Winter Parties

I hope all are doing well and had a festive Thanksgiving.  Now is the time to start thinking about your Winter Parties and holiday gifts for your teachers and teaching assistants.

Suzi Guzman and I met last week to go over our game plan.  Mrs. Creech (second grade) came up with a wonderful idea of a Gingerbread theme for our party, as the kids are going to be reading gingerbread books.  If anyone would like me to shart the information she provided, let me know!

Suzi came up with a wonderful idea for our teachers gift - a holiday wreath that we will decorate with gift cards donated by our parents.  We'll be sending out places that Mrs. Creech likes to shop/eat for gift card ideas.

We'll also be putting together a signup list (including monetary donations) for the party supplies and a gift our adopted teaching assistant, Mrs. Helman.  We'll get the kids to sign cards for both Mrs. Helman and Mrs. Creech.  For Mrs. Helman, we'll take some of the monetary donations and get her a gift card to one of her favorite places.

Please post to this blog with your winter party ideas and questions!

Thanks,
Samantha

Fall Parties

Just wanted to check and see what was going on with the Fall Parties.  Has everyone set their dates and times with their teachers?  What sort of ideas are you going with for themes?  Has anyone determined what the curriculum tie-ins will be for your grade level?

Gift Giving Ideas

I met with my co-room parent, Suzi Guzman, last Friday and she was sharing ideas of past gift giving that she's done as a room parent.  I thought they were very clever. 

Both ideas involve having the other parents donate gift cards.

1.  Get a holiday wreath and decorate it with the gift cards donated.

2. Get a bulletin board and put all the kid's pictures around the boarder.  Put ribbon across the board and intertwine the gift cards in the ribbon.

Suzi - help me out here if there's a better way to describe!!

Thanks,
Samantha

CCES Room Parent Kick Off Meeting Follow Up

Fellow Room Parents,

Thanks to everyone who was able to attend our meeting last week.  For all of the room parents, slides from our meeting, as well as some sample party food permission forms and a building request form for use with your parties were sent out electronically.

Below is a recap of key points and action items from our meeting. 

Let me know if you have any other questions and I look forward to working with all of you this school year!

Thanks for your help,

Samantha

Meeting Recap

1.       As room parent, your primary roles include:

Ø  Assisting Teacher with Classroom Activities & Needs

Ø  Planning & Conducting Class Parties

Ø  Coordinating Gifts to Teacher from Class

Ø  Supporting PTA with Teacher and Staff Events

Ø  Serving as Liaison between Class Parents & PTA

2.       The guidance around class parties has changed.  The key changes are:

Ø  Classes parties should be linked to the current class curriculum. 

Ø  Thursday and Friday parties are alternated between different grades throughout the school year in order to prevent all parties happening on the same day.  (See attached slides.)

Ø  Teachers may pick the day (per guidance above) and time of day for their party.

Ø  Check with your teacher to determine what parties you should be planning for this school year.

3.       As room parent, to get started, you should:

Ø  Have an initial meeting with your teacher to understand how you can best support

Ø  Meet with co-room parents and establish roles

Ø  Set up Email Distribution List for classroom Parents

Ø  Establish dates and times for class parties

Ø  Adopt a Teaching Assistant or Specialist (grades 1-5)

Ø  Join the Private CCES Room Parent Blog

4.       My follow up items to the meeting include:

Ø  Invite fellow room parents to the CCES Room Parent Blog

Ø  Send out an email re: PTA Membership to room parents for distribution to your classes

Ø  Send out an email re: going green for PTA items in the Friday Folders

Ø  Distribute Room Parent Roster

Ø  Create a sign-up list for adopting a Teaching Assistant/Teaching Specialist for grades 1-5.

Ø  Distribute Teacher’s Favorite Things to room parents and update Favorite Things Binder for office.

Welcome Room Parents!!

Dear Room Parents:

Thank you for volunteering!  I’m very excited to serve as your 2012-2013 Room Parent Coordinator and hope that we have a fun and satisfying year helping out in our kids’ classrooms.

Some of you have served as room parent before, and we have many new parents as well.   Like last year, we will continue our role as liaison between our teachers, parents, and the PTA, helping organize class parties and helping facilitate volunteers and donations for classroom activities.  With the new year, we will also have changes and look for more opportunities to assist with classroom activities: 

1.       We will see some positive changes in the approach to class parties where we will have more flexibility scheduling parties and tie the party themes to the current classroom curriculum.   

2.       Assist the PTA in collecting and spot checking the fundraiser order forms for our classrooms. 

3.       Expand our Favorite Things lists to include teaching assistants and many of the specialist teachers. Each classroom will sponsor one of these assistants and teachers during the holidays and teacher appreciation week.

4.       Start a room parent blog where we can share ideas and reach out to each other for support and collaboration. 

I’ll be sending out an EVITE shortly to our Room Parent Kick-Off meeting on Thursday, Oct. 4 @ 7:00 pm in the CCES Library.  I realize we all have busy schedules, but hope most of you can make it.  If you have a conflict and cannot attend, we’ll send out all of the information electronically and I’m available to answer any questions that arise.

Look from an EVITE for our room parent kick-off meeting as well as an email and sign up to assist with the school fundraiser collections.

In the meantime, let me know if you have any questions, suggestions or concerns. 

Cheers!

Samantha Peele

CCES Room Parent Coordinator