Family ties are strong in Latino cultures and home-school connections are used here to a great degree.  In particular, the connections to extended family members presents excellent opportunities for essentially bringing the classroom home and involving a tia or abuela, who shares her interest for the topic or art form as well as her love for the child.
Inversely, the parent or extended family member is brought to school to share her expertise on art forms or to recount a story in Spanish when possible.

Communications and resources useful for providing a connection for home and school are presented as an integral part of this unit: students take their artwork and projects home and get feedback from older family members who will show various degrees of familiarity and expertise in the art forms.  Students will also keep a journal where they can record their older family members’ comments on the pieces of art as well as on the process of making it.  The might recount a Mexican myth or legend, for example, that relateds to the art piece involved.  Such stories can be told and recorded in the student’s journal in Spanish.  The student will gain practice in retelling Spanish language stories and mythology, much of which comes from Aztec and Mayan culture.

Finally, the  home-school connection dovetails nicely with the national foreign language standard on communities (5.1-students use the language both within and beyond the school setting).