Teacher Appreciation Themes for Your School

April 30, 2023 by Sarah White Leave a Comment

Teacher appreciation week is typically celebrated in the first full week of May, but any time is a good time to tell and show teachers how much we care. Whether you’re a parent looking for teacher appreciation ideas or an administrator wanting a fun way to reward your team, here are some great themes and ideas for teacher appreciation week.

At my daughter’s school we typically turn the conference room into a lounge and full stock it with snacks, as well as bringing in lunch at least during the week. These snack-themed printables from Tidy Lady Printables are great for a themed snack day, whether you’re serving popcorn, cookies, snowcones or s’mores.

The Aloha Hut has a cute idea for a candy bar for teacher appreciation, complete with printables you can use to make your own.

If your school decorates doors, check out this collection of door ideas for teacher appreciation from Events to Celebrate. It might give you an idea for a theme you could use for a gift or whole school theme as well. For example there are several garden themed ones, which could turn into giving teachers plants for their classrooms or other garden-themed goodies.

Play Party Plan has a good roundup of teacher appreciation ideas, including cookies, coffee, doughnuts, pie, Italian sodas and more. Such fun and easy ways to provide teachers with treats throughout the day.

PTO Today has a list of a ton of different teacher appreciation ideas that have been done in the real world (and not necessarily by party professionals, so they’re doable for the rest of us). Lots of snack carts, travel themes, sweet gifts and time out activities to make teachers feel a tiny bit of the appreciation and love we feel for them all year long.

Do you have great ideas for teacher appreciation themes? Or a gift you’ve given a teacher that they loved? We’d love to hear about it!

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Fall Sensory Ideas for Kids

A few years ago I shared some pumpkin themed sensory activities for kids, but I wanted to get a little more general and do some fall sensory ideas that can take you from Halloween al the way to Thanksgiving.

Playdough is a classic sensory activity, especially if kids can help make it, too. These playdough recipes from The Montessori Twin Mama are fall colored and scented with cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice and apple pie spice (I honestly don’t know what the difference is!). Or try this fun maple playdough from Happy Toddler Playtime.

Throw together some cookie cutters, googly eyes and other fun things to make an easy fall playdough tray (similar to what I did on this Halloween playdough activity).

How about some fall themed slime? Natural Beach Living gave a basic slime recipe a fall twist with food coloring and glitter. Leaf shaped sequins make it even more fun. Little Bins for Little Hands also has a cinnamon slime, which is great for fall but can also carry you all the way through Christmas.

Raising Wild Things Sensory has some great easy to make fall themed sensory bottles, which you can add fall things to, or pompoms or whatever kind of I spy items you might want to include. They also have a fun apple moon sand sensory bin that has me wondering if you could add something scented to moon sand (I always hated the smell!).

And of course there are all kinds of sensory bins you can make for fall. I like this apple picking one from Happy Toddler Playtime that uses fake leaves and little apple toys. It has the added challenge of trying to pick the apples up through a mesh of branches — kind of like a low-tech game of Operation!

You can also do a short-lived sensory bin with real leaves, or use any kind of beans, brown rice, oats or lentils to make your base. Some more great ideas can be found at Fab Everyday. Their post includes some specific Halloween and Thanksgiving themed sensory bins, too.

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