The relationship between the Guide and the Classroom Assistant is one of the first that a child experiences outside of the home. Built upon humility, respect, and trust that relationship can be a model for healthy social interaction and division of labor.

What are the working assumptions, personal and professional, we need to put securely in place to assure both adults have an opportunity to grow in their roles? How can leadership support that developing relationship?

The role of the assistant is not firmly anchored, which can sometimes lead to assistants ending up with much more responsibility than they are prepared for. Assistants cannot feel confident and secure if they are automatically expected to perform unmentioned or undefined tasks. Is it possible to clearly say what is and is not part of the assistant's role in general? How do they contribute to children, classroom and the guide? Will their workload be the same in every classroom? Why is it crucial to identify their specific talents?

There is a general sense of fuzziness around the role of assistants. The intention of this panel discussion is to open up a dialogue on the role of the assistant, to sketch its contours and to offer options that you can use in your daily classroom practice.

A shared vision is essential for the guide and assistant to become good partners. The attention, care and kindness they give to clarifying and achieving common goals strengthens their relationship and creates a harmonious atmosphere in the classroom.

This workshop will give you practical tips to the main areas that contribute significantly to establishing and building a good and stable relationship:

Setting up a space for regular communication,
Clearly defining roles and clarifying mutual expectations,
Aligning behaviour in the classroom and interaction with children,
Agreeing on routines and scheduling maintanance of the classroom environment,
The identification and use of unique skills and talents of both adults.

When two classroom colleagues work together, they strive everyday to share their perspectives and how to best support each other’s work. Clear, consistent, and patient communication is needed. Everyday. All day. But in a busy classroom we can miss cues from each other and have less than ideal communication. In this fun exercise we will put on display two people working together to accomplish a shared goal, using concise communication. We will notice what works well? What didn’t work well? And how can we use this example to better our communication with our classroom colleague. We also hope to have some fun along the way!