16.1: Preview

This chapter examines how we, as early childhood professionals, create important relationships with families to build effective home-school relationships. As a professional, we need to include families at the center of the work we do with their children. Valuing the input of families creates a sense of belonging that promotes success in school and home.

Unity Poem

I dreamed I stood in a studio

And watched two sculptors there,

The clay they used was a young child's mind

And they fashioned it with care.

One was a teacher; the tools she used were books and music and art;

One was a parent with a guiding hand and a gentle loving heart.

And when at last their work was done

They were proud of what they had wrought.

For the things they had shaped into the child

Could never be sold or bought.

And each agreed she would have failed

If each had worked alone

For behind the parent stood the school,

And behind the teacher; the home.

-Anonymous