Holiday Gift Exchange Ideas for the Classroom

As the holidays draw near, I'd like to share a few ideas for teachers:

• Have parents donate to a game fund for your classroom instead of buying you gifts. Allow a volunteer to collect the donations so parents who spend very little don't have to feel obligated and you won't know who donates.
• Divide students into small groups and have each small group choose a game for the classroom.  Parents can donate to purchase a game for each group. Students could have a contest and a fundraiser --let parents know you are doing this instead of exchanging gifts. Students share their "game" as a gift to the other groups. 
• Ask for a classroom budget to purchase educational games and present them as "gifts for all of us."
• With the economic crunch, collect suggestions from parents about how to save money on gifts. Get students enthused and participating.
  
• Create a fun gift exchange with special rules like "spend no more than $0.92 or $2.009 cents.