take place.?

The last communication preference is boundaries. I know this may sound silly and you are wondering what parent would call a teacher outside of the school day? Unfortunately, it does happen and has started to happen more often with the various forms of communication that we now have available at our fingertips. Teachers and parents should both set boundaries for communication that include the best times to communicate, how often to communicate, and what needs to be communicated.?

Take it from me, there is nothing worse than accidentally checking your work email on your phone in the middle of the night only to find that a parent sent you a lengthy email at 2 a.m., or getting a notification that a parent has reached out to you via social media because they don’t have your personal contact information and want to know what the day's homework assignment is. Likewise, parents don’t want to receive late-night emails or evening phone calls that may disrupt them from making dinner and spending time with family.?

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2. Create Agreed Upon Expectations

Part of effectively communicating is through setting student expectations. When thinking about a student with autism, it is likely the individual already has an active IEP or is in the process of receiving one. Within the IEP will be goals and benchmarks for achieving the goals. The goals and benchmarks set an expectation as far as what skill the student will master and when. However, there are other small expectations that teachers and parents may have for a student that are not always mentioned within the IEP.?

For example, students with autism often have difficulties in social situations. This can create challenges during partner and group work, lunch, organized sports, and recess among others. Creating a measurable IEP goal for these types of challenges can be difficult. However, knowing that an expectation or wish of the parent is for the student to have a peer the student works well with or plays with at recess can be supported by the classroom teacher, resource teacher, and social worker.

Actively communicating between home and school regarding students in the class the individual enjoys being around, games the student likes to play, and special interests can lead to additional opportunities for the student to engage socially that are created and monitored by an adult. The parent and school staff can also brainstorm some structured recess activities or indoor games that would help to establish this skill.?

Another example of an expectation that requires further communication is specific modifications to individual assignments. Although something similar may already be included in the IEP, the exact details on how to incorporate these modifications on a homework assignment are not always clear to the parent. As a special education teacher working within a full-inclusion classroom, I would often modify the homework for some of my students. This may look like a reduced amount of math problems on a page or the use of a specific strategy that isn’t listed within the directions. On a reading assignment, the modifications could be assigned a lower-level book to build reading stamina or typing comprehension responses instead of writing them out. Any time a homework assignment is modified, it is important to communicate the expectations to reduce conflicts and confusion at home.?

3. Use IEP Drafts to Better Communicate

The IEP paperwork remains in draft form until it is finalized at the end of the meeting. It is best practice to provide some of the documents in draft form to the parents three to five days before the meeting. These draft documents should include the present-level write-up, updates on current goals, and draft goals for the new IEP. With many IEP meetings containing a large amount of information and school jargon, parents often don’t get a chance to ask questions or feel uncomfortable asking questions and voicing concerns to the whole team. Allowing the parents time to review these documents before the meeting provides them a chance to prepare questions and concerns that they may not have otherwise shared.

Additionally, it is important to follow up with a parent after an IEP meeting. An IEP meeting can contain some heavy information for a student with autism. Parents will need time to digest the various parts of the IEP. In my experience, parents rarely reach out on their own to ask questions regarding a current IEP. Sometimes they feel they missed the opportunity to ask a question. Other times, they may feel a little embarrassed to admit they do not fully understand their child’s IEP. Both of these scenarios are false because a parent can and should ask questions at any time. Parents did not go to college to receive a special education degree. Therefore, they are not expected to understand state laws, curriculum, and behavior modification practices.?

Taking the time to review and discuss the paperwork before and after the IEP will allow the communication between home and school to continue openly and honestly.?

4. Show Instead of Tell

5. Share Home and School Strategies

-> Click here to continue reading on how to improve parent and teacher communication

If you’d like additional information or have questions for us to address in our future newsletter, post them below! We also welcome your insights and experiences in the comments.