Parent Partnership

Here at Sherbrook Primary School families are at the heart of everything we do. We understand the importance of those relationships and are committed to working with parents and carers to help achieve the best outcomes for our pupils. As part our commitment we are applying for the Leading Parent Partnership Quality Mark.

The following information is from the LPPA and explains fully the 9 objectives we are working towards meeting.

The LPPA provides a coherent framework for you to deliver effective parental engagement in your school. All of us who work in schools want the very best for our pupils, regardless of their background and ability. Effective and positive parent partnerships can have very real and lasting impacts on improvements in pupil behaviour, attendance and achievement. Research makes it clear that effective partnership with parents has a major impact on the learning of children and young people. The LPPA framework and process draws on high-quality research evidence.

Objective 1: The school demonstrates a commitment to work towards achieving the LPPA

Developing effective partnership is a major undertaking for any school. One of the reasons it is complex is that it affects so many different groups of people in your school and beyond. Getting their commitment from the start and communicating with them during the process is essential to success.

Objective 2: The school makes and implements effective plans to achieve and maintain the LPPA

Your parent partnership plan should not be seen in isolation. There is often a close link between this plan and other work being undertaken. Monitoring and evaluation of progress towards achieving the plan is best overseen by a working group, led by the LPPA coordinator and composed of representatives of all key partner groups.

Objective 3: The school is a welcoming, communicative and friendly place for parents

A warm welcome is important because, as we know, first impressions last! A warm welcome will set the scene for the rest of the visit. Indeed, it may determine whether parents or other visitors return, and what they say to other community members about the school.

Positive home–school communication is also vital. Many parents find visiting or contacting schools quite daunting, so the sooner you can put them at their ease the better. Excellent two-way home–school communication, plus high-quality general information to parents about the work of the school are at the heart of good communication.

Objective 4: The school promotes the awareness and participation of all groups of parents in supporting their children’s learning and developing their own learning. In addition, the school holds and actively promotes a programme of opportunities and events for joint parent and child participation

Objective 4 is at the heart of the LPPA, because it focuses on engaging parents and their chil­dren in practical activities that support learning – with the impact ultimately being on the children’s learning.

Objective 5: The school provides a good induction for all new parents

Effective induction into a new school for parents and their children is the starting point from which all parent partnership work develops. A positive induction process, which engages parents for, perhaps, a term after their children join the school, will set the tone for the duration of their child’s attendance.

Objective 6: The school provides parents with relevant and user-friendly guidance and information to help them to support their children’s learning

Parents do not always find it easy to support their children’s learning. This might be because they have limited time, they are unfamiliar with curriculum changes or lack the self-confidence or knowledge to help their children. Alternatively, they simply may not realise what an important contribution they can make.

Objective 7: The school produces and implements parent-friendly policies to establish effective home–school links and to improve children’s attendance, punctuality, progress and positive participation in school

Effective policies need to be well presented, easy to read, and written in terms that all partners, including parents, can understand. It is very helpful for parents to be involved in the formula­tion and review of policies that directly affect them and their children, and also to understand the role they can play in helping the school to achieve the stated aims and objectives within the policies.

Objective 8: The school provides good support for all parents as their children move through or leave the school

It is relatively easy for a school to allow the transition process to be more or less entirely managed by the receiving school or organisation. But if the process is to be effective, partic­ularly for parents, then transition needs to be managed as a three-way partnership, because feeder schools, and parents themselves, have a wealth of information about children and fami­lies which, if handled sensitively, can help to ensure a smooth transition.

Objective 9: The school summarises its achievements against the LPPA Objectives and outlines its future plans

Completing the LPPA is a big achievement, but it is not the end of the story. Objective 9 is designed to help you to reflect upon and evaluate your outcomes to date, and then go on to plan the next steps in further developing parent partnership in your school.