Does my 1st grader need a yearbook?

[dawson5]

Around here, it's pretty much a last day social event. I made the mistake of NOT buying one, one year (actually it was more a misunderstanding on my part, since it wasn't my first kid! ). Literally, all they do the last day of school is sign yearbooks. They did give my kid a piece of paper that said "autographs" so they weren't left out totally but it is a big event in grade school for the yearbooks. It's actually a couple day event since they usually get them 2-3 days before school is out.

Our last day is only 1 hour long though.

HERE'S the weirdest thing -- apparently in High School kids don't sign yearbooks here since they get them the following year. When I was in High School we got them the following year too (so graduation can be included) but still got them signed. Last year my DD was a Freshman, so she got hers early in the year, she thought I was nuts when I asked if they did signings. She told me that was weird since they were last year's yearbook. OK, then, culture shifts apparently.

I personally buy them not for right now's sake but for later on. I hadn't looked at my yearbooks in years but now that I have kids, they have seen more use in the last 2-3 years than they have in the last 10.

It's up to you but I would also ask around to find the culture of the school. I know when my DD went and Kindergarten was talking about yearbooks I thought it was bizarre. They are not the hard bound ones, just soft bound with staples in the middle. It's actually the kind we got in Junior High.

Ours is the same way, don't get them until the beginning of the school year. What they do to allow for signatures is give the kids a two page insert with adhesive tape. They collect their signatures on that and when they get the yearbook, they just tape it in.

We have always gotten the yearbook. Where we live now is kind of transitory. The number of people who were born and raised here is small. It was very apparent when they did a mini-biography in 4th grade, they put where they were born. Out of 25 kids, I think three were born in town, the rest were either out of state or more than 100 miles away.

We've also moved a few times ourselves. We get the yearbooks just to let them remember the kids from their schools. Our grade school ones were all under $15 though. Middle school is at $25 and high school is around $50.

 

[kellyg403]

Because we are a larger family and I was a single mom for a long time, I couldn't afford yearbooks for everyone every year. So, we made a deal. We got yearbooks in K, 5th, 8th and 12th. A yearbook became a right of passage onto the next level in life/school.

I do know several people who buy their yearbooks every year, and I also have a friend who doesn't buy them at all but her dd uses and autograph book to get signatures. So, this thing is a 'different strokes for different folks' type of situation!

Kelly

 

[disneydreamersx4]

WOW $23, ours are $14 and I balk at that.

Our elem. school is K-4 so we just get the K and 4th yearbooks.
My 12yo DD still goes through her yearbooks quite often.