Blog with Friends - Teacher Farewell Surprise 🦄

Welcome back to another episode of Blog with Friends - today we are observing Embrace your Geekness Day.

I will use this prompt to show you what I prepared for Colin's wonderful teacher. He was lucky enough to wrap up elementary school being physically present in the classroom with his mates, even though I thought he was doing amazingly well while studying at home. Less distraction and bullying. 

I'm currently pissed at one classmate in particular. The one who knocked out C's tooth, broke Colin's glasses and threw them on the floor and probably hid Colin's jacket last winter. 

What did he do now? 

He allegedly stole some of the money Colin collected from his classmates. The money to pay for the teacher's farewell gift.

The boy was obviously bragging about the fact that some fools were bringing money to school and that he was there in the right place at the right time to lift it. When Colin confronted him he was like "who, me? Noooo, I was just kidding." Fact is about 30 bucks are missing. 

I am so glad Colin will meet new, and hopefully less irritating friends at the new school.

For now we still want to enjoy the freedom and the somewhat happy elementary school bubble vibe though. By the time this post goes live, the kids will have graduated from 6th grade, and also the day of the activity I prepared for their farewell will be over. 

Looks like over the years, I have become the go-to person to organize teacher farewell gifts and activities linked to them. 

This was 2016:

The teacher was going to leave for a world tour, and the inflatable globes, signed by the students, were supposed to guide him back home after an amazing trip:

2018 I wrote a text that contained cues prompting the kids to give their teacher items from the basket. 

Example: "We know Mondays are hard. For the future here's a little pick-me up so you may bear your new students", and then she got a pack of coffee beans. In the basket there was a roll of string for moments her thread of patience might hit its limits, and so on.

So, 2020?

I brainstormed with Colin, and he told me his teacher likes unicorns. I didn't know that, and I thought this was a perfect theme. A while ago I came across a lady within my Facebook Mommy Community who bakes and decorates pretty cookies. Check out her work on Instagram: Cookie Glamour 

She was happy to accept my project to make customized unicorn cookies. 

Last week she was done, and prior to Colin's last summer practice, we drove to the pre-alpine region where she lives to pick them up.

Look how cute they turned out! She wrote the name of every student in golden glitter! 

This one is for the teacher:

One of his schoolmates suffers from celiac disease, so I made some fudge gluten free (vegan) chocolate chip cookies for her.

They didn't just get a box full of cookies, they had to work for it. 

And this is the geeky part of this post:

I prepared questions on all kinds of topics: sports, books, movies, geography, history, everyday life. They had to divide into teams and open their envelopes. After reading the questions, they had to use the initial letter of each answer. Then they had to figure out that all the teams needed to get together and arrange their letters by color, so all the green ones revealed one word, all the purple ones, and so on. 

As an added bonus, they needed to arrange the colors in the order of the rainbow :-)

All the solution words together told them where the treasure was hidden.

For insurance reasons they're not allowed to leave the school house area, and due to the ongoing pandemic, parents are not allowed on the premises, (sadly, no classroom  pictures, except the one she sent me) 

so I asked one of the substitute teachers to have the box ready for when the class would show up at her room.

It contained the cookies, some Prosecco, a couple of lucky bamboo stems, a nice card signed by all the kids and this sign:

I think Colin's 5th and 6th grade teacher was possibly the best he was ever going to have, even though he's still very young and may meet lots of different teachers. She's more than just a teacher, though, she's an exceptional individual. Very sweet and positive. 

She was invested in her students beyond the classroom. She would coach a bunch of kids for a robotics competition, she showed up to watch one of Colin's hockey games, when they were on a field trip and the kids would throw water, she'd join in. 

However, when things got serious, she'd still have the kids' attention and respect.

That's why not only did I buy some gifts for her, I also put together a slide show. The text is in German, but you may still enjoy the pictures and the music:

She was touched and called me to express her gratitude. 

Epilog: thankfully the missing money miraculously reappeared. 

Do your kids / did you have an especiallywonderful teacher you won't forget? 

Let me know down below, and please visit my friends' posts:

Karen of Baking in a Tornado shares her recipe for Toffee Pecan Nectarine Bars

Lydia of Cluttered Genius loves to use Micro Cards

Tamara of Part-time working Hockey Mom prepared a Teacher Farewell Surprise

Melissa of My Heartfelt Sentiments is all about Summer Vibes