What a STRANGE first semester it was in public school! One of my favorite things to do though.. is celebrating teachers. This year our district created a Campus Leadership Ambassador team to help spread even more cheer. I was SO excited that I got chosen for it (along with my partner in crime Mary Anne) Now as a CLA we are tasked with doing a little something every month.. but you know I love to plan! So we helped plan out the days before winter break
Background of our school- we are a middle school in Texas. We have a little over 100 staff and we are currently a hybrid model. We have students on campus and students virtual with an enrollment of about 850.
Because it has been such a crazy year... we wanted to bring smiles. If you haven't seen Elf you must do it! It has SO many great quotes... and it is just silly fun. Each day starting December 7th was a different Elf quote with fun to go along with it. I did purchase a life size Buddy the Elf from Amazon... and it was AMAZING (and scared a few people too) At the beginning of the month I also asked staff to fill out a form of their favorite holiday songs- and we created a Lamar Spotify Playlist
At the bottom of this blog is the Piktochart (there is an educator discount.. and this is a program that I use all of the time) that I created for teachers and promoting.
One of the main things when thinking through different ideas this year is making things were socially distanced and safety protocols were followed. I am going to share just a few highlights from the last couple of weeks. We also created a photo opportunity with Buddy
The first day was Desk Pets- which was an idea that I saw on TikTok (Quote: "So- good news...I saw a dog today")
We had a waffle bar that used Eggo waffles (which was the BEST idea ever) Quote-"We elves try to stick to four main food groups: candy, candy canes, candy corns and syrup." Admin served: milk and toppings using gloves and it was spaced out.
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| All the sweets to go along with an Eggo Waffle Bar |
One day we hit on all the staff bathrooms and put nicer toilet paper in them (it was hard to find toilet paper by the way) Quote- "Have you seen these toilets? They're ginormous!"
We did virtual gingerbread houses during the three different lunches. I was worried how this one was going to turn out, but was thankful it kind of worked! Staff picked up prepackaged ziploc bags of 6 graham crackers and prepackaged bags of scoops of regular icing. Staff stopped by the library and were able to pick out extra items to add to their gingerbread houses (these were also served.. so only one person touching the items with gloves)-Quote- "I thought maybe we could make gingerbread houses, and eat cookie dough, and go ice skating, and maybe even hold hands."
Covid Style Cookie Exchange- usually we have a potluck during the season, but due to safety concerns, we had to postpone this year. We made sure to have plenty of prepackaged cookies ready for the taking and then if people wanted to participate and bring their own to share.. it too had to be individually wrapped so staff could come through and grab a bag. Quote-"I'm sorry I ruined your lives and crammed 11 cookies in the VCR."
We of course had a coffee bar where admin created the coffee and added all of the toppings. Quote-"Congratulations! World's best cup of best of coffee! Great job, everybody! It's great to be here."
I worked on a holiday card done with staff Bitmojis. I began asking for a Bitmojis at the beginning of December (I also made a few of them) Each staff had a Google slide where they uploaded a few festive photos. I then turned those into a holiday card that we printed off and also sent out through email. "You have such a pretty face. You should be on a Christmas card."
One game we played was with the quote- "The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear." We played music from our Lamar Staff Christmas Spotify play list and the 5th caller would get a prize.
In the work room we also create a new What do you Meme board with various photos from some of our favorite holiday movies and left sticky notes. The memes that teachers created were hilarious!
It was a crazy and ROUGH year. There was nothing easy about it! But just because it wasn't easy and it was hard doesn't mean that it isn't okay to smile underneath your mask.
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