There is this awesome page on Facebook (
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) called Thank-A-Teacher where they are requesting people submit a teacher thank you... They are trying to build the nation's largest thank you project virtually. Believe it is PTA-related but cool none-the-less for parents and kids to do... could be creative and even ivite your teacher/share with your teacher once you join ... or an older class "project?"
Our "Aide/Support Staff" appreciation lunch is today. But, no matter what we "label" it, or who it is "targeted" towards, we don't exclude anyone in the process.
The Teachers have their week as well but just like with today and Teacher Appreciation week, when we set up a table of food, etc. we don't have someone standing there going... "No, you can't have that your a __________." We put up a sign by the table saying... "Thank you!" and then whoever wishes to participate/enjoy may.
Our staff is a family and while they may hold different positions they all understand that any one position couldn't occur (or at least function as well) without the other positions. Just as the PTO couldn't function as well without all of them as well.
There are simply not enough PTA/PTO parents to keep the Teachers happy. We try our best to provide things all year long and then the Teachers complain that they want more. We were told by our Principal to make it simple for us. We appreciate all staff and this year will provide a breakfast for all staff. Evening staff will also have a nice snack to show our appreciation. There are no staff or Teacher gifts. Parents are welcome to send in a gift for their teacher.
We include teachers assistants and specials teachers for teacher appreciation. We feel the aides and specials teachers do spend a good amount of time with the students also and there is preparation they have to do.
We do a combination of a few different things. We have a "classified staff appreciation week" that I am not sure is a district thing or a state thing or what, but we do that in March. Then we have Teacher appreciation in May. Then in June we have a staff appreciation lunch.
The classified staff week was just little things the PTSO did each day - like a Kudos bar in their box or a thank you note for how much they care about the kids in our school. For Teacher week, we get the whole school involved and encourage the kids to do special things each day by having a set "theme" for every day of the week.
