A Guide to Launching Ladders at Home

A Guide to Launching Ladders at Home

Welcome! You've decided to launch Ladders at Home in your school as part of your whole school approach to parental engagement and with a wealth of research showing the benefits of ongoing, consistent parental engagement, there has never been a better time to embark on this launch. 

“The effect of parental engagement over a student’s school career is equivalent to adding two or three years to that student’s education.” 
   John Hattie


This guide provides all you need to implement Ladders at Home; from time saving letter proformas, to pre-designed guides to send out to your parents. We have a separate guide for launching Ladders at Home in the Early Years here. 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Step 1: Discuss your settings for Ladders at Home 


"Parental engagement is successful when treated as part of a whole school strategy-not a bolt on activity" (Desforges and Abouchaar, 2003)


Step 1 of launching involves engaging in conversations with Senior Leaders and other teams to provide a consistent approach to communicating with parents.

Click on 'Ladders at Home' on the navigation menu to view the settings for Ladders at Home. This is a good basis for starting these conversations. 

Only admin users are able to access the settings tab in Ladders at Home. EYFS and KS1+ have separate settings for Ladders at Home.


Settings for sharing learning goals


Sharing learning goals with parents provides immediate feedback about what their child is learning in school. Learning Ladders has reviewed the research that shows better conversations about learning are achieved when communication with parents is ongoing throughout the year.


Watch this video to learn about the sharing options for learning goals, or read this support article. 



Settings for Homework, Evidence and 2-way messaging

  
     

1. If homework is enabled, parents will have the 'homework' button on the navigation menu and the number of homework set upon logging in. If homework is disabled, parents will not be able to see the homework buttons.

2. If enabled, parents can see evidence linked to a learning goal and will see this evidence in the 'Portfolio'. Evidence is only shared for the subjects selected in settings.

3. If two way messaging is enabled, parents and teachers will see 'notifications' to manage messages.

Two Way Communication Settings

The Two-way communication tool creates opportunities to build partnerships with parents and open up conversations about learning.
Watch the video below explaining two-way communication or read this article for more information.



Step 2: Communicate the Launch to your Parents


For genuine partnerships to exist between teachers and parents, Learning Ladders encourage schools to share their parental engagement approach and ethos for collaborating in supporting learning.

To support and minimise the burden on teacher workloads, we have developed a range of documents for parents to communicate the launch of Ladders at Home:

Parental Engagement Pledge (editable document, with the ability to personalise with school names and features used)


Ladders at Home Parent Presentation (an editable presentation to use in a parent information session)


Step 3: Import Parents


We have developed straightforward processes for importing parents into Ladders at Home.

There are three options for importing parents: 

1. Import parents using an import file (a separate file for schools using Grades)
2.MIS integration for importing parents with further support in this guide: Troubleshooting 


 Step 4: Invite Parents


Experience shows us that communicating with parents to expect an invite, along with supporting information on how to register, leads to a greater number of parents registering successfully. 

To support you in communicating the registration process we have developed the below resources:
 
Registration Parent Letter- An editable proforma for communicating the invitation process to your parents

Parent Guide for Ladders at Home- An editable word document with links to support videos for parents

How to invite parents to Ladders at Home- An article explaining how to invite parents to Ladders at Home


Step 5: Share homework

​Watch this video for more information about sharing home learning tasks or read a guide here.


Step 6: Support parents using Articles


Watch this video for more information about using Articles to support parents, or read a guide here.


Step 7: Student Reports

Using Learning Ladders student reports has multiple benefits for both teachers, senior leaders and parents.
  1. Reports in Learning Ladders save teachers time- there's no sense in doubling up work. Teachers already record formative assessments in the system, so benefit from reports that pull in personalised objectives for strengths and challenges. 

  2. More efficient sign off for teachers and senior leaders- no more shared drives, lost reports or confusion over who is signing off reports.

  3. Clear visibility of report statuses for teachers and senior leaders- filter reports by student, class, status and report type.

  4. Improved engagement from parents- option for parents to translate reports into over 100 languages, view reports online or download a copy as well as contribute with their own comment, following up with questions via 2 way messaging.

Launch student reports in your school by following the steps in the Student Reports: Admin user guide.

Step 8: Ask parents for feedback 

Research by Desforges and Abouchaar (2003) concludes that regular reviews from parents are a key factor for success when delivering parental engagement strategies.

Feedback will shape your continued use of Ladders at Home and refine the use to ensure your parental engagement is based on your own parents' needs.

For any other questions about launching Ladders at Home in your School, contact the team at support@learningladders.info



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