To not want to contribute to this madness? Christmas teacher gifting experiences

My two are adults but I never gave presents to their teachers! When my DS left kindergarten I gave his favourite teacher some flowers.

We are in an economic crisis and it's Christmas. This sort of pressure annoys me.

They would have to go on the school Christmas tree. I don't know about the legality/illegality of having the image at home if the child's parents had given it to the teacher. I wouldn't take it home anyway though, I wouldn't want it.

I doubt teachers are even allowed to hang images of young pupils in their houses anyway. It’ll be part of the safeguarding policy that they shouldn’t be in personal possession of images of their pupils. Authorised school stuff only. I’d find it weird if I saw the Bauble Child on show in someone’s living room in the hols.

As a teacher, I appreciate a thank you card that's from the heart.
As a parent, in our whatsapp group (30 parents) we do a £10 at the of the school year and do an experience (last two years was a spa) each teacher was extremely thankful and lets face it, something like that is needed after a year of teaching little ones 😂
Christmas i just send a thank you card.

Laughing at the bauble of a child's face what on earth, kids are great but you dont want thar on ur tree at home 😂

I think the bauble is insane and will surely be chuckled at by staff after hours, but £15 for two teacher gifts seems fine to me

That's mad! And why would anyone want a picture of a random child?

We did small, thoughtful gifts at the end of the school year only eg a bar of their favourite chocolate etc. and a thank you note/best memory note.

When my son left school, he bought a couple of his most helpful teachers note books but spent ages looking for notebooks in the style they'd use. He wrote a note in the front page saying how much they'd helped and encouraged him. Apparently one cried, he got all embarrassed and said he's never doing it again. 🤣🤣🤣

Oh yes, and please don't bother with Best Teacher mugs. They just go straight to the charity shop.

My DP is a primary school teacher and would be mortified with vouchers for an experience day! What if the teacher doesn't like spa breaks? Total waste of money. And if he was presented with a bauble with a pupil's face on it, it would go straight in the recycling. Who does that for a present?!

The bauble is hilarious. What if every parent did that?!

I bet it's going around the back of the tree!

I generally duck mass collections and do a card and chocs/wine.

This.

100%

This is planet loony bin.

As for the bauble - cringe!

The Baubel is ridiculous, i could understand it [ although a bit twee) if it was one of somebody's own child
But a child they taught???
Also the present is OTT and presumptuous, that everyone can afford.the contribution.

This sounds madness! In our class, people contributed what they wanted/were able and the class rep got something with whatever money was given- usually a wine/chocs and a voucher- and it was given from ‘all the parents’. My DD would write a card herself to the teacher with her own message (when old enough). There were 30 kids in the class and I’m sure the teacher would be horrified to get baubles with all their little faces! 😂 imagine over the years, literally hundreds of baubles…

I would probably just do the £15 if I hadn’t done anything just for ease. But if you’ve done what you wanted to do that’s okay also, just say you’ve sorted something already and move on.

Also @lostintherhythagain- are they sure the staff can find the time to do this?amy women work in these term time only jobs because they have their own dcs and want to be with them in the school holidays, but it’s really hard to take a day off work in the term time. A spa voucher might work for some staff but I would put money on at least one of them not being able to make it work. A voucher for somewhere like M&S (that they can spend on clothes for themselves or use for posh food treats) would be better and avoid being a waste of money.

DD went to primary in an area of deprivation. On the last day parents would turn up with huge gift bags of gifts with balloons. There’s definitely a bit of competition going on for who brings the biggest.
I’ve sat in that schools staff room, dozens of ‘best teacher’ mugs in the cupboards, it’s all land fill.

i always think it’s odd that when children go to secondary it just stops, which is good. I know DDs school tried to put a stop to it but they should be more forceful I think.

Was a teacher for many years. Chocolates always nice . A card with a sentence about something nice we've done during the term also fabulous.For final leaving present John Lewis vouchers always lovely. Spa days absolutely not my thing and certainly didn't want to spend a day at a spa with the people I worked with.

To be fair they’re not worrying about because… they’re not doing it!

Oh my word....
I have bought the teacher chocolate pencils- after my daughter told me about a fight in her class over pencils last week!!! Apparently her teacher doesn't want to see any over Christmas.... So I have decided that chocolate pencils are the way forward. We normally pop an Amazon gift card in as well for some class supplies (or put in some small prizes for the class prize jar).

I think class collections, where everyone gives what they want and it’s split between teacher and TA, is a good way to do this. Our dcs are secondary now but primary school teachers and TA used to get around £150 each in either M&S or John Lewis vouchers. Class rep set up a collection donation thing or took cash. Some parents handed over a couple of pounds, some £30, some nothing, but the gift was from all the children and families.

I did think this would be more helpful for the teachers than 30 boxes of cheap chocolate.

Box of chocs and leave the WhatsApp. That way you won't even know what other people are doing, and will rapidly cease to care.

(Are there any men worrying about this sort of nonsense, ever? Maybe just... don't?)

Don’t mind putting a tenner or something in and then not having to think about teacher gifts til next time. Equally happy to get them
each a box of chocolate and a card.

The bauble with the kids face on it though 😂

We do a class gift with no expectations on amount contributed which ranges from a few quid to £30. This goes on a voucher (generally of £250ish) and a small token gift to open like a personalised notebook. When I’m arranging it I always ask the teacher where they shop to get a voucher they will use. Tends to go down well.

Hello I've been a teacher for over three decades and I remember more lovely letters and notes sent to me (and please my line manager) then any shitty scented candle best teacher mug or gift voucher.

I never put into the class collections, to me the gift should be from the child and the child should understand that they’re giving a gift to say thank you, and be helped to choose something appropriate. We always go with a nice box of biscuits or chocolates that they can share in the staff room with a card from the child. I just don’t think it’s appropriate to be giving teachers hundreds of pounds in gift vouchers.

I used to stay out of all that madness. I'd buy those miniture boxes of lindt balls for my children to gift to their teachers.