Working in child care is highly rewarding, but it can also be physically and emotionally challenging. As an employer or supervisor, don’t overlook the importance of helping to prevent burnout in your childcare center staff. Staff appreciation for child care workers can help ensure your staff know how valued they are and can also help with retention rates for daycares. Check out these helpful ideas for preventing burnout among childcare educators, and keep reading below for meaningful ways to show childcare staff the appreciation they deserve! 

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Ways to Show Appreciation for Child Care Workers

Write a Note

Show your gratitude with a handwritten note. A simple “thank you for everything you do” or “you’re doing an amazing job” is a great way to show appreciation. Add a small gift card for a local coffee shop if you’d like as well. 

Share with Parents

Highlight a different educator in your regular newsletter or email. If you send out regular communication to your parents and staff, use this time to shine the spotlight on a different employee each week.

Celebrate Special Occasions

Recognize staff birthdays and work anniversaries with a note, surprise gift or little cake. 

Reduce Stress & Free Up Time by Going Digital

Paperwork and other administrative duties can take up a lot of unnecessary time, taking staff away from doing the job they love – working with children. Going digital with software like ChildFriendly makes it easy for staff to document daily happenings, incidents and communicate easily with parents. This frees up time for your childcare center staff to focus on being with the children and drastically reduces the time employees need to spend filling out paperwork. Removing the stress of administrative duties is an easy way to help prevent burnout in childcare educators and show you appreciate the amazing job your employees are doing.

Buy Lunch or Treats

A surprise box of healthy goodies or treats lets your childcare staff know you appreciate them. You could also have a monthly or quarterly staff lunch – switch up the food each time to make it fun. 

Celebrate Theme Days

Theme days are an easy way to make work fun for both staff and the children. Encourage decorating and dressing up where appropriate. You can incorporate crafting decorations into the day with kids. Beach day, pajama day, twin day, superhero day – the sky’s the limit. Let staff vote on monthly theme days so they can feel more involved. Use the ChildFriendly staff portal to share ideas and plan together.

Create a Gratitude Board or Tree

Set up a fun board or tree, where fellow staff members or supervisors can add a quick shoutout to their colleagues for something awesome they noticed them doing, or even just because! It’s a great way to boost morale and support in the workplace. This gratitude tree is a fun example, and can also be done with in classrooms with kids!

Host Events

We all have busy lives, but connecting outside of work is not only a nice way to show staff appreciation, but also lets staff and employers get to know each other better while strengthening team relationships. A few ideas:  

• Bowling night out 

• Plan a BBQ  

• Organize a big picnic at a local park 

• Host a paint night 

• Treat everyone to dinner out 

• Organize a board game and snack night 

Contests

Use the theme days for this staff appreciation idea. Think of door decorating or best-dressed contests. Celebrate the winner with a little prize and announcement.

Surprise Gift

Saying “thank you” with a small gift such as a gift card to a local business or coffee shop, or a little self-care package, is an easy and effective way to show appreciation to your childcare staff.

Support Their Professional Goals

Don’t overlook the importance of providing the opportunity for your staff to grow professionally. Supporting each employee with their professional development goals helps them feel valued. Retention is also higher when staff feel they have goals to work toward and there is an opportunity to develop skills or move up in the workplace. A simple way to do this is by tracking progress in the ChildFriendly staff portal area. Employees can quickly check their progress here and it gives you an area to easily offer encouragement and show your appreciation. 

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There are so many unique ways to let your childcare educators know you appreciate them. Little acknowledgements and actions can go a long way, and special events outside of work create a sense of camaraderie and help increase staff retention. Finally, help free up their time by removing obstacles such as tedious paperwork and providing them with simple and fun digital tools like ChildFriendly. Ensuring your childcare educators feel valued, while also setting the groundwork for helping prevent burnout (link to other post) makes your childcare center a peaceful and happy place for everyone.