Dear Paragon Parents,
Spirit Week is one of our favorite Paragon traditions! A week we celebrate each year to show our school spirit, have a little extra fun, and celebrate the beginning of another great school year together. The kids love it, the teachers love it…and parents, well….I know it is not my favorite. Suddenly, getting out the door in the morning involves costumes, accessories, face paint, and a child announcing at 7:42am that the one thing they absolutely need is nowhere to be found.
So, my first piece of advice: do yourself a favor this weekend and make a plan. Sit down with your child, look through each day’s theme, and decide together what they’re going to wear. Then actually find everything! Try costumes on now, make sure things still fit, and put each day’s outfit together. Better yet, lay everything out the night before. I promise, your Wednesday-morning self will thank your Sunday-afternoon self.
Here’s another tip from many years of Spirit Weeks: think about the entire school day, not just the photo opportunity at drop-off. Can your child sit comfortably in the outfit? Run around at recess? Participate in PE? Eat lunch without half the costume ending up in their food? And perhaps most importantly– can they independently get the costume on and off to use the bathroom? Please don’t underestimate that one! If a costume requires an adult assistant and a ten-minute instruction manual, it may need a little simplifying.
Also, don’t feel like you need to make every day Pinterest-worthy. Spirit Week should be fun, not stressful. Sometimes the simplest ideas are the best ones, and your child does not need a brand-new costume for every theme. Shop the closets, borrow from siblings, improvise, and let your child help create something. I would much rather have a child arrive excited about the funny outfit they put together themselves than have a family start the morning frustrated because everyone was trying to create the “perfect” costume.
Most importantly, enjoy it! These are the silly little school memories our kids will remember– the teachers dressed up, comparing costumes with friends, laughing at morning arrival, and seeing an entire campus get a little ridiculous together. Plan ahead, keep it simple, give yourself extra time in the mornings, take the picture before you leave the house, and then send them our way. We’ll take it from there. Happy Spirit Week, Paragon!
Wishing you a wonderful week,
Lindsay Hay, M.Ed.
Head of School
