All You Need is LOVE

Most teachers I've encountered feel class parties equate to extra large headaches. I, on the other hand, disagree :) I have warm memories of the various class parties I experienced growing up, especially on Valentine's Day. Naturally, I attempted to recreate my experience verbatim with my third graders this year.

I wanted my students to decorate shoeboxes to hold their Valentine cards JUST as I had when I was younger. So, I stocked up on stickers of all sorts (both of the shiny and foamy variety) and I utilized the heart-shaped dicut in our workroom to provide red, white, and purple paper hearts for decoration. I also tore off large sheets of colored butcher paper for us to wrap the boxes in.

Now, I must say wrapping 19 shoeboxes in butcher paper was a bit more time-consuming than I'd envisioned (taking a full 45 minutes of class time). Thankfully a few of my students have experience wrapping Christmas gifts. Between the three of us, we were able to assist those who were a bit more...shall we say..."challenged" by the task.

This experience made me thankful to have third graders - any younger and I would have been pre-wrapping each box on my own… which I wouldn't have consented myself to do… which would have meant no decorated shoeboxes for VDay :(
Yay third grade!

When all the wrapping was finished, I cut a mail slot in the top of each box for special deliveries to be inserted. Finally, (my favorite part) each box was personalized with a slew of VDay decor! The more gaudy the box, the better!!
Afterwards, I lined up our handmade mailboxes in a row, and we were ready for business.
Valentines were passed out, and we had a spread of sugary sweets to stuff our bellies with while we enjoyed opening our cards!

The kids really loved their mailboxes, and I'm so glad we took the time to create them :) However, next year there are a few things I will choose to do differently:
1. Make the mailboxes during the first week of February instead of two days before VDay. This way students have two full weeks to bring their Valentines to school to be delivered - avoiding a mad rush of students cramming cards into boxes as I experienced on VDay this year…
2. Save empty Kleenex boxes to use instead of shoeboxes. I have another teacher in my building to thank for this fantastic idea! Using old tissue boxes not only promotes recycling, but it insures all of my students will have a box to decorate (Lord knows we go through PLENTY of tissue boxes from August to February!). This year, only about 5 of my students showed up with shoeboxes from home. Luckily, some kids brought an extra box or two; and I was able to scrounge some old tissue boxes from other teachers to supplement what we lacked. Also, Kleenex boxes have a pre-cut hole for mail - genius!

My third graders did not neglect an opportunity to butter me on up this holiday… I don't know if I have ever been so spoiled with VDay gifts. I guess those little boogers do have a sweet side ;)