We held our first Family Fun and Games Night last week and it was a huge success. I ordered the planning kit from this website, which helped. We are a K-8 school and this event was only for K-4th. The funny thing is that we advertised that the event was free, but tickets were required (so we'd get a headcount). We had about 250 rsvp but when the night arrived, only about 200 came, which surprised me. Consequently, we had many, many extra pizzas.

About a week before the event, we lucked into finding a guy who would come "run" our games for us(2 hrs at $40 hour=$80). I guess I could have done it but I was most relieved to find someone who has done this alot before. He brought some equipment with him (tons of hula hoops, etc.). This is how we handled a group this size: We asked everyone with the last name A-K to go to the gym from 5:30-6:15 for games and L-Z go to the cafeteria for free pizza and bingo (bought a bingo set and 150 cards off eBay). At 6:15, we rotated the two large groups. This worked well. I thought the 45 minutes wouldn't be enough time, but it was fine.

I am sort of anal(excuse me) and here are a couple of things that really made the event run very smoothly: I made name tags, in advance, for everyone who rsvp'd. On each nametag, I put a colored dot (red, blue, green or yellow). This indicated which "group" they were in when they got to the gym for games. I had a big red sign posted in the gym for the red team, etc. This way, when this crush of people arrived in the gym, they knew exactly where to go. The nametags only took me about 30 minutes to make and I think it was worth it.

I way overestimated the pizza. I thought MORE people would come than rsvp'd but 20%less came because the tickets were free and they didnt think it really mattered if they didn't show up . If 250 had showed, it wouldn't have been too much pizza.

I was able to get 7 high school students who needed volunteer hours to help. one worked at the drinks/dessert table, 2 at the pizza table and the rest in the gym with games. I couldn't have done it without them as I did not seek lots of parent volunteers (about 4 parents were "coaches" in the gym). I e-mailed the parents in advance with all the directions for the games, plus our games leader met with them for about 15 minutes before the event started. I also had a little typed sheet prepared in advance, which I handed to each high school volunteer, telling them exactly what I needed them to do (I told you I was anal).

I can't think of anything else to share other than it was great fun, got lots of good feedback and I would recommend it as a good way to build community in your school.
SHC