• Even if a parent comes to us angry, we can still appreciate that they came at all.

• The fact that the parent showed up in the first place means they’re interested in resolving the situation, have taken the time and even invested enough effort to get angry. “It’s good of you to come.”

• Recognize the other person’s needs. “I can see something is bothering you and I’m happy you came to talk about it.” It is good to express this kind of recognition at times when the situation is getting melodramatic and one of the speakers is raising their voice.

• The hardest thing is to avoid joining in with critical, devaluing or vulgar language.

• It’s better not to give in to emotion.

• Don’t take the parents’ attacks personally.

• When talking with parents we speak from the role of a teacher, not on our own behalf. If the situation gets heated, it remains a conflict of roles, in no case is it a personal conflict. For this reason we should never use expressions such as: “Who do you think you are?” Don’t add fuel to the fire. We can’t expect a reasonable answer to such questions.

• It’s necessary to understand what the parent needs.

• Avoid why? questions. The parent may perceive this as some kind of accusation and will feel the need to defend themselves. During the conversation we should try to negotiate the best solution for both sides – aiming for a win-win situation. We should ask: “I’m not sure I understand? What do you mean by that?”

• We should try to avoid any critical evaluation of the parent’s educational methods – we should rather focus on the disadvantage a given approach has for the child.

• Express facts, not impressions. We should always describe what actually happened and what importance it has for the functioning of the school.

• We realize that when evaluating others the following perceptional key is relevant:

• o appearance
  
• o our previous experiences
  
• o similarity with someone we know
  
• o stereotypes
  
• o clothing
  
• o gestures
  
• o I judge others as I judge myself
  

• It is necessary to realize that our listening is selective – all information we take in goes through our personal decoder/filter – we have a tendency to attach meanings to other people’s words, reflecting our own experiences and beliefs.

• It is enough to notice one thing we don’t like about the other person to get the impression that we “know something about them” – this is the halo effect.

We describe what we see (observation, emotion, interpretation).