So tomorrow night we have the big parent meeting for our confirmation students. I’ve done a lot of parent meetings over the years, and I think I’ve learned some tricks that really help. Some of them are
- Start on time, but have your first 10 minutes of information be relatively meaningless. People are impressed if you start and end on time (I think folks give too much credit for this).
- Give people a lot of paper (information), but don’t overwhelm them.
- Be very organized in your presentation, room set up, etc.
- Put significant effort into your content and media- it will show
- Give parents the chance to sign up for a very specific task or job
- Avoid any bog down activities such as introducing 30 people, etc. Treat them like 7th graders with a seven minute attention span, that’s all they’ve got left (assuming it’s an evening meeting).
- Do more than give information
- Always share your vision at some point
- give them a chance to mingle (mixer game?)
- Share a devotion, strategy for passing on the faith to their children, or a short book suggestion
As well as some of these tricks work, I still find the parent meeting pretty challenging. They’re exhausted at the end of the day. They’ve already been to 3-4 other parent meetings that happen at the beginning of the year, and they’re afraid of the big ask- for money or time.
What do you find challenging about parent meetings? What are some of your tricks?