Help with gifts for teachers please

jap200

alyssa_mae wrote:

we now organise a collection in each class and put in a suggested amount of £5 each them that is shared between 50% the teacher 25% each teaching assistant then we buy a voucher for a shopping centre. teacher £70 assistants get £35 roughly. I know what you mean by feeling presure to buy something it was a bit of a shock when my boy started school. but i just grin and bear it now. My daughter starts school in Jan so that will be two lots of collections. I think if I were a teacher I would ask parents not to buy gifts.

I can see the point of this as the teacher/TA actually gets something useful, but I have three kids and £15 would be a lot of money to me this month.

Last week
I sent 2 of the boys in with donations for the school Christmas bazaar (2x chocolates = £5).

I have also paid for the Xmas dinner for two of them as they usually take a packed lunch, but don't want to be left out (2x £1.75 = £3.25).
I also paid a £2 contribution to my youngest son's pre-school party

Today I sent 2 of the boys in with £1 each as well as a bag of goodies (worth at least £3) for the shoebox charity thing they do each year (= £5+). I have already filled 2 other shoeboxes with stuff for my other son's pre-school collection - which I spent about £8 on in the end and then discovered that they need £2 each added to them (= £12)

Tomorrow I have to send 2 of them with a small gift to the value of at least £1 - and also give them each £1 to buy a gift back - to be wrapped and brought home for a member of the family (= £4+)

And these are just the things I have thought of off the top of my head. This comes to roughly £31 - knocking a hole in my monthly budget. I know that some of these costs were optional, but believe me, there is a huge amount of peer pressure (on both kids and parents) and when the children are so young (my eldest is only 8) they just want to be the same as their friends.

I also don't want my kids to be the only ones who don't have something to give their teachers on the last day of term - I don't know any other family that braves it out, although I do think that some of the gifts are rather over the top.

BigAde

A_LANCASHIRE_LAD wrote:

I agree jesus these people get over 25k a year and about 140 bloody weeks holiday n all thrown in plus 978 inset days ! What more do they need ... bah humbug !

Agree with everything Dan has just said, my wife was a teacher for several years. She worked bloody hard - at least 12 hours a day, plus weekends, plus holiday planning, plus Baker days in holidays (as they were called back then). She was also verbally abused and threatened by pushy parents wanting their little darling to succeed. She was stressed to the point of illness. Anyone who thinks teachers have an easy life clearly haven't got a clue what's involved. Most teachers would probably agree that they love teaching the kids, it's the cr*p that goes with it they can't stand.

Anyway, back to the original question, would agree with other comments, I know my wife most appreciated gifts the kids had made themselves... doesn't have to be expensive, just a bit of thought and effort. The whip-round idea from alyssa_mae sounds excellent, and would go down very well with parents and teachers alike.

scat

Speaking as a T.A and School Librarian I would do something like this!

http://www.oxfamunwrapped.com/ProductList.aspx?CategoryID=11&BrowseType=category&CategorySelector1:BrowseByCategory=11&Page=1

It shows your appreciation, it helps out people who need it and it would be a talking point in the staff room. Other ideas would be to buy a book for the school library. I've yet to meet a teacher that expected a gift from his/her pupils at christmas, and quite frankly if they did expect a gift then I would say they don't deserve one!!!!! Don't feel you have to, a hand made card is infinitely more precious than anything money can buy.

jap200

I just had a thought:

All my kids love to cook. What about if I got them to help me make so chocolate brownies or cookies and we wrapped them nicely in cellophane? I could attach a photo of them making them to the label - to indicate that they were home-made.

*debbie*

I am a playgroup assistant and there are 6 members of staff at my playgroup. When I first started there were 3 of us, and we would often get individual presents, now we usually get larger boxes of sweets / wine / biscuits to share. We divide these into 6 piles and draw lots for a pile to take home after the Christmas party. Works for us!

My kids take in a Christmas tree decoration for each of their staff / TA's. Being a stingy cow I usually buy a load in the January sales! You can buy really nice wooden ones in a box, I think there are about 12 to a box, and then you could divide them up?

Don't feel too pressured to buy stuff, my favourite present / card ever (been there 6 years) was a card made by a child, inside it had a photo of her and she wrote her name inside (a real feat of effort for that child). I was really touched. Also, cards written by the parents saying how pleased they are with their child's progress / happiness are always GREAT!

floydy

jap200 wrote:

I just had a thought:

All my kids love to cook. What about if I got them to help me make so chocolate brownies or cookies and we wrapped them nicely in cellophane? I could attach a photo of them making them to the label - to indicate that they were home-made.

that sounds lovely, but wouldnt ur little darlings want to eat them themselves after helping u to make them???mine would, lol:rotfl:

jap200

floydy wrote:

that sounds lovely, but wouldnt ur little darlings want to eat them themselves after helping u to make them???mine would, lol:rotfl:

Actually - my concern was more about whether the teachers would actually want to eat them knowing that they had been made by children - escpecially my middle son who is a wipe-your-nose-on-your-sleeve type of child!

itsme_2

If I had to buy for that many I would buy one tin of sweets for the staff room.

mr_knight

Maybe a Lancashire lad should swap with a teacher for a day or 2. The amount of hours put into this job is ridiculous. This is the first time I've been home beffore 6 for ages. I reckon that if you worked the amount of hours put in you could earn more working in a retail job that pays by the hour with overtime etc.

As for the gift idea. One of my pupils has just made me a picture with a message she wrote to me on the back and another brought me a shell back from their holiday. Neither cost anything but it really was the though that counts. Something personal from the kids for their teachers would be lovely. The cookies sound nice but a card would be just as appreciated. If anyone does buy I also think the oxfam idea is great, it helps someone less fortunate and also stops us teachers putting on those extra pounds with the wine and chocs:)

oibaldy

As a teacher, I expect nothing other than the pupils to politely wish me a happy Christmas. Anything else is a bonus.

Please do not feel pressured into giving anything, otherwise where does it stop? The postie? The bin man? The fella who occasionally comes round and throws all the recycling over the street rather than put it into his truck? The kid with the free newspaper that you don't read? Someone selling double glazing? Jehovah’s Witnesses?

I would much rather have a peaceful end to the term than 30 boxes of chocolates that I only end up giving back to the pupils since I am diabetic (and I feel guilty about sharing them in class since I spend all year advocating a healthy diet!)