I moved to Arizona in 2011, pretty desperate for some friends. I went to all the PTO meetings (PTO is like PTA, just not part of the PTA — they have their own bylaws), and felt like an outsider for a long time. They kept saying they needed someone to take over their carnival — I just knew that wasn’t for me. But, I knew the way to make friends was to get involved. So I did something really dumb. I took over the school carnival. I don’t even throw my kid birthday parties… what did I know about carnivals? My friends in California had wild laughing fits over me running a school carnival. I preferred to sit in site council and talk about test reults…
But, it turns out there isn’t a whole lot different between test results and running a school carnival.
It’s all about organization. This one just required a lot of organization. It is a BIG carnival with a lot of pieces.
So, I’m going to split the carnival into 3 areas.
1. Games
2. Vendors
3. Food
In the coming weeks I’ll start in on those.
But today I’ll talk about my spreadsheet. Running a fairly large school carnival takes an investment of time and energy that can hurt your brain. Also, I was coming in as someone who had NO idea who anyone was. I couldn’t just know that my friend Pili was doing dinner.
My school spreadsheet is pretty intricate and each school’s spreadsheet would need to be different according to how you run yours. I will say these tabs will be pretty similar.
- Chairs — each main area has a “Chair” over it
- Classroom reps — we’ll talk more about this in my games post.
- Budget — it’s important to get an idea of how much your PTO wants spent and about how much they want to make. The first year I only had how much they wanted me to make, and that wasn’t helpful. You need to know how they hope you’ll balance community spirit and fundraising. That’s up to each PTO, not really up to you (although you should have definite input, since this is your baby).
- Timeline — I have refined this each year so I knew what I should be doing when, and less got left in the cracks
- Volunteers — how many you’ll need where (we use www.signupgenius.com to have parents/teachers sign up)
- A list of all the meetings you have and what you’ll go over. I meet twice with the principal. We used to have a big overall meeting, but I felt like I wasted less of everyone else’s time if we didn’t have that. We do have one meeting where classroom reps can meet with us if they’d like. Some people really prefer talking in person, so that left an option for those people.
That’s what’s on mine. I’d love to have input from other Carnival chairs. I’m actually DONE running our school carnival (I’m incoming PTO president next year — yay.} but it’s always good to hear how other schools do it! I only have my school, and our school in CA to compare.Be sure to check out my whole PTO carnival series.
Kay Schrock says
So my mom had kind of a reputation for being able to tell if a bone was broken or not. 🙂 Never wrong so far, and she raised 8 kids – 4 of which were boys, yikes!
anyways, she taught me that if it is swollen and hard to the touch, it’s likely broken or at least cracked. Other injuries swell as well, but the swelling isn’t as hard? I don’t know if there is any medical proof behind this but so far it’s held true for me. My husband broke his wrist a few years back and I made him go in because it had that really hard swelling. It was broken.
Can you tell me of this is something dr’s/nurses experience or was it just coincidence?
Hilary says
I think that’s normally true. I think kids breaks are hard…. but there does “seem” to be a different swelling with a break then a sprain. Your mom was a smarty, kay. 🙂
d gasawa says
Yep, I keep a mental list of problem areas, and look for solutions when I thrift. Easterweek I found a Longaberger basket for .75 at the Salvation Army, tossed in with the old Easter baskets.
Hilary says
Oooo, that IS a find! There’s always storage and organizing solutions a plenty at Goodwill. I just try to take the measurements and a tape measure if Iam on top of my game. 🙂
melissanehlspacker says
So I was an elementary teach for 15 years. While I completely understand your passion for your children’s education, let me point out some reasons why allowing parents to select a teacher is an unfair practice, to kids and teachers. First of all, have faith. Have faith that your school district has vetted every teacher and that they provide on-going training to improve teaching practices. Also, have faith that they are all being held to the same standards of practice, and that they are all doing the best they can. No one goes in to teaching because they hate kids or want an “easy” paycheck. But also remember that educators, principals, school districts are held to federal and state laws, and “graded” based on standardized tests. I can tell you that with a class of 25-30 kids, I was lucky to have 50% come to me “on grace-level.” There were maybe 3-4 “high” kids, and the rest were below. When it comes to elementary grades, the longer we allow kids to go without basic skills like reading, the harder they are to get caught up. AS a third grade teacher, I did focus 90% of my efforts on kids who needed the extra help. Sadly, your child who can do it on his own would be the least of my concerns, too. I’m sorry if that sounds offensive, but when you think about it, it makes sense, in a sick way. If I am being “graded” based on how my kids perform on tests, and your kid is proficient already, then I am going to do what I can to help those kids who need me more. There are states that are even basing pay on test performance now! Second, coming from personal experience, allowing parents to gang up on a team of teachers to pick who they want is not in the best interest of the kids. Think about it — first of all, it pits the teachers against each other, when they SHOULD want to work together to better ALL the kids they serve. Second, it inevitably builds one classroom full of kids whose moms are on the PTA, and help with every party/function, who help with homework, etc. leaving the other classrooms grossly imbalanced. As for me, I was a strict teacher. I had rules and procedures that we followed every day, and a set of standard consequences that would follow anyone making a poor choice. That being said, my kids loved me, but it wasn’t easy to want to maintain those standards. Why? Because I had this reputation, so when parents came in thinking that their kid needed “structure and discipline,” I got them. All of them. Every year for my last 5 I had ALL of the SpEd kids, ALL the kids with ADHD, most of the kids with behavior disorders, and then a couple “normal” kids. What choice did I have but to focus my attention on where I was needed most? And no, it wasn’t fair to my “regular” kids, but we have to play the hand we’re dealt. Meanwhile, my teammate across the hall was pretty and quiet and had a sweet demeanor, so she got every “gifted” kid, every PTO mom, every “legacy” (kids from families with kids who had been at the school for years)… and of course, she killed the rest of us with her test scores every year. They were able to do advanced projects and go further than the rest of our third graders because she didn’t have a single kid reading under grade level. How nice for her. Meanwhile, my kids didn’t have any examples of what “advanced” work looked like because we didn’t have any advanced kids in the class.
I’m sorry this is so long, but I implore you to think about all of the other people involved, and the ramifications of allowing parents to pick teachers like kickball teams. Someone always feels like the last choice, and that is no way to build a healthy learning environment.
Hilary says
You did read my husband is a teacher, didn’t you. So I truly do see both sides of that coin. Just teacher pickin time is one of anxiety for me, but I do trust our teachers and principal, and I do think almost all teachers are doing their best. But it isn’t fair my kid gets left to learn on his own…. I deal with that. 🙂
from my fancy phone… ignore typos. 🙂
Leah Sandoval says
I will be reading all you have because I am at my wits end with my 13 year old daughter. Pray I will handle it all well!!! Thank you for people like you.
Rayanna Wojahn DeFord says
I noticed you said you were in AZ…my mom lives in the Mesa area!! I just love going to visit her. I am from WA and go down a couple of times a year. We always hit up the Goodwill stores and go “junking”…Best deals around if you have the time to dig and look..I have found great deals on gadgets, cookie sheets, muffin tins and bread pans. Sometimes brand shiney new!! There is a huge Goodwill not far from her that I love and have found fantastic bargains on clothing from very expensive boutique stores with the tags still on them for as little as 4 and 5 dollars! Love your page!
Hilary says
Thanks for the sweet words Rayanna… it’s been a long day and it was nice to hear positive things. Yes, the Goodwills here are amazing. I have no idea why — but it’s true. I love the 50% off day, it has almost killed me for all other shopping. Do you go to Last Chance when you’re here?
Kay Schrock says
I’m back — this time to ‘really’ read this – my daughter just got kicked by a horse in the lower leg, and I can’t decide to take her in or not… :/
Marybeth Santos says
Hmm, my school does not have these forms and I’m not sure how I feel about them. I can understand filling this out for a child that is new to the school, but I don’t get it for a kid that is just moving to the next grade within the same school. Shouldn’t the teachers be able to answer these questions after having spent 9 months teaching them? I like that they are asking for input from the parents, but I don’t like how the questions are worded. They are too open ended. When I get forms like this or I get an IEP report back for my son, I get frustrated because I have a hard time understanding them and I’m an English as a first language, Bachelor’s degree in English person. What about the kids who’s parents may not speak English well or aren’t well educated or simply can’t slog through a 12 page report? I work outside of the home and I often think there is a major disconnect with how schools function and how the real world operates. Technical manuals are written to an eighth grade reading level. Shouldn’t we be doing the same thing with this super important information that is coming from school? Sorry, off topic, but this post got me going! Thanks!
Marybeth Santos says
I’m sorry, I can’t not respond to this. This is a great example of the disconnect between schools and the real world. Parents don’t care if a teacher feels like the “last choice”. We want our kids to get what they need and it’s not our problem if some other kid needs more help than than ours. This is exactly how I assumed things worked in schools and it is so very very disappointing to read. I’m literally shaking reading this it is so upsetting to me.
Hilary says
Kay, what did you end-up doing?
Hilary says
I actually do trust our current teachers, but since the form is there I feel like I need to fill it out. I also guess, if you were really unhappy with your current situation you might cling to the form a little more tightly. Schools just don’t run like the real world. So much balancing and working with what you’ve got. I know our school tries their very hardest. It works out. 🙂
Hilary says
It’s all your viewpoint, right? I do want the principal to take ALL the kids into consideration — but ours is also great about weeding out bad teachers. As a parent, we too need to think about what’s best for the school and not ONLY our child. Mine certainly has to work on his own a lot, and I’m becoming OK with it.
Kay Schrock says
I didn’t think it was broken, but she was favoring it so much, so called my drs office and described symptoms to the nurse. She recommended waiting till morning and if no better to take her in for scans.
so this morning my daughter was still not wanting to walk. I wasn’t sure if it was fear of pain or actual pain. (shes 5) Anyways, so I took her in and got some X-rays. Thankfully, no broken bones – just a bad bruise/swelling.
(and no hard swelling, either, just the softer kind.)
Thanks for a good list of tips!
Hilary says
And the hard swelling tip comes through again!
Beeba9 says
We had a gobble bag back when my kids were little. It was actually an old army duffle bag of my husband’s. Items gobbled by the bag had to be earned back by extra chores. I loved the gobble bag!
Hilary says
Oh man…. 13…. painful. 🙂
Hilary says
Amen sista’, amen!