When I first took over Catholic Schools Week prep, it had been a somewhat standing tradition to decorate door for the week. Then, one year the 8th graders decided to up the ante by turning it into a contest. Because our principal asked that each grade be recognized for their hard work in decorating the doors, each door is awarded a prize, which we attach to the door during the week, and each student gets a mini ribbon to wear with the prize written on it. Here is a copy of our door decorating contest guidelines:
All you really need to run a door decorating contest are a few good categories for prizes, lots of construction paper or ribbons for the student prizes and some time. Having students with good handwriting also helps.
A door decorating contest is a great way to build community and celebrate Catholic Schools Week. You could turn the decoration of your door over to the class, or work with students to create a design you find online. I always take my classes on a “tour of doors” so they can see the hard work of other classes and think about the ways those classes chose to celebrate our school and Catholic Schools in general. There’s also a lot of great symbolism with doors in our faith that you could tie into either decorating yours or looking at others.
Here are some of my favorites from past years:
