The Quintessential Back to School Supply List

I am nearly sixty years old and as August nears its halfway point I still feel compelled to search for a perfect box of beautiful Crayola crayons, a package of yellow number two pencils, a pink pearl eraser, and a big bottle of Elmer's glue. These items represent the quintessential basis of the school supply list. Every year I get these items in multiples and children in my life are blessed year round with replacements when their supplies run low. Oh yes and don't forget the PeeChee folders.

School supply lists now are much more complicated than that but those are still the basics. Today's quintessential list includes a backpack. The ubiquitous backpack was not an item we carried when I was in grade school. (I think all of our backs were much healthier than today's school children also; note the article) The list I looked at today asks for Kleenex, oh yes, I remember those, they were gone by the end of the first week. If a parent wants their child to have face tissues they need to buy more than one box. The nice thing about tissues now is that they come in little pocket or purse packs that fit in the side pocket of that backpack.

In addition to the Crayola crayons, the yellow number two pencils, the pink pearl erasure, the Elmer's glue the Kleenex and the backpack add scissors (these were supplied by the school I think in my first three grades), and Ziploc type bags. That's relatively new....I think..... I don't remember taking zip closure bags though I do remember my first zipper close notebook. Oh my, that was classy and special to me.

Other additions that have made the more modern quintessential back to school supply list are glue sticks, wide ruled spiral notebooks (we used to get tablets with really wide lines with a dotted line between them to show where the tops of lower case letters went), and dry erase markers.

I think I was out of college before the dry erase markers and whiteboards entered the school scene. Guess that illustrates my longevity.

Okay where are we now.....By the time you get to the fifth grade you should have about twenty items on your required school supply list. Some of the items can be generic but many are brand name specific. Crayola brand crayons and Elmer's glue are specifically requested by many teachers because of possible contaminates in unknown brand names and also because of consistency of quality.

So here is one list that is pretty universal:

One backpack

One box or Kleenex (give me a break, get a lot more that one box)

One box of Crayola crayons, 24 colors (oh get a life here, you need the ninety-four color box at least!)

24 #2 pencils (why 24? , maybe because the packages come in 3, 6, 12, and 24 sizes?)

Two glue sticks ( if your student is in the lower grades you will need as many as 8 to 12 glue sticks)

One large (8 ounce)bottle of Elmer's glue

One pair of Fiskar's scissors (most of the lists I saw specified Fiskar's brand, I suspect it has to do with quality and reliability)

One small school box or Zipper Pouch (these are also called pencil boxes or pockets)

Two spiral notebooks wide-ruled

Two pink pearl erasers (these are important because the erasers on the pencils do not work, they just smear stuff)

One wooden ruler marked in centimeters and inches

Two PeeChee folders

One 12 pack of Crayola colored pencils

Two packages of Notebook Paper

One Highlighter.....some teachers want a specific color others say any color is ok

Two packages of dividers for a notebook (five count packages)

One plain 3 ring binder with a 1 ½ inch to 2 inch back

Three ball point pens (one red, one blue, and one black)

One protractor

Two Expo dry erase marker Black with bullet tip point

And there you have it shoppers! The quintessential back to school supply list. Can you learn with out these items? ...Yes!.... Can you have as much fun? Probably! ......Will you be teachers pet? ......No!