Students who are deaf/hh often have difficulty socializing and making friends with their peers. How can you address this within your classroom? 

The teacher needs to pay attention to the social situations with these students to make sure that none of the kids are picking on the student for not hearing something or for misunderstanding. The teacher needs to encourage the children to work through miscommunications and be friendly to all students. The teacher should also encourage the students to give those who have a hearing loss more time to respond to them and if they are not responding to touch them on the shoulder to make sure they get the student's attention instead of assuming the child is ignoring them. It is also important to practice different scenarios with the student who has a hearing loss so they learn to ask to join a group or ask friends to join them with a task, say thank you, please, and I'm sorry and many other social norms that will help them make friends.

Communicating with parents is very important. What are some ways you can communicate with parents and is there a better way than the other?

It is very important to communicate with the parents of our students. I think the best way to do this is by the preference of the parent. I know some teachers text parents or email if they prefer it that way. Some like phone calls weekly or sometimes daily depending on the situation and your schedule. I like the idea of sending notes home weekly to keep the parents in the loop of what is being taught and how the week is going. I think no matter how you do it, it needs to be effective and respectable fot he parent's time and yours as the teacher.