Questions to ask at a parent-teacher conference

What should I actually ask?

Teachers are not being evasive. "How is she doing?" is an unanswerable question asked with fifteen minutes on the clock and a queue outside, so it gets the only available answer: she is doing fine. Changing the question changes the conversation.

The questions worth asking

"If you could fix one thing for my child this year, what would it be?"

This is the highest-yield question available. It forces a priority, and teachers almost always have one they have not been asked for. It also surfaces concerns that are real but not yet serious enough to have triggered a formal conversation.

"Where is she relative to the rest of the class?"

Not to embarrass anyone, but because "meeting the standard" and "in the bottom group" can both be true simultaneously, and only one of them tells you what your child experiences every day. Teachers can usually answer this in general terms.

"Can he decode an unfamiliar word, or does he guess?"

This is far more useful than asking about reading level. Guessing works well enough through first grade and then stops working, which is why so many children appear to struggle suddenly in second or third. It is a specific, observable behavior a teacher can report on.

"Are her number facts automatic, or is she working them out?"

Also specific and also observable. Non-automatic facts slow down everything built on top of them, and they are one of the most common hidden causes of an apparently sudden mathematics difficulty.

"What does she do when she gets stuck?"

This tells you about persistence, confidence and strategy in one answer, and it very often reveals things parents never see because they never observe their child stuck among peers.

"How long should homework be taking?"

Ask for a number. Compare it with what actually happens at home. Any large discrepancy is worth pursuing.

"Is there anything you have noticed that I have not asked about?"

Ask it at the end, and then be quiet. It is the question that most often produces the thing you needed to hear.

What to bring

• One or two specific observations from home, ideally with a timescale — 'homework has taken about an hour a night since October'.
• A piece of work your child did alone, if you have one. Unsupported work is more informative than supported work.
• Your actual question, written down. Conferences run short and drift easily.
• A note of anything that has changed at home, if you are willing to share it. Teachers interpret behavior differently when they know the context.

What to do with the answers

Write them down during the meeting, not afterwards. Reassurance is memorable and specifics are not, and by the evening most parents can recall the tone of a conference far better than its content.

Then decide whether what you heard matches what you see at home. When the two conflict, both are usually accurate about different settings — a child can be unremarkable in a class of thirty and visibly struggling at the kitchen table, because the classroom offers supports that home does not.

If a concern was raised, ask what the school will do, by when, and how you will know whether it worked. A concern with no attached action tends to reappear at the next conference in identical form.

If you disagree

Say so plainly and stay specific. "I hear that she is meeting the standard, and at home she cannot read an unfamiliar page without guessing — can we look at that together?" is a productive sentence. It gives the teacher an observation to respond to rather than a judgement to defend.

You can also request a further meeting. Fifteen minutes at a scheduled conference is not the only access parents have, and a follow-up with a narrow agenda is often far more productive than the conference itself.