As most of my teacher friends know, I am IN LOVE with Vista Print. Seriously, it is a mild obsession of mine. :) On VP I made this Birthday Banner.
Once the kids have walked in, we finished our morning work and I am giving announcements, we sing a rousing rendition of "Happy Birthday" (with the obligatory, "cha cha chas" in there) and then I pass around this Birthday Postcard I, of course, made on Vista Print.
The students each take a second or two to sign it while the rest of us just go along with our daily lesson plan. It does not distract from the lesson I am teaching AT ALL. The students have been really good about only paying attention to the card when it is right in front of them. 
When all students have signed the card, it comes to me to sign. I then hand the card to the birthday child, along with a "No Homework Pass" (I bet you can't guess where I made it??!!!??!!) and the birthday has officially be recognized and celebrated, with only 1 minute taken out of class time to sing the birthday song.
What do you do to recognize birthdays in your class?
Great minds think alike Stephanie! My birthday post was showing my Vista Print too! :)
ReplyDelete~Lorraine
Fabulous 4th Grade Froggies
That is so cool, Stephanie!! Gosh, how did you come up with that? CUTESY!!!! I truly need to start doing that. I'm not good about it! Shame on me! I do make a loud announcement and sometimes we sing, but 8th grade just seems to be to embarrassed to sing! :)
ReplyDeleteI keep birthday sticker ribbons for them to wear on their shirt all day!
Guess I need to amp it up! Thanks for the inspiration! I like vista print too, but you got me beat, girl!
Oh I love the VP postcard idea! I have a homework pass made up but not that! Thanks for sharing!!
ReplyDeleteMisty
Think, Wonder, & Teach
I'm signing up for VP. Great ideas. Curious though...how do you acknowledge summer birthday?
ReplyDeleteI'm a bit in love with VistaPrint myself, and have a stash of homework passes to give out on birthdays. I may have to do the postcard idea as well - I like that! For summer birthdays I usually celebrate on their half-birthday, which has worked out marvelously :)
ReplyDeleteI always struggle with the amount of time it takes for students to draw a picture or write a message for the birthday child. This I can handle!
ReplyDeleteI love the Vista Print idea! Thank you! I use brown lunch bags for our class birthdays. The first few days of school, each child decorates their own bag, with name and birthday as colorful as they wish. I then organize the bags in order of birthday to cut back on search time later. Then on each child's bday, the class gets an index card along with their morning work. They write a personalized note (with date, greeting, body, closing and signature) on it, then place it into the bag on my front table. I place my own brief happy birthday note in there, along with a few pieces of wrapped candy, and fold it over. After morning show, we sing happy birthday and give the birthday child their present. I like the idea of using Vista Print to make my birthday note. :-)
ReplyDeleteI love the Vista Print idea! Thank you! I use brown lunch bags for our class birthdays. The first few days of school, each child decorates their own bag, with name and birthday as colorful as they wish. I then organize the bags in order of birthday to cut back on search time later. Then on each child's bday, the class gets an index card along with their morning work. They write a personalized note (with date, greeting, body, closing and signature) on it, then place it into the bag on my front table. I place my own brief happy birthday note in there, along with a few pieces of wrapped candy, and fold it over. After morning show, we sing happy birthday and give the birthday child their present. I like the idea of using Vista Print to make my birthday note. :-)
ReplyDelete