The end of the school year often brings parent-teacher conferences, a chance to sit down with your child's teachers and benefit from their close observations and suggestions. Even if the teacher offers some negative feedback in the conference, there are ways to use this meeting to help your child improve. While it is never easy to hear less-than-stellar reports about your child, the conference can be a time to help connect your child to resources at your school you may not have thought of, including the help of a learning specialist or guidance counselor, or extra help from the teacher. With some advance planning, you can make the conference as productive and helpful as possible. Here are 4 tips for getting the most out of parent-teacher conferences.

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In recent years, our knowledge of the developmental curve of students with learning disabilities and other special needs has grown. As a result, private special needs schools have sprung up across the country to help students with dyslexia, ADHD, autism, and other learning differences. These schools help students by providing them with small class sizes, specially trained teachers, and a curriculum that caters to their cognitive and social needs. Read more about how special needs schools help children.

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Holy Angels Catholic School, a pre-K though 8th grade Catholic school in the historic Bronzeville neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, is one of the largest African-American Catholic schools in the nation. Started in the 1880s by Irish immigrants, the church and school now serve the African-American families who began to settle in the neighborhood in the 1920s through 1950s. Formerly led by African-American priest George Clements, who originated the One Church-One Child program to help families in Catholic churches adopt African-American children, the school still caters to working families with extended hours and a rigorous academic program that prepares students to prepare Catholic high schools in the area.

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Cleveland, Ohio is home to a number of private schools, including Montessori schools, Catholic schools, schools for children with learning differences, and single-sex schools. Private schools in the city date back to the founding of Western Reserve College and Academy in 1826, which later became Case Western Reserve University and the separate Western Reserve Academy. Read more about private schools in Cleveland, Ohio.

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