Mailbags - The BEST way to Manage Home - School Communication

Are you looking for a better way to deal with home/school communication and ensuring that everything gets to where it is going?  I am sharing what works and what DIDN'T work, from experience.  Read on to find the best way I have found to send things home as well as get important papers back.

Sending things home from school and getting them back can be challenging.  Many times I have received ripped, wrinkled and wet papers dug out of the bottom of a backpack or had a child dump out their backpack looking for the coins for their milk order.  I have tried it all and I wanted to share my system (and my previous fails) with you.

Way back at the dawn of my teaching career I used bags.  I thought they were the perfect way to get everything home in one piece to a parent. I used the ones with the little zipper on top. However, it was soon very evident that these were not going to work as I had thought.  The zipper thing broke off and then the bags would not close.  So I moved on to Ziploc bag 2.0.  These bags were the typical Ziploc bags (minus the fancy zipper closer) and I simply labelled them with a sticker.  These bags worked a little bit better but they still ripped and were never big enough to fit everything.

Next, I moved on to folders like the one below.  I laminated them and put everything in the pockets inside to go home.  I did like these but I needed to make a new one for everyone halfway through the year as they didn't hold up very well.  These worked better than the bags but I still struggled with where to put bigger things.  The other ongoing issue was how to deal with money that came in. There wasn't a good place for it.

So I moved on to option number 3.  I found both these bags in a dollar store and instantly loved them. The mailbags are actually courier bags from Dollarama and the clear pencil cases are from Dollar Tree. The third time was a charm.  

THESE ARE WHAT I HAVE BEEN LOOKING FOR ALL MY TEACHING LIFE! 

I loved the size of the zipper bag and I loved that it closed tight.  Now everything could be stored safely inside and it would stay inside.  I had another a-ha moment when I saw the clear pencil cases. They were perfect to use for money pouches.  Now I could almost guarantee that the money and the forms would get to me.  I put this holder on the wall of my classroom for the pouches and the kids put them there if there was anything in them.  It works like a charm.

I hope you find this tip useful.  I have found the investment worth it as I have never had to replace one mid-year.  The money pouches are actually on their third year.  Every year I buy a few more to replace those with broken zippers or ones that have not stood up to the use.

You can grab labels for both the mailbag and the money bag too.  They are in bright colours or in the rainbow that is shown.  Add your name and email below to get access to this freebie in my Free Resource Library.

Don't forget to pin this post to come back to during BACK TO SCHOOL time.


Are you looking for other ideas to get you ready for Back to School?  Check out my Pinterest board for lots of ideas.