The Case for Making Phone Calls Home

“I hate making phone calls to parents!” a colleague of mine once exclaimed in the faculty workroom. I didn’t blame her for feeling frustrated about talking to parents or guardians on the phone. It can be nerve-racking to be put on the spot to answer a question from a parent during a phone call. Even worse, if the parent becomes upset, you have no lag time to prepare a response.

Although calling a parent on the phone has its drawbacks, the benefits often make it worthwhile. Consider the following three benefits to picking up the phone rather than sending an email to a child’s caretakers. 

3 Benefits of calling Students’ homes

Phone calls save time. It may not seem like a phone call takes less time than emailing, but it can take less than 10 minutes to have a meaningful and productive phone conversation. In my research for my book When Calling Parents Isn’t Your Calling: A Teacher’s Guide to Communicating with Parents, I tracked all of my phone calls to families. Even the most serious conversations lasted under 15 minutes.

In his book Phoning Parents, Michael Goldstein suggests starting a phone conversation with a “time check” statement like “I need five minutes of your time. Is this a good time for you?”

But doesn’t it take mere seconds to compose an email? Not really. When you factor in the drafting and revisions, the back-and-forth replies, and the anxious waiting to see how the parent will reply, emailing can take up a considerable amount of time and energy.

One strategy to make phone calls more time efficient is sending a scheduling email such as this:

Good afternoon, Mr. and Dr. Luckenbach. Would you have some time today between 8 and 9 a.m. or 1:30 and 2 p.m. for a brief call to discuss Willy’s progress on his spelling tests? Please let me know if either of these times works and what number is best to call.

Another helpful tip is to set a hard stop so that a conversation cannot run over time. If the conversation starts to go off topic, gently nudge it to an end with “I’d love to talk more about this, but unfortunately my next class starts at 9:25.” (This strategy also works with long-winded friends and relatives on personal calls.)

Phone calls promote clear communication. How many times has the true nature of a message been lost in an email chain? When you talk with someone on the phone, you can actually answer the questions being asked and (mostly) avoid misunderstandings. If you are having a conversation with a parent about their child’s struggles with homework, you can discuss what you’re both observing at home and at school. Such a flow of understanding cannot happen in email messages.

This back-and-forth conversation can also be uncomfortable if you’re asked a question you don’t immediately know the answer to. It is unsettling to admit that we don’t know something, but it is perfectly acceptable to say, “Let me research this and get back to you.” If the answer is brief, the follow-up can be in the form of an email after you have had time to research.

Often teachers push back on the suggestion of making phone calls instead of emailing because there is no written record of the conversation. This is certainly a valid concern, especially for contentious or sensitive conversations. To provide written documentation of a conversation, you can follow up with a summary email to the parents, copying or blind copying additional recipients such as administrators or counselors as needed. To save time, I (quietly so they won’t hear me typing) type a summary in an email draft as I am on the phone. I then use the “schedule send” feature to send the email a few hours later.

Phone calls build connections. If saving time and communicating clearly don’t convince you to pick up the phone, consider the potential deeper connections you can make with a family. When you are having a voice conversation, you can hear the tone of the other person. It is easier to express empathy when discussing a hard topic about a student’s progress. Alternatively, it is easier to hear the parent’s tone of concern, curiosity, and, hopefully, appreciation as they ask you follow-up questions or tell you more about their child’s experience.

One of my favorite reasons to make phone calls are the side anecdotes that parents often share. These small tidbits do not take too much time, maybe a few seconds, but I can learn so much more about a student and their home life. In a recent phone call with a parent, I learned that the student speaks Italian at home. I may not have ever learned this if the parent and I exclusively communicated by email.

Phone calls can also calm an otherwise tense conversation. I received a late-night email from a parent that I perceived to have a snarky tone. Instead of replying with an answer, I replied with a request for a phone call. The parent’s tone on the phone was a 180-degree turn from my perception of her original email. It turned out to be a productive, pleasant, and brief resolution to her concern.

Of course, it is not always practical to call every parent or guardian for every small bit of communication. Sometimes a quick email is more efficient for both the teacher and the parent—such as a quick question, a follow-up, or a brief reminder. A simple rule of thumb: If the email or the reply requires more than one paragraph, request a call instead of sending an email. It is not easy at first, but I assure you, it gets easier with practice.