These 5 Staff morale boosters are guaranteed to help get you through November. After implementing these morale boosters, teachers and staff will be able to breeze through the holidays. Since November comes on the heels of “Shock-tober,” it’s the perfect time for a few morale-boosting activities.
But first, a little disclaimer. This blog post is being written towards, what we hope is the end of a global pandemic in 2021. Masks mandates were lifted and then reinstated and lifted again. Vaccinations are available yet people are still being quarantined and dying from Covid19. The vaccine was recently made available for young children.
With that said, everyone in the education profession is in need of some morale boosters at work. You will notice that the 5 things chosen for this post take little to no effort for teachers. The purpose is to boost staff morale, not give them more to do. Hopefully, this will give you and your school the boost you need for a successful November!
Seek First to Understand
Before planning any type of appreciation, motivation, or morale booster for staff, take a bird’s eye view of the month. During November there are multiple things that can gobble up teachers’ time. The time change, Thanksgiving, and the pre-race to Christmas shopping.
First, the time change affects everyone differently. Some are tired immediately. Others are hit with exhaustion later in the week. Then, there is the frantic rush to plan Thanksgiving and gear up for Christmas.
The majority of your school staff are women. Most of the time women are the heroes behind everything Thanksgiving and Christmas! Yes, there are men who do this. However, statistically, women do the heavy lifting around the holidays. Regardless, do not give teachers more to do.
National Carbonated Beverage with Caffeine Day – Nov. 19th
Our favorite morale-boosting event is getting all staff Sonic Happy Hour drinks. Based on your access to funding, there are a few ways to handle paying for drinks. If you have a slush fund, use that. Sometimes parents want to donate teacher treats. Ask them. Most often, teachers enjoy the treat delivered to their classroom and don’t mind paying a dollar or two for the convenience.
Hey! You Want a Piece of Me?
Pies are plentiful this time of year. You can get a good deal on the little mini pies at Walmart. Or, you could have parents sign up to bring a pie. In this case, there are a variety of tools to use for sign-up sheets and/or donations.
The most successful tool I have used is the website Signup.com. Especially because it sends email reminders. Google forms and sheets are also great tools for staff morale-building forms and templates. However, the only reminders when using google forms and sheets are the reminders you remember to send regularly.
Gratitude BINGO
Creating BINGO boards is one of the most popular ideas for morale boosters. In The Principal Blog Facebook groups, we see a variety of BINGO boards this time of year. Be that as it may, you still need to keep in mind what I mentioned earlier about not wanting to create more work for teachers.
When creating BINGO boards and/or any other type of challenge, consider balancing the activities between what the staff has to DO and what staff GETS with no strings attached. Click here for an example.
Scratch Off Ticket Morale Boosters
Amazon carries a wide variety of shapes and sizes of scratch-off stickers. There are so many uses for these tickets. Basically, we started using scratch-off tickets over 5 years ago. The activity in the image is a lot like the “You’ve Been Booed” activity, only easier. If you have followed me for a while you know that I LOVE clipart. So when I found these turkeys I had to come up with multiple uses for them because they are so cute.
Decorate for Thanksgiving
Our district provides a free lunch for all staff on Thanksgiving and Christmas. As a result, I do not have to prepare a special meal or treat the day before break. Since the food has been taken care of, over the years I started collecting Thanksgiving decorations.
Due to a limited budget, our first year was not as festive as our last few years. At any rate, we have acquired and/or replaced decorations and now have a nice stash for this year. Without a doubt, cute decorations can be a morale booster for staff.
Before planning or announcing these activities, check yourself. Do you have the time, mental capacity, and help to carry them out this time of year? These are meant to be EASY November morale boosters for staff.
