Vernon Parish schools are providing various resources to parents who want to help their children with homework, but struggle to understand the new methods of teaching under Common Core.

Susan Haney, a first-grade teacher at North Polk Elementary, recently invited parents to her classroom to find out what their children were learning in math.

She said about half a dozen parents came to the workshop and left with a solid understanding of how to help their children. Haney asked that parents bring their child to the workshop so she could give an actual lesson to students while the parents watched.

Haney’s idea is the basis for workshops the district plans to hold in most schools in the next few weeks. Haney herself plans to hold another workshop in the future.

Each part of Eureka Math, the Common Core curriculum, is broken into modules. For every module, schools will send home a newsletter that explains what students are learning, along with the changes brought by Common Core standards.

“We’re trying to make this as easy as possible and make everything available to (parents),” said Renita Page, curriculum director.

Page, one of two curriculum directors, oversees the implementation of English-language arts in Vernon Parish schools. Her counterpart, Anne Smith, heads up the math rollout.

The district is also making resources available on its website, including a “parent road map” that describes the objectives and goals for learning during the school year. One teacher is filming her lessons and posting them online for parents to watch.

Smith said the hardest part for parents is learning new names for concepts they learned as children. “It’s really just a new name for standards that we’ve been doing for many years and the change in the academic vocabulary,” Smith said.

Some South Polk Elementary parents have been invited to the classroom to learn alongside their students, Smith said. “We’ve left out parents out of this whole educational scene for many years and yet our parents are the first teachers,” she said. “They’re every child’s first teacher.”(MGNonline)