Teacher gifts - worth the extra effort!

Hello again - it's Jo here! Following on from Maria's fab post on quickie gifts yesterday, I'm going to be looking at teacher gifts in a little more detail.

For the past three years, since my elder daughter was in the Reception class at school, I have made some form of mini album at the end of the school year, for the teacher, and for the teaching assistant in the class. The first year I made paper bag albums, last year I used the little accordian albums made by American Crafts, and this year I decided to use the Lippy Chick 'flop' and 'flap' albums. The key to putting these together is preparation, and so I'm giving you all plenty of time to get yours planned and created before the end of this school year! These don't have to cost very much money at all; a simple accordian album can be made using cardstock decorated with patterned paper scraps, and your children will be contributing a lot of the decoration!

I always try and include photos of the children taken at different points throughout the year; this is when forward thinking comes in very handy! It's time to dig out those photos you took on the first day of school, way back last September - it's fascinating to see how much the children have changed in such a short space of time, and it's a lovely permanent record for the teachers to have. You might also like to include photos from school plays, the Christmas nativity, and school trips.

I also encourage my children to do drawings of their teachers and teaching assistants, to put in the albums.

Here's where a little bit of effort goes a long way; ask your children to write down a sentence or two about their teacher, or about school - this will be treasured by the recipient, and is well worth the few minutes it takes to complete.

These really don't have to be very time-consuming or overly complicated, and they will certainly be very well received - a unique and personal gift which is just a little bit different from a mug or a box of biscuits!