what sorts of questions might parents want answered by a teacher?

For me, I'd prefer a few that address your class specifically since I know most of the generals, but...

Maybe something about the benefit of incorporating technology? There are so many parents that are trying to take old technology rules from when they were young and apply them to their children, which means there are a lot of parents who don't quite realize that technology has tons of wonderful uses and applications in education. Do you use Danielson's framework at all? From what i understand, "differentiation and technology use" was added under the instruction domain recently (year or two ago?), so you could benefit from addressing the technology as well as differentiation.

Another idea could be to address either the MI theory or Bloom's Taxonomy (or both) in a way that helps parents understand that (1) kids _do_ learn differently and (2) true learning is more than drill and skill. I'd be thrilled to know that my son's teacher is doing what she can to teach to different learning intelligences and that she's consistently providing opportunities for students to work beyond comprehension into applying, analyzing, and hopefully further.

I'd want to know more about the state tests.

More about what takes place on a daily basis in the classroom.

How does my child get along with the other students?

Is there anything we should be working on at home that he's struggling with in the classroom?

I'd want to know how the grading system works with reading levels, etc.

LOL - I thought I had anticipated all the educational questions and all the answers prepped for my first set of parent conferences. Four parents cried over personal issues which they thought were affecting their child's behavior and one pair got in a fight over whether they should tell their son about Santa Claus and wanted me to weigh in on the issue. You'll never anticipate it all.

While it's important for you to stay up to date on what the latest research suggests about best practices in education, my experience is that parents want to know specific examples of their child's strengths and suggestions for techniques and resources to help with areas that are more challenging for their child. It always helps me to think deeply about each child and what educational and social issues are unique to them. You should be able to talk about what specific teaching techniques and procedures you are already using and how they are designed to meet that individual child's needs.