frank and suz family: Teacher Appreciation

As it turns out, I'm no stranger to teacher appreciation week. I did two in Bountiful, so when I moved to Kaysville, the PTA President (and my sisters backyard neighbor) drafted us immediately. I was looking forward to doing one with my sister since our kids go to the same school. Stacy and I put together a "design board", and started the planning in January. We had a committee of about 10, so we met monthly to plan details and give assignments. Here's how it went down...

THEME: Teachers...You Can Do Magic!!!

On top of the daily gifts from the PTA, we wanted to somehow include the students. We decided rather than have them bring assigned stuff each day, we would send home a "get-to-know-your-teacher" sheet with fun facts about their teachers. This would also give the parents some ideas as to what their teacher might like for gifts. We also had a spirit week, and asked that the kids do the following to recognize their teachers:

Monday: Hat's Off to Teacher's (wear a hat to school)

Tuesday: You Color My World (wear your teachers favorite color)

Wednesday: Teachers Make our Future's Bright (wear sunglasses)

Thursday: We're Crazy For You (crazy hair day)

Friday: You Make Us Better from the Inside Out (wear your clothes inside out)

The week started off the Friday BEFORE Teacher Appreciation when we met after school to decorate doors with "show curtains" out of dollar store red tablecloths and metallic stars. We also decorated the teachers lounge.

Backdrop

I taped together (too many) decks of cards making a striped pattern with the red face cards and the backs to give it a clean look. We hung a cluster of paper lanterns above as a chandelier. The table was set in front of it for the daily "treats" covered in white with a black and white chevron table runner. I also made 15 cake stands out of plates, candle holders, sundae glasses, glass light shades etc., and painted them fire engine red. We used these to display the gifts as well as center pieces for the luncheon later in the week.

Dining Tables

Dining tables were simple. Just black lanterns with a "poker hand" held up with a black binder clip

MONDAY

We "WAND" you to know what an amazing teacher you are

The lounge table was filled with with chocolate covered pretzels dipped to look like magic wands. For the full-time class room teachers, we delivered it to their desk along with a black bag to carry their gifts and goodies throughout the week.

TUESDAY

Teachers, you make the world go "ROUND"

The lounge table was filled with Einstein Bagels. We also filled all the teachers book order "wish list" as a surprise and left them in a neat pile on their desks with a folded card labeled, "We're under your spell"

WEDNESDAY

For a very "POP-ULAR" teacher

The lounge table was filled with individaul boxes of gourmet chocolate cinnamon popcorn. They were also place on the teachers desks.

THURSDAY

We are "soda-lighted" to have you at our school

We set up concessions in the lounge with a variety of soda, red vines, and treats. To go with the soda, we bought black cups at the dollar store and added a white vinyl mustache.

This day was a two part. The lounge was for everyone, but we had something a little extra for the classroom teachers. About a month before TA Week, we gave the room moms a deck of blank white cards (with a moustache stamp on the back). The room moms set up a time for the teachers to leave the classroom for 5 minutes while they had the students write little notes to the teachers. We put the notes in empty facecard boxes and wrapped them with twine and a little round tag that read "student notes". These were put in a top hat gift basket with a dove white chocolate bunny (bought right after easter for a discounted price), Red Vines, Popcorn, Pop Rocks, Peppermints, and a mini clipboard with coordinating papers, ribbons, with an ADORABLE vinyl saying!

(sorry, no picture with the student notes...)

FRIDAY

LUNCHEON

We made a movie of all the teachers with their students, and put it to music (Uh Oh Oh it's Magic, Do You Believe in Magic, For Good). The teachers sat down, and had individual boxes of popcorn, and a place mat that read, enjoy!

After everyone was settled in their seats, we brought in a surprise performance from the student council. Satcy wrote new lyrics to the Selena Gomez song, Magic, and we put a little choreography with it and taught it to the student council the month before. For the performance, we had them wear sequin bow ties, and magic gloves...they did awesome!

After that, it was time to eat! We had Plates and Pallates cater all sorts of yummy salads. We also had a lovely volunteer who donated deli sandwiches.

Dessert was gourmet "vanishing cupcakes" that were also used as centerpieces in clusters of three red cake stands. They were red velvet with cream cheese frosting topped with the most adorable mini tophat!