Hosting Donuts With Dad: A Guide for Success

Are you trying to plan a Donuts With Dad event? From invitation wording and decorations to inclusivity and itineraries… We’ve got you covered. All the necessary steps and details are right here! 

Donuts With Dads, Muffins With Moms, or even Pastries with Parents! There are so many fun breakfast-themed event titles to choose from. Pick your favorite to welcome your students’ parents into your classroom for a morning of fun and festivity. 

What Is Donuts With Dad?

Donuts With Dad is a breakfast-themed event that invites dads or parental figures into the classroom for a morning of fun and getting to know the school or class their child is a part of. 

You can host this classic Donuts With Dad event or even update the name to include other important adults in your student’s life with a title like Breakfast With Buddies. 

An event like Donuts with Dad is an opportunity for the male figures or parents to come into their child’s classroom, and get to know the teacher and other parents in the class. It’s also a time when young children feel proud of showing the people they love the type of work they are accomplishing in their class. 

Sometimes Donuts With Dad is an event that occurs around Father’s Day to honor the father figures in a child’s life. Since Father’s Day typically falls in the month of June, local communities and churches will often host this event to accommodate the summer holiday.

How to Host an Event Like Donuts With Dad

When to Host

If you’re hosting a traditional Donuts with Dad event or a breakfast event for father-like figures in a child’s life, a day near Father’s Day could be an appropriate time to host the event. 

But if Father’s Day Donuts doesn’t work for your schedule, pick a day in which you think the majority of families could be present. A day that is not too close to a vacation or religious holiday can be a good choice.

Inclusive events like Pastries with Parents or Breakfast with Buddies don’t need to be at a specific time of year. It can be a nice, welcoming way to make parents, friends, and caregivers feel more comfortable with their child’s school and classroom by getting more familiar with the setting.

Hosting this type of event on a school day might be a difficult time for dads to attend if they are working. You could host a fun morning like this on a weekend or alternatively, even have a donut-themed event in the evening when most children are home with their families.

Get the Word Out to Families

For a successful event, get the word out to all the invited families. Use our free invitation template or create a simple invitation to send it home with your students.

Get your own copy of this free, editable Donuts with Dad flyer to use for your event. The invitation template is 100% customizable with a free Canva account.

On your invitation, include details like:

• What: Decide on the title of your event (Donuts with Dad/Breakfast with Buddies)
• Where: Your classroom number or school cafeteria etc. 
• When: The date and time of your event
• RSVP: Your contact information (email address, phone number, etc.)

If sending out the flyers digitally, make sure you have an updated list of parent emails.

After sending out your invitations, you may also want to send out a small reminder to families the week of or the day before your event for people who forgot to add it to their calendars.

What to Serve

Events like Donuts with Dad are typically breakfast events, with, you guessed it, donuts! Think about your event name and draw inspiration from it. Pastries with Parents might have scones, donuts, muffins and danishes on the menu. 

At breakfast-themed events, a simple menu of coffee, tea, milk, fruit, cheese, and pastries can often be enough. Think about what a simple menu at a continental breakfast may look like.  

While donuts are the star of the show, consider offering in one or two breakfast casseroles to create a heartier breakfast. For larger school events, you may need volunteers to help bring in or prepare food to be served. 

Recruiting Volunteers

It can be helpful to recruit a couple of key volunteers before committing to plan an event like this. If your school is running a large event, it may even require a committee of volunteer planners. 

For some help with how to ask for volunteers check out this article. There is lots of great advice and a free template you can use!

You may need to involve your principal and other school staff like custodians and lunchroom coordinators for a large Donuts with Dad event.

If you’re looking for donors to sponsor dad’s donuts, use this letter to parents asking for donations template. Parents and grandparents are usually more than happy to pitch in!

Keeping Donuts With Dad Inclusive for All Family Dynamics

Every family looks different! Not every student has a dad or a male father figure in their life. For a more inclusive event than one titled Donuts with Dad, consider an alternative name that invites any parent, guardian, or caregiver to attend. 

Donuts With Dad Alternative Names

• Donuts with Dudes (any male role model in the child’s life)
• Desserts with Dudes (for an evening event instead of breakfast)
• Muffins with Men (any male role model in the child’s life)
• Muffins with Moms
• Donuts with Dads & Muffins with Moms (both/either parent welcome)
• Pastries with Parents
• Breakfast with Buddies (any parental figure in the child’s life: grandparents, guardians etc.)
• Cookies with Caregivers
• VIP Tea
• Flapjacks with Family
• Bagels with Buddies
• Breakfast with Besties
• Picnic with Parents

Invite All Father Figures

Aside from the name of the event, another way to increase the inclusivity of your Donuts with Dad event is to invite any significant father figures or adult role models in your students’ lives. You could also consider inviting moms, grandparents, uncles, aunts, guardians, family friends, or caregivers. 

Child-Created Themed Gifts

Children feel a sense of pride when they present crafts they have created to celebrate their fathers or special adults in their lives. Consider having the kids create a gift or craft before this event so they can give it to their guests to thank them for attending.

Donuts With Dad Gift Ideas

Here are some fun ideas for child-created donuts with dad gifts. 

• Framed photo
  • Students can decorate the frame and personalize it for the parent they’re giving it to.
• Framed drawing
  • Students can make both the drawn pictures and the frame for it to go in.
• Card
  • Make a card from scratch or provide your students with a template to use for a nice card they can give their loved one.
• Keychain
  • There are many ways your students could make a fun keychain that will be a cute keepsake for their parents. 
• Painting
  • A personalized painting is another great gift option to send home with parents after a Breakfast with Buddies event.

Donuts With Dads Event Decorations

There are so many cute ways to decorate your classroom with crafts your students help you make! 

A paper plate donut banner is one fun option your students can help create. Instead of stringing them together, you can also place them individually around the room on the walls as decor. Depending on the age of your students, you may need to prep the craft by cutting out the center of the plates first. 

You could also have your students decorate paper ties or paper mustaches for dad-themed classroom decor. Check out this tutorial for how to make a DIY banner your kids can help with!

Here are a few Donuts with Dad decor options you could purchase to add to your classroom’s party theme:

• Donut themed banner
• Donut plastic table cover
• Donut hanging decorations

Donuts With Dad Day Itinerary

You’ve sent the invitations, rallied the volunteers, and prepared the food… Now let’s make sure you have an itinerary planned out for what you want your Donuts with Dad event to look like!

Games & Activities

Adding some games or activities to your event can keep it fun and interesting. You can set up some game or activity stations around your classroom or event location so parents can play with their children at their own pace. You could also lead the whole group in some drawing games on paper, a character building activity, or a round of icebreaker questions like “Would You Rather.”

Here are some fun options:

• Photo booth
• Slide show
• Bean bag toss
• Musical chairs
• Donut pinata
• Relay race

Crafts

Having a craft station at your Donuts with Dad or Breakfast with Buddies event is a nice way for children to interact with their parents. You could have a volunteer run this station to explain the craft or set it up in advance with some directions for the adults to follow. You can choose from traditional Father’s Day Crafts or even a fun donut craft that fits the theme of your special occasion.

Where The Smiles Have Been offers these fun free printable ‘all about my parent’ interviews you could use. There are templates for Dad, Mom, Grandpa, and Grandma!

Another great craft idea from Non Toy Gifts is to use paper rolls to make a tiny version of each student’s parent. You could set up a table for this craft station with some pre-cut pieces, or printed templates that parents can help cut out.

Music

Adding background music to your breakfast event can help entertain your crowd. Or consider having your students learn a song that they can perform at some point in your itinerary. 

Songs like the ‘Finger Family Song’ or ‘Skinnamarink’ are good choices for an event like this. You could even teach your students the ‘B-I-N-G-O’ song and replace the lyrics so it’s about ‘daddy’ or ‘mommy’. 

Donuts!

Of course, no Donuts with Dad or Donuts with Dudes event would be complete without donuts. At the end of your special event, leave time for parents to sit, eat and enjoy a donut or meal with their child. You may want to bring in some folding chairs for adults or see if you can borrow larger chairs from elsewhere in your school for your big guests.

FAQs

Why Is It Important to Make Donuts With Dad Inclusive?

Not every student has a dad! Other students may have a dad who is unable to attend an event like this for many reasons. Whatever the reason may be, students with no dad able to attend a ‘Donuts with Dad’ event, may feel left out and excluded. 

First of all, consider a more inclusive event name like ‘Breakfast with Buddies’ and state who is invited to attend in your invitation. 

If you’re sticking with the title ‘Donuts for Dad’, you may want to consider letting your students know that any male father figure in their life is invited to attend with them. Even better, any parental-like caregiver who is important to them is invited to attend. Make sure the language of your invitation is clear that it’s not JUST dads who are invited. Our free Donuts with Dad invitation template includes this messaging and is completely editable.

What Can I Do Instead of Hosting Donuts for Dads?

What you can do instead of hosting Donuts with Dad will depend on your motivation for hosting in the first place. Are you trying to honor dads on Father’s Day? Maybe you’re trying to invite dads into your classroom so they can feel involved in their child’s school?

If you’re looking for ideas for a different way to recognize and honor dads, consider having your students create a special craft, gift, song or project for their dad to take home. This gives you the opportunity to modify your assignment individually for students who don’t have a dad.

If you’re trying to invite dads into your class to be more involved in their child’s school, try hosting an event that is welcoming to dads but not exclusive of other important adults in the classrooms and students’ lives.

What Is a Good Book to Read on Donuts With Dad Day?

Here are some great book recommendations that celebrate dads you can consider reading to your class.

Cave Dada by Brandon Reese – This adorable book is about a caveman and his baby, who he is trying to cheer up!

Dandy by Ame Dyckman – Daddy lion spots a weed growing in his yard and wants to get rid of it… But his little girl has decided it’s a beautiful flower. What will he do?!

Dad By My Side by Soosh – The stunning watercolor images in this book add to its sweet story of the special bond in the relationship between a father and his child.

The Invisible String By Patrice Karst – The Invisible String is a great, inclusive book for children and all families. Its main takeaway message is that you’re never alone and always loved.

Donuts With Dad: Bottom Line

Your dads event is sure to be a great success with all of these awesome options! The special guests coming to attend this celebration are going to be excited to be there and grateful for the time and effort you’ve made to put it all together. 

Your breakfast-themed event can be as extravagant or as simple as you’d like! By keeping it inclusive, you’ll set up the kids and their guests to have a fun stress-free time.