Wednesday, December 22, 2010

The 25 Days of Christmas Day 21

Gift of Words




When I was teaching school there was always a dilemma at Christmas time. How do you celebrate Christmas with a classroom full of kids? Do they exchange gifts? How do you keep it fair? Some classrooms do a book exchange, some do an ornament exchange, and others just decorate cookies and call it good. But another option is "Gift of Words". To have students give "Gift of Words" each student must be assigned the name of another student and then write a nice note to them. This works best if you give the students lots of guidelines like: it must be at least 7 sentences and include at least one thing you like about the person with a specific example...etc. Teacher's names were not entered into the mix of names to be assigned during "Gift of Words" but my first year teaching at the school that did "Gift of Words" I had a family who took the time to write me a "Gift of Words". And what a gift it was! It was so encouraging to see in print what I meant to a family. As I thought about giving to my family who has most everything they want and need I decided to include a "Gift of Words" along with a small gift I got for each of them. I have done this for several years now. I don't remember what I got my mom last year, but I do remember what I wrote about in my "Gift of Words" to her, and I venture to guess she might say the same thing. So over the next few days I will be sitting down to wrap pretty packages and tie pretty bows, but that seems like a "todo" I MUST get done. But I will also be sitting down to pen a few "Gift of Words" and that is something I can't wait to do!

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