Can you hear me now? Staff–parent communication in child care centres

Abstract

Supporting the growth and development of young children through effective communication with parents is one of the greatest challenges of the twenty‐first century facing early childhood and special educators. This article examines adult communication in child care centres through data gathered via a mixed‐method study of child care directors’ perspectives on parent education and their actual practices and a one‐year‐long ethnographic study of relationships between mothers and teachers in an ethnically and economically diverse child care centre. Findings show that practicing ongoing dialogue between child care centre personnel and parents presents multiple opportunities for clarification which support the current NAEYC and CEC standards requiring collaboration with families. Yet, the analysis suggests that the fields of early childhood education and special education need to focus more on the process of how information is provided and conveyed to, received by, and accepted by/from families. Communication between staff and family can be viewed as a theoretical model that contains three primary components: (1) The communication process is ongoing and continuous; (2) there is open, bi‐directional communication; and (3) support of parents is provided through education.

Keywords:

• child care centres
• child care directors
• communication strategies
• early childhood education
• mixed‐method meta‐analysis
• staff–parent communication

Notes

1. The authors met in 2005 through a mutual colleague and McGrath was a member of Reedy’s dissertation committee. Reedy’s (2007) dissertation, ‘A child enrolled is a family enrolled: Early child care directors’ conceptualisations of parent education and actual practices’, focuses on communication between directors and parents from the directors’ point of view. McGrath’s (2003) dissertation, ‘Ambivalent partners: Relationships between mothers and teachers in a full‐time child care center’, focuses on communication between parents and staff in a child care centre.