I’m not sure when teacher gifts became another hot item on the December stress list. I have vague memories from my childhood of carrying to school homemade shortbread on paper plates, wrapped in green or red cellophane. A generic message on a cardboard tag. How quaint those festive footnotes seem now. What cheapskates we were then.

There are probably rules about buying presents for teachers. Legally binding rules that prevent government employees from accepting gifts above a certain value. But when it comes to end-of-year gifts for professionals who have probably spent more of the year with our children than we have, those rules – if they do exist – matter less than the more informal and bewildering rules of social niceties, gratitude and, yes, guilt.

The question of how much to spend on your child’s teacher is very much tied to how much we value education. And, for that matter, how embarrassed we are that our culture seems to value educators so little.

There can’t be many parents who don’t want their children to grow up well-rounded, happy and successful. Odd then that, for 11 months of the year (aside from a couple of days scattered throughout – a birthday or World Teacher’s Day), we give so little thought to the people tasked with the job of making........

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