Component 5: Parent & Family Involvement
Head Start programs support and involve parents as their children’s primary teachers, and provide learning opportunities to empower parents to grow as role models for their children.
Ways to Encourage Participation
- Have an “Open Door” policy
- Organize a parent resource library
- Invite parent helpers (food prep, reading, culture and language activities, fitness activities, etc.)
- Involve family members in organizing special events (recognition events, summer camps, graduations, fundraisers, clothes and toy swaps, etc.)
- Offer parenting and personal development workshops for parents
- Offer parent participation programs (Mom and Tot, Mother Goose, play group, Dads-Only, etc.)
- Facilitate a parent advisory group
- Welcome involvement from extended family
- Offer parenting and personal development workshops for parents
- Communicate with newsletters, bulletin boards, notes in lending bags, back-and-forth books, etc.
- Provide outreach services
Implementation Ideas and Examples
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- Baby Welcoming Ceremony
- Beating the Winter Attendance Blues
- Bucks for Babies [284 KB]
- Celebrating Dads [796 KB]
- Communication Books
- Creating a Space for Parents
- Family Day
- Family Photos
- Family Tree and Preschool Family Train
- Getting Dads Involved
- Indigenous Fathers Project
- One Hundred Percent Parental Involvement
- Orientation Session
- PACs and Involving Parents
- PACs: Questions for Staff
- Parent and Community Supper
- Parent and Tot Garage Sale
- Planting Bulbs With Families
- Snuneymuxw Playgroup
- Summer Parade
- Video Your Head Start
- Virtues Parenting
- Ways to Help
- What Makes a Dad