I know we have talked about this topic SEVERAL times but I'm still at a loss what to get Lucas' teacher and parapro as an end of the year thank you. I'm not sure what expressed the "thanks for putting up with my kid" sentiment just right.
Teachers love gift cards. My mom had a CLOSET full of apple and music note junk (she was a music teacher) and for the most part, it was all worthless. Teachers get more than their fair share of that kind of stuff.
some like things they can use in the classroom or gc to places they can buy for their classroom, but others like things for themselves.
Do you know if the teacher has any summer plans? I always try to make that a question for the teachers and go from there.
I'm not a huge fan of giving teachers alcohol. If I know a teachers drinks, I would get them a drink mix or a GC to a wine shop, but I don't typically buy and give alcohol at school. (and one of Kate's previous teachers is someone my dad knows through AA-but she doesn't advertise that by any means, so unless you are sure, I wouldn't go that route)
I think the movie ticket idea is always a good one.
I have done gift cards to 7-11 with great response even! Also restaurants are always a hit because people love to go out without feeling like they are paying for all of it.
You could have him make a bouquet of flowers to present as well-with his hand being the flower petals, kwim? Cut out handprints in different colors, glue them together, add a center to the flower and some stems/leaves, and you'd had a cute bouquet.
Good luck!!! I always rack my brain trying to come up with just the right gifts for people, lol.
ok - this will probably be unpopluar {ducking under chair now}
but is an end of year gift necessary?
We got both of Jake's teachers something for teacher week 5 or so weeks ago to show our appreciation.
We got them all Christmas gifts to show our appreciation.
I volunteer to help in the classroom. I go to all of the class parties and help out and I do appreciate all of his teachers but is it necessary to gift gifts so many times during the school year?
Kris, gifts are never necessary, and I know from my teaching days, there were always kids who didn't give gifts to the classroom teachers (I was a specials teacher, so I didn't expect many gifts at all-but I always GAVE gifts to my volunteers). I think it is 100% preference.
I am extremely generous with the preschool gifts. But that place is just amazing, and I feel like they are an extension of my family. And they get paid squat-not that I feel pay should be indicative of gifts, but it is clear to me the staff does what they do because they love it a lot more so than the paycheck they get from it. I think the vast majority of teachers in general do, really. I do a lot more than I think its necessary or expected for them, but again, it is a preference. It is 100% my choice to do it.
As far as the public school-I don't have the same kind of relationship with the school or the staff as I do with the preschool. I will still do gifts, but it isn't the same for me since I just don't know them as well. But Anna's teacher has been very important to her this year, and I have not had the chance to volunteer for as many things I would have liked. But even with that, I don't think it is a necessity-just something we want to do.
The things we did for teacher appreciation week were very small-tokens of our appreciation more so than gifts. They had a list they sent home-it was like wear your teacher's fave colors one day, write a note to your teacher another day, etc. Things like that, but so it was clear no one was expected to buy anything.
We pretty much stick to Christmas and end of year gifts, so just twice a year. I do send in cards for Easter and Mother's Day and those sorts of things, but not gifts.
But again-I don't think anyone ever HAS to send in an end of the year gift. I think it is like any other similar career-gifts are always appreciated, but never necessary.
I love all those ideas. I really love the "whine bottle" but I don't feel comfortable taking alcohol to the elementary school.
I don't thing teacher gifts are a MUST but Lucas' teachers have been so wonderful. He went through a really rough patch for a while with his behavior and his teacher worked very closely with us to turn it around.
His teacher is my facebook friend soon I know she is athletic (loves running) and does a lot of work with rescuing sea turtles and lives near the beach. I don't know anything about the parapro though, just that she's been with the K program at that school for something like 30 years. This was going to be her last year but she decided to hold off on retirement because she loves working with the teacher that much.
At Christmas we gave each of them a walmart gift card. Our teacher appreciation week was things like "give your teacher a hug, bring in a sweet treat, bring in a flower, draw a picture."
I usually give Barnes and Noble gift cards along with a book or something Andrew has picked out, wind chimes, something like that. I aways give Christmas gifts, and I did this year too, but have had such a horrible, awful experience that I won't be giving an end of the year present to Andrew's teacher. She has fought me with everything that she could, arguing that it was ok to give homework that had a picure of a pop gun to cut out, yeah, make a gun with your hand, lose your recess, but cut it out to learn the G sound, giving homework at all even though the school board said not too because Kinders are in school full time, doing nothing about bullying, fighting me about Andrew doing K again next year, I think anouther year of maturing will do him good even though he's very smart... Ok, so, you get the point, not my favorite person...
So, this year, we are walking away from her, the school and the district and are going to try and not glance back.
We just found out last night that Lucas' teacher got laid off for next year. The school board is short on $$$ so they decided laying off 104 teachers county wide was the way to go. She was the last hired so she was the first "fired."
Thank you, I really wanted to get her like a $50 gift card somewhere but we just didn't have the money so I thought something that really expressed how we felt was good, she has been the BEST teacher, I can't believe how much he has learned. That sucks his teacher is getting laid off! It is amazing what they are doing to education, so sad.
How many bags of M&M's did that take? Where did you find the jar?
I just bought a big bag at Wal-Mart for like $4 and I did have a hard time finding the jar, I finally found it at Joann, a craft store where I live. I also found another really cute idea that I think we are going to do, the colorful crayon letter if I can find a decent priced shadow box:
I am sorry to hear about Luca's teacher being laid off. I am in the same boat actually! It is crazy. I got a Publix gift card, three Target gift cards, and a beach bag full of beach stuff for my kiddos. I appreciated it so much! I also got a BEAUTIFUL three slot picture frame with dried flowers in one (they know I love dried flowers), a pic of me and the little girl on fifth grade awards day, and a teacher poem in the last part. Of course it made me cry!
The best part....I got bunch of recommendation letters and emails about how I touched their child's life because they knew I got laid off. AMAZING!
