Are you giving the perfect gift this holiday season?
If you’re anything like me, after spending 0.000547 seconds online, one thing is abundantly clear: you’re probably not.
As with most of life, we’ve managed to overcomplicate things when it comes to gifting. I fell down that Pinterest rabbit hole so hard when I was picking out gifts for my bridal party, I can’t believe I didn’t tunnel straight through Earth and come out the other side. It was stressful. It was time-consuming. And it was expensive.
Now, I see the same thing happening in schools. List after list, tweet after tweet, pin after pin. The 10 worst gifts. The 20 best gifts. 5 teachers share their least favorite gifts.
Which is unfortunate.
Because I think gift giving ultimately boils down to something really simple: it’s a gesture of kindness, thanks, appreciation, or even love. It doesn’t have to be complicated, social media be damned.
Which is why I felt the need to re-publish this post.
If you’re worried about finding the perfect teacher gift, fear not. Those bad gift lists? They’re bogus. I’ll let 2015 Penny tell you why:
To The Families Who Gave Teachers Gifts,
I spent the day before winter break writing your children thank you notes that I am fairly confident you will never see. In fact, they’ve probably already been relinquished to the deep recesses of binders next to permission slips, school calendars, and progress reports or banished to the bottoms of lockers atop moldy sandwiches, gym shirts, and library books. Some cards won’t even make it that far. Some are tossed in the trash, which I later dutifully recycle. Others are discarded underneath desks. Even if you did see my note, the letter I wrote your child is different than what I’d like to say to you.
Thank you.
Whether you spent thirty seconds or thirty days strategizing over what gift your child would bring to school this year, thank you. The picture-perfect pin of travel mugs replete with pun-ny sayings and handknit koozies. The crayon-wreath photo your neighbor posted on Facebook last week that has garnered over 40 likes. Between the Pandora’s box that is Pinterest and the filtered glow of social media, the pressure is enormous and absurd. I appreciate it all.
Whether your child engineered the gift himself or you could barely convince her to scribble her name on the tag, thank you. Some students skipped up to me with their gifts proudly in tow and explained not only the gift but the entire selection and gift wrapping process to me before I could even get the card out of their hands. Others discreetly dropped them on my desk. Some even made you leave them in the front office. They are in middle school, after all. The ideas are all different, but the thoughts behind them are the same.
Whether you spent a few cents or serious chunk of change, thank you. Many of you have multiple children. If you happen to have children close in age, you may even have multiple children in middle school this year. That means that your family gifted dozens of teachers presents today. Be it time or money or both, it all adds up quickly, sometimes bafflingly so. The snacks and school supplies are much appreciated, but the notes and cards are what will fuel me through the next six months.
Whether you have heard it before or not, thank you. Of course, I appreciate the gifts. More than that, though, I appreciate the thoughtfulness, the consideration, and the kind words. Sometimes they’re heartfelt notes that go on for nearly a page. Other times, they’re one line filled with misspellings or grammatical errors. I cherish them all.
For the gifts, for the cards, for sharing your children with me, thank you. Even if your child didn’t hand me a present or a card, your family has given me an incredible gift – the chance to laugh and learn alongside your son or daughter each day. Thank you.
So Tell Me…What are some of your favorite things to give or receive? Do you find yourself enjoying the cards more than the gifts sometimes?
Yes! Thanks for posting this again. I appreciated reading it the other day when I was irritated by those same posts.
For me, it’s never been about the item. With kids, it’s great to get the hand-written cards because they can’t help but splash their personality all over the page.
Thanks for posting this today Penny. I was seeing a lot of tweets about the subject and I felt a little down. My family did not have much when I was growing up. But my parents appreciated my teachers so much (I did too). So my mom and I would spend so many hours making pastries. It was my mom’s way of showing her appreciation in an economical way. We would make empanadas and cookies. My dad and I were in charge of unshelling the pecans that fell from our pecan tree. Honestly, so much love went into the baked goods.
So I started to feel bad about the gifts I gave my teachers…because we could not afford gift cards for all my teachers. If I felt bad (I’m 28), imagine the kids that saw the tweets who were not planning on gifting gift cards because maybe their families cannot afford the gift cards or because they think baked goods are an excellent way of showing appreciation.
I for one love getting baked goods as gifts.
So again, thank you. Thank you for being a teacher because I had amazing teachers. Thank you for being appreciative.
Oh my! That sounds like a fantastic gift!
The fact that anyone expects someone to spend money on them is just bananas to me. That pressure is unfair and unnecessary.
I would take the empanadas or cookies or pastries over the gift card ANY day. I can get a bazillion gift cards at the local grocery stores. Home baked goodies??? Much harder to come by.
Agreed! I still remember the family that brought me “blondies” to parent teacher conferences. <3 YUM! Great gift!
Breaks my heart to think any teacher would post negative sentiments about gifts from students. As as teacher, I appreciate any gesture. I do tend to keep notes that are written to me, when I’m down or frustrated, I read them over, which can actually refocus me. And yes, the chance to learn and laugh side by side with a child is the most precious gift.
I agree! I love adding to my bin of notes. It’s the little things that become the best things, I think!
We used to feel SUCH a great deal of pressure to provide great teacher gifts but because we hardly had any money we couldn’t afford storebought presents. My mom always cooked amazing meals for them, I often wondered if they were appreciated. We don’t do a great job of teacher gifts now, I need to plan ahead way better for teacher gifts than I do at the moment.
Meals are amazing. I had a parent bring me a tray of brownies to parent teacher conferences one year, and I’ll never forget it. It’s 4 hours of nonstop talking, usually without even a bathroom break, after teaching all day. It was SUCH a kind gesture.
Yes!! This! I am a preschool teacher, and I get amazing gifts, to a sweet hand-written card to nothing. Anything that is given, I appreciate. I don’t expect anything, ever, especially this time of year when people are already doing so much for their own families. I get so upset when I see fellow teachers bashing gifts, calling them useless, etc. Nowhere does it say “you must provide Christmas gifts for teachers”, less alone target and amazon gift cards. So, again, thank you for this wonderful post!