Schools and Families: Creating Essential Connections for Learning [Hardcover]

Sandra L. Christenson (Author), Susan M. Sheridan (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 13, 2001 | ISBN-10: 1572306548 | ISBN-13: 978-1572306547 | Edition: 1

This practical volume is designed to help school practitioners and educators build stronger connections with families and enhance students' achievement in grades K-12. Beyond simply getting parents involved in school work, the book describes how positive family-school relationships can socialize and support children and adolescents as learners throughout their academic careers.
Identified are key pathways by which professionals and parents can develop common goals for learning and behavior, a shared sense of accountability, better communication, and a willingness to listen to different perspectives. The focus is on assumptions, goals, attitudes, behaviors, and strategies that professionals can draw on both to assess school-home connections that are currently in place and to implement new, more productive practices.
Grounded in theory and research, the book features case examples, self-reflective exercises, and discussion questions in every chapter, as well as useful appendices.

Editorial Reviews

Review

'Invaluable as a classroom text and practitioner guide. Although many books espouse the importance of parent involvement, this book is unique in emphasizing the enormous responsibility educators have to empower families to engage in partnerships with the school. The book's thesis - that creating home-school partnerships can protect against risk and promote health - will be exciting and challenging to professionals from diverse disciplinary backgrounds. Superbly written, this book provides guidelines that are extremely helpful to practitioners in promoting family school partnerships.' - Thomas J. Power, PhD, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia 'School psychologists are in a great place to develop partnerships between the people at home and the people at school to benefit children's learning. The strategies described in this book were implemented in our school last last year, and we can see the difference. When parents request to continue as partners, when teachers volunteer to participate and recruit other teachers to become involved - that's when we know the processes and systems are working! This book is an important tool for shool psychologists, teachers, and administrators.' - De Ann Currin, PhD, Principal, Elliott Elementary School, Lincoln, NE

Product Details

• Hardcover: 232 pages
• Publisher: Guilford Press; 1 edition (April 13, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1572306548
• ISBN-13: 978-1572306547
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #491,265 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars An important read on a critical topic, February 25, 2011

By 

Marcy Willard "Marcy Willard, MA" (Broomfield, CO) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Schools and Families: Creating Essential Connections for Learning (Hardcover)

Finally! The importance of forming partnerships between schools and families is coming to the forefront. Christienson and Sheridan are pioneers of this now more mainstream area of work. If educators and families learn to collaborate effectively, research shows impressive gains for students. While this seems like an obvious idea, it is unfortunately not as commonly highlighted as one might think. Christiensen and Sheridan are doing the world a favor with this book.