Teacher Appreciation Gifts

It’s Teacher Appreciation Week! Here are a few of the billions of reasons why your community appreciates you:

• the compassion you show your students when they’re having a bad day
• the enthusiasm with which you celebrate your students’ success
• the email reminders you send when there’s a project almost due
• the time you watched your neighbor’s class because she needed to use the bathroom
• the after school help you offered even though it was your birthday and your family was waiting for you at home
• the frantic student emails you reply to over the weekend
• all of the ways you let your students know that you’re happy to see them
• the time you stopped by your students’ softball/basketball/baseball/football/soccer/lacrosse game to cheer them on
• the time you went to your student’s art show/play/orchestra performance/choral performance to cheer them on
• the way you remember every students’ birthday
• the evenings you spent planning something new and fun for the next day
• the hundreds of times you repeated the directions without losing your temper
• the extra days of review you scheduled
• the letters of recommendation you’ve written

My favorite Teacher Appreciation gifts, in order:

• notes from students
• time off (extra prep, opportunity to skip a faculty meeting or duty, even letting me leave a few minutes early)
• gift cards

My least favorite Teacher Appreciation gifts:

• everything else

I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. The granola box in my mailbox will be a nice treat later and the ice cream cone during the faculty meeting was delish. But, to be honest,  I can buy myself granola and ice cream.

Here are teacher appreciation week freebies and discounts I found for you for 2024:

• 25+ National Teacher Appreciation Day Freebies and Deals –   Applebees, Budget truck rental, Buffalo Wild Wings, Costco, Michaels, TGI Fridays and more.
• Staples stores are stocking free dry erase markers, highlighters, pencils and glue sticks for teachers with ID from May 5-11.
• Burger King – free fries with any purchase May 5-11.
• The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf – any large drink for $5 with ID from May 6-15.
• 68 Discounts, Deals and Resources for Teacher Appreciation Week – Amazon,  AT&T,  Blue Apron, National Rent a car, Office Max and more.
• Dunkin’ – $3 medium Dunkin’ Refresher May 5-11.
• Jo-Ann  Fabric – 15% off all year.
• Hanes.com – 5% off all year.
• TeachersPayTeachers – 25% off May 7-8  with coupon code THANKYOU24.
• JustAddH2OSchool.com – $2 off any purchase with coupon code MILEY May 4-20.

I hope you get lots of notes of appreciation from your students, and I hope you get time to put your feet up and relax. You absolutely deserve it!