PTO Today

Earth Day is around the corner and it’s a wonderful time to run a program or hold an event that celebrates the earth and really inspires families.

Many parent groups run cleanup or recycling programs at their schools on Earth Day (April 22) to help kids understand the message of taking care of our planet and to give families tips for living a more eco-friendly lifestyle.

But Earth Day lends itself to a variety of different programs, too. We have lots of ideas on our site, from fashion shows featuring clothing made of recycled materials to gardening projects. You can find more information on these events here.

Or, you could download our free Go Green Night planning kit and plan something fun for next month at your school. Our Go Green Night Kit has everything you need to organize and run an event that focuses on protecting the environment and saving energy. In addition to a step-by-step planning guide, promotional flyer, poster, and banner, the kit has kid-friendly activities, including some inspired by the movie EPIC, a three-dimensional animated adventure scheduled for release in May.

Curious about what sort of activities are in the kit? Check out one of our 9 fun activities, How Big Is Your Carbon Footprint..
This Carbon Footprint activity provides information about what a carbon footprint is and it helps kids learn about it with a fun coloring activity.

Also, your school will have a chance to win a free screening of the movie EPIC before it is in theaters. Learn more about how to enter the EPIC Go Green Night Sweepstakes in your free planning kit! Order yours now!

Now here’s a school that know how to have fun! Parent volunteers at the Learning Community Charter School in Jersey City, N.J., recently held a Pi-e Day celebration in honor of Pi Day, which is celebrated on March 14.

The event featured a bake-off, pie arts and crafts, and a pie-eating contest. Organizers said it was expected to raise more than $3,000 for the school. The idea was to get a message out about pi, the mathematical constant that is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter (equal to 3.14159).

Pi Day has become a fun way for PTOs and PTA to get kids excited about math. Last year, we got a great response to ideas for Pi Day, so we wanted to offer them again to any groups that may be looking for last-minute ideas:

• Fun with teachers: Many schools observe the day with activities using pies or pizzas. You might recruit teachers who agree to be “pied,” then invite students to vote for one teacher to take a pie in the face by putting coins in a jar. Or you could help teachers with their Pi Day lessons by supplying pizzas for their classes. Teachers can use the round pizzas to demonstrate lessons before students eat them for lunch.

• Games with kids: Have kids count off from 1 to 9. Then recite the digits of pi, with a person representing each number moving to the appropriate place in order, until you run out of people. Plan math games and invite students to challenge each other.

• Pi Contest
Challenge students to write poems about pi or to memorize as many digits as they can. Give winners storybooks that involve pi, such as Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi by Cindy Neuschwander, or gift certificates to a local pizza place.

April is National Financial Literacy Month, a great time to help kids learn about money management. With fun programs, you can get kids interested in basic transactions, entrepreneurship, and even investing.

Here are some ideas to consider for your school:

Ask kids how they feel about math, and many will tell you they aren’t good at it, as if there is a “math gene” that they just weren’t born with.

Virginia Wilcox, a college professor and parent volunteer, wants to debunk the math-gene theory. As a volunteer at Thomas G. Scott Elementary in Forsyth, Ga., Wilcox has logged many hours teaching kids math so it is more accessible and is even considered…fun.

Yes, fun! So when Wilcox, an associate professor and chairwoman of the education department at Wesleyan College in Macon, goes to her kids’ school, she often wears a wizard costume and answers to the name “Professor Zero.” In costume, she immediately captures the students’ attention and proceeds to teach them math concepts in an easy, sometimes even silly way.

The stress of math drills and worksheets melts away and the kids start truly paying attention. Wilcox says the children get so caught up in the Professor Zero show, even those most afflicted by math phobia start participating and answering questions.

“I want to instill in children that math is not scary,” Wilcox says. “If you work hard, you can get it.”

Wilcox’s involvement at Thomas G. Scott Elementary started in 2008 when her children began attending school. At first, she volunteered to present a few math lessons to parents to help them guide their children with homework. She also provided math lesson plans to teachers and even co-taught some math classes.

More recently, Wilcox worked with the PTO to run family math nights.

So far, there is anecdotal as well as statistical evidence that kids have made strides in math as a result of Professor Zero’s efforts. Wilcox says she and a group of teachers randomly selected 30 5th graders and tested them before and after the Professor Zero training. Prior to the lessons, none of the students scored above 50 percent on an assessment of algebra concepts. After the lessons, all 30 passed the assessment with a score of 70 percent or higher, Wilcox says.

With thoughts of the Sandy Hook tragedy still so painful, we wanted to share a story of two parent groups that demonstrate how school communities take care of each other.

Both groups, one a PTO on the coast of Florida, the other a PTA from Newport Beach, Calif., “adopted’’ Northeast schools that were clobbered by another devastating event this year, Hurricane Sandy.

In both cases, the parent groups posed a basic question to their community: Does anyone know of someone who needs help?

And so earlier this week, the PTO at Indialantic (Fla.) Elementary loaded up a truck with 100 boxes of school supplies, clothing, toys, and blankets from a collection it had run for several weeks, says Tina Descovich, PTO president.

Indialantic community loads up the truck headed to New Jersey.

The group sent that cargo, along with $3,100 and $1,200 in gift cards, to Monmouth Beach (N.J.) School, which was flooded in four feet of water from the hurricane.

Meanwhile, the PTA at Corona del Mar High School in Newport Beach, Calif., wrapped up a gift card collection that will be added to $5,000 from a community assistance fund. The gift is headed to the I.S. 061 William A. Morris School in Staten Island, N.Y., reports Sue Ellen O’Connor, PTA president.

In both cases, these connections came about from a chain of people, with one person who knew another person who knew of a school that needed help.

At Indialantic, the guidance counselor spearheaded the effort by first searching online for a school. Overwhelmed by the volume of hurricane relief information, she asked some Indialantic staff if they had relatives in the Northeast who might know of a school in need. Eventually, one teacher’s family member directed Indialantic to Monmouth. The guidance counselor corresponded with a Monmouth teacher and learned about the supplies the New Jersey school needed.

The Corona del Mar PTA was also searching for a school to adopt when one of the board members piped up that she had a cousin who was a school principal in New Jersey. She contacted her cousin and discovered the school has suffered extensive damage.

“The school was devastated,’’ says O’Connor. “The computers were ruined. They needed supplies and a lot of help.’’

When an Indialantic news outfit reported on the PTO’s Hurricane Sandy effort, community members began pitching in. For example, a woman stopped by the school and donated $50.  Other PTOs in town donated goods and money, too. And a local business provided the truck and agreed to haul the donations to New Jersey.

Indialantic sent along a great photo to the Monmouth community, which offered good wishes to their new friends.

We’ve had a big blast of bad news from the parent group world recently. First, there was another batch of embezzlement stories. Then there was a story concerning a PTO’s role in a misguided effort to single out kids who did not make fundraising goals. And the real topper was a piece about a parent volunteer who threatened to harm a public official.

Really? And it’s what season?

Luckily, we have you—our parent group community—to remind us that most PTOs and PTAs are far more focused on building community and taking care of others. So what exactly are you up to this time of year?

Well, here’s just one example. We posted a simple question on Facebook last week asking about your holiday plans. Here’s what we got:

• Parents Night Out—Fun and games for the kids while the parents enjoy kid-free shopping

• Annual Christmas Fair: Two-day event that dates back at least 40 years

• Santa Shop

• Parent/child cookie contest

• Selling discount gift certificates to local playhouse

• Annual Movie Night, free cocoa and cookies
• Advent Mass, refreshments for 70

• Santa Shop and two winter shows

• Pancake breakfast, along with a craft fair and a book fair

• Santa Shop with candles fundraiser

• Book Fair, Santa Shop, Pizza Night With Santa

• Christmas Store

• Holiday shopping and a personalized ornaments project for the kids

• Cookies With Santa

And that’s hearing from just a few of you! So thank you again for the reminder that, yes, there are some unfortunate (even strange) stories in the news, but there are plenty of good things happening every day.

We know many PTO leaders are already working on spring events, but our guess is some of you are putting the finishing touches on your holiday programs.

No worries—some of the best creative work comes when there’s a deadline looming!

Check out our story, 12 Holiday Ideas for Your PTO or PTA, and you might find some last-minute tips. For instance, if you are having a holiday event, consider adding a Frosty the Snowman or Santa Claus photo opportunity for the kids. It’ll be a great keepsake. But you need two things fast: a good-sport volunteer and a holiday costume!

If you’ve planned a Breakfast With Santa event, consider sending this flyer as a reminder to parents. You can find this downloadable in our File Exchange along with other holiday-related documents.

Or how about this quick turnaround idea? It’s based on a cute poem published by a parent group leader on our Message Boards. You could enlarge a copy of the poem, mount it on poster board, and have the children sign it.

Here’s the first verse below, and you can find the complete poem here.

Holiday Thanks to Our Teacher

T’was the week before Christmas at the elementary school

And all the weary teachers were losing their cool!

Santa searched for the ones that gave their time and hearts

He wanted to thank them but how could he start?

Candygrams are always fun at school, and it’s something that you can pull together really fast. Just get our free downloadable Holiday Candygrams, buy candy, hold a candygram purchase during a lunch hour at school, and you are all set.

Last, the holiday season is a great time to make a Box Tops for Education or Labels for Education push! We have lots of collection sheets in our File Exchange, such as this Christmas tree sheet or this one featuring snowflakes.

Looking for a way to really help your teachers this holiday season? Check out this article about great classroom gifts on our sister site, www.teacherlists.com, by PTO Today Associate Editor Elizabeth S. Leaver. The article includes tons of ideas for useful and educational gifts for the classroom. We have some examples of gift ideas here in this blog, and you can find the full list here.

Also, consider helping teachers set up their own Classroom Holiday Gift List on www.teacherlists.com. It works something like a wedding registry, allowing parents to select and purchase a classroom gift online.

Classroom Gift Ideas:

• Art Supplies: The brightly colored designs in Roylco’s Animals and Creature Paper lend themselves to a world of wildlife-theme possibilities, including origami, murals, masks, and more. (preschool-elementary grades; $10.99) Big stencils mean big fun! The Roylco Mega Stencils with pop-out templates come in a set of eight, making it simple for kids to have hours of fun with paint, chalk, and colored pencils. (preschool-elementary grades; $17.99)
• Social Studies: Children will enjoy learning or enhancing their map skills with Creative Teaching Press Map Skills workbooks, a series that uses age-appropriate maps for practicing skills like using latitude and longitude, locating places on a grid, estimating distances using scale, and more. (grades 2-6; $11.54-$35.68) Just about every classroom could use the House of Doolittle Laminated World Map. At 50 inches x 33 inches, the map has write-on/wipe-off capability and includes national capitals, major cities, rivers, time zones, and major peak elevations. What’s more, the heavy lamination will last for years. (elementary-middle grades; $28.55)
• Science: The Dowling Magnetics Super Science Magnet Kit contains everything students need to explore the science of magnetic forces, including a lodestone, the Earth’s only natural magnet. (grades 3 and up; $23.18) Based on a NASA Space Shuttle experiment to study ants in zero gravity, the Fascinations Toys and Gifts Antworks Space Age Ant Habitat Set contains a nontoxic translucent gel that acts as the tunnel medium for the ants as well as their food and water source—providing hours of good (and clean) fun and instruction. (grades 2-6; $1.83)
• Math: For students learning the fundamentals of money, the Didax Money Sudoku Game contains everything needed to complete 10 challenging Sudoku puzzles, including 32 realistic coins, 10 full-color game boards, and an answer key. (early elementary grades; $11.99) Teaching shapes and sizes is easier (and more fun) with Learning Resources Mini GeoSolids, a set of 32 colorful plastic geometric pieces in four sizes of eight shapes: triangular prism, cube, cone, cylinder, rectangular prism, hexagonal prism, triangular pyramid, and square pyramid. (preK-elementary grades; $14.99)
• English/Language Arts: Teachers can help boost middle graders’ vocabulary and reading comprehension skills with the Didax Cloze Middle Grades Activity Books, which include more than 150 pages in a three-book set, plus a free book of spelling essentials. (elementary-middle grades; $29.35) Give young readers a boost with Didax Rhyming Words Matching Puzzle Cards, a 30-card puzzle set that helps students with word recognition as well as vocabulary development and rhyming. (grades K-3; $13.99)

Parent groups, especially at this time of year, can teach great lessons on what it means to be a community.

In some cases, PTOs are stepping up in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. Just one such story: The PTO in Closter, N.J., helped out families who were without power by throwing a pizza party. Volunteers reached out by email, phone, and word of mouth to alert families, and the town’s mayor gave permission to hold the party in Closter’s Council Chambers.

Other community events in the news include:

• Wiley Elementary in Utica, Mich., hosted its annual coat drive to help families. Keeping it low-key, parent volunteers set out the coats during parent-teacher conferences so parents in need could easily pick up the clothing. There’s no tally in for this year, but last year the group distributed 100 items, including coats and snow pants.
• The PTO at the Dansville (N.Y.) Primary School hosted its annual Fall Festival and added a twist. Kids were asked to make a contribution to the district’s backpack program. This program provides needy families with food by sending it home discreetly in children’s backpacks. The PTO received more than 100 items and reported that a last-minute request for donations for victims of Hurricane Sandy brought in another $44.
• Parent volunteers at the Riverton (Wyo.) Middle School are extending its backpack program to get food to needy families during the holidays. Parents plan to hold a “Food for Break’’ fundraiser this weekend using a loaned school bus, which will be parked at local grocery store so residents can easily drop off food items. The goal is to run this event before every extended break during the school year.

All school volunteers bring something special to kids, but senior citizens can provide a level of comfort and caring that’s hard to beat. Senior Corps, an independent federal organization, offers grants through its Foster Grandparent program to local nonprofits so seniors can provide help in school classrooms. One such volunteer is John Bowden, a St. Cloud, Minn., resident and former educator who spends several hours a week helping kids boost basic skills.

What can a senior volunteer bring to the classroom that’s different or unique?
We bring life experiences to the table. A senior brings the wisdom of a working life, their years of experiences. I think what I have found in working with children is you can give that missing link if they don’t have a grandparent in their life.

You also set up a program where students read to residents in a senior living complex. How do the kids and seniors benefit?
When you are in a retirement center, you are limited in what you can do and your life has restrictions sometimes. Hearing a child read and giving the child encouragement gives [residents] a feeling that they are making a difference in a child’s life. For a child, it’s so important to have someone take an interest in what he is reading. To be on the receiving end of appreciation and nice comments, well, it is something children crave. It doesn’t take a heck of a lot to make them feel good.

Can you tell us what you personally get out of this program?
What I get out of working with children is they give you so much pleasure. It gives you a sense of pride to see a child grow. If you take an interest, they respond. I helped one boy bring up his reading level. But first, we connected because he loved Legos and I have an interest in Legos. Once you establish a relationship, there’s a moment of trust and you can make their lives so much more positive.