Good afternoon! Today I'd like to share how I celebrate birthdays in my classroom. Disclaimer: it takes a lot of prep, and admittedly cost quite a bit. That said, I feel it successfully meets my goal. My goal: I love to recognize people's birthdays and make them feel seen, valued, and bring them joy on their special day.
In my classroom, I hand-draw (since the banners I bought would disappear due to some misunderstandings about recycling them rather than taking them home each birthday, and I could not afford to buy one for every birthday) a birthday banner that reads "Feliz Cumpleaños, [Student's Name]!" with markers on construction paper. I tape that to their desk along with a gift. The gift is a coffee-looking cup filled with confetti or grass, a desert sticker, and a special lava pen. I tie a ribbon to the top of the pen, which sticks out like a straw. I try to make the ribbon, pen, and sticker all the student's favorite color (which I know from a form they fill out on the first day of school). I buy the supplies in bulk from Amazon. After the initial work it takes to prepare the cups, it is really simple to set this up each birthday.
I also use Google Slides each day, so on the warm up slide they all see at the start of class, I feature a cat throwing confetti on the right side where I list reminders, and write "Today is [student's name] birthday!"
Lastly, at the end of the month, I celebrate all of the birthdays from that month by putting their names on the board with their favorite colors (and maybe even characters), put up a balloon arch with their favorite colors combined, and set out treats. The Google Slides on the board might say something like "In honor of our January birthdays (name, name, name, and name) you can help yourself to a treat on the table!" We do Friday prizes each week anyway where students have the option of choosing food, so this falls on a Friday and basically is our regular prize day with an extra treat, or treats in place of non-edible prizes, along with that extra recognition.
