The connection between parent involvement and student achievement is obvious.  The question is how do teachers go about increasing this parent involvement.

There many different ways teachers can do this...such as a classroom newsletter, website, blog etc.

If you can do this on a weekly basis you will see a great improvement in your students' performance.

Personally, I think the best way to do this is through your own website and/or blog (granted, nearly all of my students have internet access).

Nevertheless, I think every teacher these days should have some type of website/blog.  Here's mine: http://www.MrWaxlersClass.com

Notice each week I make a simple post informing parents (and students) of what we are doing that week and what the homework is each day.  I can also inform them of important upcoming events and due dates (such as the History Fair, fcat testing etc.).  I even include helpful links to the school calendar, district website, homework philosophy, curriculum map etc.

What I did is really not that difficult.  But you should know that my way does cost a little money (about $6.95) per month...though you can easily make that back if you just throw some adense ads on your site (again, really easy to do).

First, let me tell you about a couple of free ways.  First of all, check with your school....you may have some type of web creating software and you could host your site though the school's servers.  However, the program at our school is so bad I don't even bother...it's really a joke.  The other thing you can do is set up a blog with blogger.com or wordpress.com.  Both of these are free, but you are limited in some ways...not sure if you can have people sign up for automatic email notifications, and you do not use your own domain name.  If these things don't bother you then maybe you should go that route.

Personally, I enjoy having my "own" web site where I have complete control AND my own domain name.  To do this you must purchase a domain name and host your web site.  Fortunately, if you do this right it does not cost much.

Simply sign up for a hosting account with a reputable host such as Bluehost

If you sign up for a certain number of months you get to register your domain name for free.

Next, you simply log into your control panel and there is a link where you can automatically install the wordpress blog script...that is what I use.  Again, this may have sounded complicated, but really it is not...it is quite easy and any good hosting company will have a great support staff.

Once you have your blog up and running you will want your parents (and students) to be able to sign up for automatic notifications.  This way, every time you update the blog your parents will automatically get sent an email with the blog post embedded in the email.

Think about this from a parents point of view...how great would it be to get an email each and every week letting you know what your child will be working on that week and what the homework is each day of the week.

To do this you can use a site such as http://www.feedburner.com. Simply follow the directions provided on that site that show you how to publicize your "feed".  You basically copy small amount of html code from their site and paste it into the sidebar of your own site (via your control panel).  Again, this may sound complicated, but it is actually very easy...you could have the whole things set up in less than 20 minutes.

Just think how impressed your parents, students, and administration will be, but more importantly, think about how much it will help improve your students' academic achievement.