Homeroom Parents Meeting Agenda

August 8, 2012 at 6:30pm - 7:30pm

Prairie Trail Media Center
1. Welcome &Thank you
2. Homeroom Parent (HP) Role
3. Homeroom Parent Coordinator Role
4. Classroom Assignments - Sort in to classrooms. Assign LHP
5. Meet the Teacher Night
6. Back to School Night FORM
7. Birthday Books
8. Wendys Nights
9. Field Day Co-Chair
10. 5th Grad Reception Chair
11. Childcare at PTO Meetings
12. Other Ways to Help the School and thePTO
13. Upcoming Important Dates
Monday, August 13th, 4:30-6:30pm - Meet the Teacher Night Tuesday, August 14th, 6:30-7:00 pm - Kindergarten Welcome to School Night -.
Wednesday, August 15th, FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL late start 8:55am
Thursday, August 23rd, 6:00-8:30 pm - Back to School Night Thursday, August 30th, 5:00-8:00 pm first Wendys Night
Friday, September 21st - Picture Day

14. Example Party

15. Party Idea Sharing
16. Questions & Open Discussion
Order Birthday Teats from the Food Service
Volunteer Handbooks and Forms
Internet Sign up Sheets

Homeroom Parents Meeting Minutes

August 8, 2012 at 6:30pm - 7:30pm
Prairie Trail Media Center
1. Thank you
a. Thank you for volunteering to be a Homeroom Parent this year at Prairie Trail.
We are working hard in the PTO to help us all have a successful year. Follow the
PTO website at www.prairietrailpto.org
2. Homeroom Parent (HP) Role - The primary role of this to help plan 3 Parties
throughout the school year and help push out PTO activities to your classroom (usually
emails). One fall party about mid-October, the Winter Party on the last day of school
before Winter Break and the Friendship Party on February 14 th.
a. Our Homeroom Parent coordinator and group that will share ideas and give
support so you dont feel like you have to start from scratch. The Homeroom
Parent role also helps find volunteers for Fun Night. We also suggest that, as
part of this role, you request contact information from each parent in the
classroom in order to more efficiently distribute class information (i.e. asking for
classroom party donations). We will get the the form on how to do this later in
this meeting. You can also ask parents if they would like to have their contact
information shared with other classroom parents to help facilitate afterschool/weekend play dates, birthday parties, etc.
b. The secondary role is to promote the PTO and help the Volunteers Coordinators
collect data to recruit more PTO Volunteers. In the PTO, people can volunteer
for 1 hour or 1000 hours whatever they have to give. Many people have a large
misconception that being a PTO volunteer takes up a lot of time. In each
classroom, we need one Lead Homeroom Parent(LHP) some to be the leader for
that room to get the party planning started NOT PLAN the entire party but start
the conversation on what the party should consist of and what donations are
needed to pull off the party.(we will get in to this more later in the meeting). You
will also need to ask for parent volunteers for the parties.
3. Homeroom Parent Coordinator Role a. Shannon Sandvig is serving as the Homeroom Parent Coordinator. Along with
the Volunteer Coordinators, we will make sure we have at least on Homeroom
parent in each room. The Homeroom Parent Coordinator will facilitate the party
planning and the SHARING IDEAS! There is NO SENSE in recreating the wheel
from year to year and we need to help those volunteers that we first time home
room parents. Apart from the Prairie Trail PTO Page on facebook that is for
ANYONE. We also have a Prairie Trail PTO Group where PTO Volunteers are
working to post party ideas and games. We are posting both ones that have
worked well and ones that did not work so well. The Group is Prairie Trail PTO
Volunteer Page at www.facebook.com/groups/PrairieTrailPTOVolunteers
b. My contact information is Shannon Sandvig, Homeroom Parent Coordinator,
PTO Fundraising Chair and Homeroom Parent Volunteer for a K and 2nd grade
class, 319-360-6425 cell, 515-965-6963 home, shan4444@aol.com

4. Classroom Assignments Sort in to classrooms.Decide on Lead Homeroom

Parent(LHP) purely to have someone be accountable to the room/PTO and the teacher.
5. Meet the Teacher Night We need one volunteer to read the PTO script for each
room. We are still working up the script and will email it out to those that volunteer..
6. Back to School NightWe handed out a sample form and then discussed it is had all
the information that Homeroom Parents needed. The final form will be redone by the
Homeroom Parent Coordinator and pre-populated with the teachers information and
the Homeroom Parents name and email address and placed in the classrooms for Back
to School Night or Welcome to Kindergarten Night.. When these forms are collect
return them to the PTO that night (at the PTO table by the front door of the school) so
they can make a copy and then they will come back to you to make your class list to
email out to the class parents.
7. Birthday Books -. During the month of your child's birthday the PTO will give you the
opportunity to purchase a book through the PTO (and receive a tax deduction) with a
plaque in the books with your personal note to the child and you child will be offer the
first chance to check that particular book out. 20th of each month - next month's
Birthday books submissions due. Why are we telling you this? We will need the
homeroom parents to help push this out once a month via email. For children with
Summer Birthday we will honor their birthday on their birthday.
8. Wendys NightsWill be held the fourth Monday of Each Month. Prairie Trail PTO get
10% of everything else (drive up and dining room from 5-8pm).
These dates are:
Thursday, Aug 30th 5thGrade to Volunteer
Monday, Sept 24th 4thGrade to Volunteer
Monday, Oct 22nd 3rd Grade to Volunteer
Monday, Nov 26th 2ndGrade to Volunteer
Thursday, Dec 20th 1st Grade to Volunteer
Monday, Jan 28th Kindergarten to Volunteer
Monday, Feb25th 4th and 5th to Volunteer
Monday, March 25th 2nd and 3rd to Volunteer
Monday, April 22nd K and 1st to Volunteer
Thursday, May 9th All grades
9. Field Day Co-Chair This event is typically held the 2nd to last week of school. This
chair has requested a Co-Chair as we need to plan/build/buy all the games for this
event. This year it may take one or more people to get the planning done.We are not
expecting this group to fill those two roles but maybe inform their parents of the open
needs to see if they can drum up interest.
10. 5th Grad Reception Chair We are planning on having a sign-up sheet for the 4th
grade classrooms at Meet the Teacher Night and Back to School Night, we also wanted
to put the word out through the HRP group. We are planning on having 4th grade
parents host the reception (as is done at Westwood), which is believe is different than
what is done at Southeast (we believe the 5th grade teachers/parents put it on). Getting
the word out early, especially to former Southeast parents would be helpful. We are not
expecting this group to fill those two roles but maybe inform their parents of the open
needs to see if they can drum up interest.

11. Childcare at PTO Meetings -Typically, we have one adult that volunteers their time and
2 Fifth graders that are paid for their time available at PTO meetings to help with
childcare needs. We are looking for Adult and 5 th Grade Volunteers.
12. Other Ways to Help the School and thePTO Box Tops for Education collect and turn in at school

Labels for Education (Campells) - collect and turn in at school

My Coke Rewards - collect and turn in at school OR register them on line

and donate theto PT

Capri Sun Pouch Recyling collect and turn in at school

Target Red Card - Cannot start until school OPENs PTO will push out
through all contact means.

13. Upcoming Important Dates

Monday, August 13th, 4:30-6:30pm -Meet the Teacher Night - Grades K-5 -. This is an open house
format for students to drop off supplies and for students and parents to see the building and meet the
teachers. This is the only time students and parents will have to stop and meet with their teacher prior to
the school year starting. Teachers will be involved in meetings, training and organizing their classrooms
during the course of the day. Please respect their time as they prepare for the school year.
Tuesday, August 14th, 6:30-7:00 pm -Kindergarten Welcome to School Night -. This is a parent only
night to meet your child's teacher and review curriculum and expectations for the school year. Parents will
meet with teachers in the classrooms.
Wednesday, August 15th, FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL late start 8:55am
Thursday, August 23rd, 6:00-8:30 pm -Back to School Night - Grades 1-5 -. This is a parent only
event. Parents will attend meetings in classrooms with teachers at the following times:
6:15-6:45 PM - Grade 1 & Grade 3
6:45-7:15 PM - Grade 4
7:15-7:45 PM - Grade 2
7:45-8:00 PM - Grade 5
**Special area teachers will be in the building at various times throughout the evening.
Thursday, August 30th, 5:00-8:00 pm first Wendys Night
Friday, September 21st - Picture Day - Lifetouch will be at Prairie Trail to take fall pictures.

14. Example Party Before, we planned the party we had a conversation with the
teacher to see if they had any limitations or suggestions for the party. Some
teacher have things they do not want. You need to be aware of that. Also be sure
to check and see if there are any food allergies in the classroom (the teacher
cannot tell you who but they can tell you what the allergies are). And once you
get the party planned emailed the teacher the plan as well.
Plan your party for about 45 minutes leave the teacher time at the end to get
control of her room before they leave for the day.
For a Kindergarten party - We divided the room in the 3 groups, the teachers
often have quick ways to divide the children into groups. Then we had 3 stations:
cookie decorating in the theme of fall harvest (we washed hands before this/

hand sanitizer or wet wipes could make this faster), then we made toilet paper
pumpkins at one station and had pumpkin bowling another station (they had
score sheets where they recorded scores and added points). We spend about
10-12 minutes at each station and about 3-5 minutes to switch stations.
Typically, we brought a book that went with our theme as filler if we needed it.
15. Party Idea SharingOPEN discussion
Fall Party Mummy Wrap (children wrap each other in toilet paper OR if
the teacher gets involved the kids LOVE it)
Sight word bingo (Kindergarten)
Snow Man dress up
Bingo
Make Valentines Cards for their parents
Candy Heart Stacking they use the heart for bingo markers.
Community Service Project type work (possible organizing a school wide
project for the February Party that would be one station of your party)
16. Questions Additional Items Discussed:
a.
Order Birthday Teats from the Food Service (this can also be used for the
parties) The link is below OR the form is found as the end of the minutes as
Appendix A
http://ankeny.schoolfusion.us/modules/groups/homepagefiles/cms/694384/
File/Food%20Service/Classroom%20Snack%20Order%20Form%20for
%20Parents%202011-12.pdf
b.

Internet Sign up Sheets: www.pleasebringit.com or www.SignUpGenius.com.

How they works (you can use either)

If you are a group leader and find yourself organizing volunteers, meals, service projects, or
events... we want to make your life a lot simpler! Now you can coordinate it all online... FREE!

Build Your
Free Sign Up
Choose a professional
theme and enter the
dates/times and slots you
need!

Invite Your
Group Members
Use our email invites, or
send people the link
yourself. Make your sign
up public or private.

People Sign
Up Online
Your members can sign
up 24-7, and we'll notify
you by email when
someone signs up.

We Send Email
Reminders
Customize when
reminders are sent.
Members can receive
them by email or text.

c.
Volunteer Handbooks and Forms We forgot to cover this last night Below is
the link to the handbook and the forms OR they can be found at the end of the minutes
as Appendix B

http://ankeny.schoolfusion.us/modules/groups/homepagefiles/cms/694384/File/Handbooks/20102011/Volunteer%20Handbook.pdf?sessionid=0561e575cdf73b52f60ada75511f5528

Appendix A

Appendix B double click on this to OPEN the handbook.