Room Parent Advise

There is not a correct way to put on a party. I sguest you ask the teacher what the previous years parties were like. Ask her if there is anything she'd like to be included.

About one student bringing a treat for Halloween. THAT mother disregarded the request to not bring food. It makes for awkwardness. IT also causes the teacher extra work to distribute food. The teacher will likely have to rearrange her schedule.

I recognize that sending a treat seems thoughtful but it's not when parents have been told it to. If the parent ahead of time asked the teacher if she could and teacher approved it then it would be OK. However asking puts the teacher on the spot.

Treats disrupt the classroom, especially when kids know there is one.

Do yourself a favor and get 3 parents to come to the party. One comes early to set up, one comes on time to help with the party and one is responsible for clean-up. If you are taking off of work, be there the whole time.

Emailing the parents is good, but ALSO sending a copy of the email itself, on paper, in large font, is better. Ask the teacher to put it in the child's backpack so that the mother finds it. Be very specific (but friendly of course) in the email.

The key is to really connect with these parents. You need to make sure that they have answered and that you are very organized.

The biggest point I want to make is that "room parent" doesn't mean you do all the work. It means you organize the work of the other parents. That's the best way to keep from doing all the money spending, and from having chaos in the classroom. I did it for my son's first grade class, and this method worked for me.

It is good that you have been told that "coordinating 4 parties" is your only responsibility. I have a feeling that one reason more parents do not volunteer is because the phrase "classroom parent" sounds like a position that could cover many things!

I think you can view yourself as "management" for each of the 4 parties. You should be there to oversee everything, but get plenty of other parents involved to help make the party go smoothly.

For the structure of a 30-minute party, as some have mentioned below, I think "three ten-minute rotations" is a good idea. Divide the class into three groups and rotate through stations. With at least one parent to run each station. Game, craft, snack. For a Thanksgiving party, the game could be "pin the feather on the turkey" (with maybe three small prizes, one for the child in each rotation group who pins it best), the craft could be "hand-tracing turkey drawings", and the snack could be "decorate a leaf cookie" (leaf-shaped sugar cookies, decorate with icing/sprinkles/etc).

Don't worry about a parent who brings a snack "for no reason", I don't think that is something you need to imitate!

ETA: One way to keep things "fair" for parent contributions, if you have any reason to be concerned about this, is to ask each parent to either make a donation of money OR of stuff OR of time. In other words, one parent could donate some party supplies, one parent could donate money that someone else can use to buy supplies, one parent can volunteer to attend the party and work at the stations.

I was my child's room parent last year. I first sent a letter home to every parent...and an email (not everyone gets email) introducing myself and telling them our plan for the year (for you it would be the 4 parties). I asked for each family to donate $25 to the class fund. This was used for special snacks and teacher gift from the class later (before christmas break and at the end of school). For class parties I made a sign up genius sheet and sent that to parents to sign up to come volunteer and/or to bring in food/drink. I sent out an email reminding parents of certain things...the teacher's birthday, what to bring each day for teacher appreciation week (one day it was a piece of fruit, one day it was a flower from the store or garden (I provided a vase), etc), things like that. I also coordinated our class making a gift basket for a big fundraiser the school has each year. Each class comes up with a themed basket to be used in a raffle. We did just 2 class parties for the whole year. Winter party and End of year/Field day party. Good luck.

at our fall party, we split the kids up into 3 groups, we had the foodies, the gamers and crafters, every 10 minutes we switched so every kid got 10 minutes in each area.
we did pin the nose on the pumpkin, a leaf craft found on pinterest and then had plates of food for each kid.

Wow, I'm surprised that there wasn't a Halloween party, I thought that was pretty standard. Even our Christian schools have a "Fall party".
Anyway, our elementary school mothers usually help coordinate parties, teacher's gifts on appreciation day and end of year and sometimes the teacher will ask them to do a few other things to coordinate parents when they need help, but usually they will contact you. You should ask the teacher or contact another room parent if you need more information.

I've helped with a few class parties. Both of my boys kindergarten parties had stations, and the kids rotated through the stations in groups of 5 or 6. Each station had a craft, game, activity, photo booth or snack. One year I played a Christmas themed memory game. At a Valentine's Day party I did a craft from Oriental Trading that said "I love you to the moon and back."

Most of the time the only adults that come to the parties are moms/dad/grandparents who volunteered to staff a table. One year several parents just showed up (just to hang out with their child - didn't help, just got in the way), but I haven't found that to be the norm.

I would talk to the teacher about what the parties usually look like. When I've gotten an email from the parent in charge, it usually lists things still needed (volunteers, supplies or both). Some years I've volunteered and not brought anything. Other years I have purchased things (napkins, juice boxes) and just dropped them off at the school on my way to work. Work with the teacher, considered what has already be volunteered and go from there.

Good luck. You can do this!

I love being home room parent. Here is my advice for a 30 min classroom party. Have 2 parents come to help you. Since there are 3 of you:
Ask 1 parent to handle the snacks that everyone else is sending in.
Ask 1 parent to plan an activity (game or craft that takes about 10 min)
You plan an activity (game or craft that takes about 10 min (alternatively, you handle the snack station and ask both parents to plan activities))

On party day, set up 3 stations in the room - one for each parent.
Have the teacher break the kids into 3 group. Each group of kids starts at a different station, and they rotate every 10 minutes through the 2 activities and the snack.

This works great for a few reasons.
1 - it means you don't have to plan everything. Let the 2 helper parents decide how to handle the snack and/or what activity they want to do.
2 - it is SO MUCH EASIER to handle 6-8 kids for an activity at one time as compared with trying to corral 20+ kids at one time.

Since you are only having you plus 2 parents at a party, split your parent volunteers into 4 groups. Do not have everyone at every party - it will be chaos to add that many more people to a small classroom. Plus, people will burn out andy you'll have a lot at the 1st party and no help at all by the 4th party. Give everyone a chance to attend at least 1 party. Let them know NOW what party they are assigned to so that there are no hard feelings, and they can plan in advance if they need to take the day off of work. Depending how many volunteers you have (if you have fewer than 8 volunteers, not counting you), some people may attend more than 1.

Specifically, I did this by emailing all the parents with the specific dates of each party. I said that if they were interested in attending a party, please email me back within 1 week with the 4 parties ranked in order of their preference. Then, I assigned each parent to 1 party based on their preferences (2 parents got 2 parties because I was 2 volunteers short). It works well because some people love the winter holiday but are ambivalent about Valentine's day. Or vice versa.

If you google elementary school Thanksgiving activities, you will get a ton of ideas, and you only need to pick 1 so it won't take a long time to see something that appeals to you (as I said, let the other parent pick their own activity).

Good luck

classrooms have changed so drastically since my kids were in kindergarten that i have no helpful advice, sorry. just chiming in to say how sad i think it is that there's no halloween or costumes.
:( khairete
S.

Hi B.,

I've been room parent for my 5th grader 4 times and room parent for my 1st grader twice! I also work but have a reputation for being organized. Talk with the teacher - make an appointment to see what she wants/needs. That is how I start each year. Then I make my plan. Some teachers only want you to email your parents and gather whatever the teacher wants for the party and they handle it. Other teachers expect you to come up with a craft or two plus snack and an activity/game. Just google when you need ideas...

I plan to take off for at least 2 parties and a field trip each year. That's with two kids. It is very important to me to spend some of my precious vacation days being present at the school to get to know their friends and routine.

If there is 30 minutes, ask if the teacher wants three 10 minute stations. Break the kids into three groups, 10 minutes at each station. One is food/snack, one is a game and one is a craft. Done. Good luck!

Some parents attend - if it is allowed - and some parents can't make it.

Your best bet is to talk with the teacher, because she/he is not new to this and has experience under her belt about what works best.

A few things to add to the great list below, or to reiterate because I think they're important:

Meet with the teacher in the next few weeks to go over her expectations, needs, recommendations, and calendar. I agree about 3-4 stations of small numbers of kids, vs. 25 kids doing the same activity. Put together what you think is a good program, then delete one thing - you'll find you're all set, really, given the delays and some glitches!

Find out rules about costumes (although that ship has sailed for this year), things like Valentines (and I assume Valentines is like Halloween, that there are some religions that don't permit it), and food allergy policies.

Instead of emailing individual parents or getting them to sign up manually at some event, use SignUp Genius. It's so easy and you will find it's better for managing people or updating your needs as you go along. It also sends reminders on whatever schedule you dictate, and people can see what others are doing which either gives them inspiration or makes them reluctant to bail out because their life got busy. Those who cannot pay may be able to help out in person, which is great. Get to know your fellow parents to be sure you know what their skills and abilities are, as well as their shortcomings. (Those who always come late, or those who like to boss the kids around should be relegated to some other task.) This also lets you recruit a helper parent - lots of people won't sign up to be the main organizer, but can be terrific assistants.

Do allow for financial contributions for those who don't have time off, and do allow for those who are financially able to kick in a little extra to help out a family in need (you don't have to name that family!). Any leftover money can go to the next event.

If no costumes were allowed for Halloween, consider something like Crazy Dress Day or Upside Down Day (kids wear clothes inside out, wear pajamas, mismatched socks, etc.) but not associated with any particular holiday. To encourage reading (even in pre-readers), consider a "Dress as your Favorite Character" Day.

Anything you send out should have the wording and spelling checked by another set of eyes. (For example, you asked for "advise" but what you meant was "advice" - for some people, that really counts when you are representing an educational facility.) And double check your instructions and quantities and due dates and event times - it's amazing what looks fine to us when we've read it 20 times, but which is confusing to the recipient. It's so hard to undo it and send out corrections. And when you tell people a time to report or bring their stuff, add 15 minutes! If you need them and their stuff there at 11 AM, tell them 10:45!

Good luck!

I think a good start would be to find out what the school allows. One of the schools in my district has a no parties/no recess/no birthdays policy. This was set by the principal. My nephew used to go there and he said it was boring. After lunch one year, the teacher had the students do stretches in the classroom to try to ward off the energy that they surely had from sitting for a few hours already since there is no recess at the school. The teacher is allowed to let the classroom sing happy birthday and maybe give the child a small token but no cupcakes or other items for the class. Where my child goes (my older also went) they have Halloween, they have a short birthday celebration etc.

I would talk to the teacher and ask what's normal in her class.

You were given a job description. That's all you are responsible for. I feel bad for the kids though, too much emphasis is on what today's ideals about healthy is and the fun is being sucked out of their little lives. I would bring something fun and dessert like just to annoy those who made the rule about nothing fun for snacks at the parties.

I suggest you just go ahead and send out your messages or notices or whatever but you need to do it today. Some people only get paid once per month and after they pay their bills they decide where the extra money is going. Once they do that there isn't any money left to buy stuff for school parties.

Also, let the parents know they're invited. Parents don't eat or take anything that is the kids. They just come and attend.