Introducing LENA Grow to your site

When first introducing LENA Grow to staff and families, make it fun! Building the energy and excitment early will help everyone be more prepared when it's time to start. 

For staff: 

Introduce LENA Grow ~1 month before you plan on getting started. Using time in a staff meeting, one on one meeting time, a newsletter or email are all good ways to communicate. 

Here is some sample language: 

Dear teachers,

We are excited to share that we have the opportunity to participate in an innovative professional development program called LENA Grow. LENA Grow is a longstanding tool that teachers have used across the country to help them be more aware of the amount of talking happening in their classrooms. LENA is like a pedometer for language – it tracks the amount of words and conversations happening in the classroom so teachers can make sure they are providing a rich language experience for all children in the group. 

All teachers will participate in an Orientation before talking to families about the program. Each family will be given a consent form to review and an opportunity to opt in or out. 

We’d love for all children to participate so you get the most accurate data about your classroom. You can read ahead and see the information that will be shared with families here: https://info.lena.org/lena-grow-families.

We’ll be doing LENA Grow as a team, so we can all learn together!

IF APPLICABLE: Add information about any incentives or specific details. 

For Families: 

Sample email/letter:

Dear families,

We are excited to share that we have the opportunity to participate in an innovative professional development program called LENA Grow. LENA Grow is a longstanding tool that teachers have used across the country to help them be more aware of the amount of talking happening in their classrooms. LENA is like a pedometer for language – it tracks the amount of words and conversations happening in the classroom so teachers can make sure they are providing a rich language experience for all children in the group. 

We’ll be posting more information and sending home a consent form in the near future. We’d really like all children to participate so that teachers can see data that reflects their full classroom. You can start reading more now at https://info.lena.org/lena-grow-families. 

If you have any questions or concerns once you review the consent form, please let me know! 

Sample text message (or communication app e.g.Brightwheel):

Hello! I’m excited to share that we’ve been selected to use LENA Grow in our program! Be on the lookout for more information soon. In the meantime, check out the LENA parent website to see what it’s all about! 

Info for family meeting or follow up conversations:

If you have the chance to talk about LENA Grow in person, provide the information from the letter template above. It’s a good idea to have the flyer printed out and be able to pull up the parent website on a large screen so you can all explore it together. 

If you want to get really fancy, feel free to download and edit this powerpoint:  

👩‍🏫 Introducing LENA Grow to Families Slide Deck English / Spanish

If you need more resources for answering questions, you can share theLENA Grow FAQs resource.