Kindness, which embraces generosity, compassion, inclusiveness and caring, is critical to a world too often inclined toward cynicism, self-centeredness and intolerance. So it couldn’t be more important to put these values center-stage when raising our children. Though sometimes considered “weak,” kindness, in fact, often requires courage and strength. Families that give back together and share daily messages of concern for others raise children who are most likely to display “heroic kindness” when they’re called to. Here are a few tools to nurture your children’s hearts – and make kindness a family habit.
Materials:Download our template for fill-in-the-blank mantras, or create your own using paper and markers.
How To: Think of small kindnesses – in written form – that you can give to yourself and to others. Key step: Hang them up on the bathroom mirror, the refrigerator, front and back doors.
Time it takes: 10 minutes
Caring for the Common Good Project
Create a Kindness Quilt
Materials: Printable Kindness is squares, colored pencils, crayons, or pens; scissors; painter’s tape; colored paper and glue (optional).
How to: First, read or watch the video of the book The Kindness Quilt by Nancy Elizabeth Wallace together. Next, print your “Kindness is…” squares and cut them apart. (If you don’t have a printer, create your own squares!) Make space on your wall to display your quilt squares as you draw on them. Many of the squares are blank, but some have suggested acts on them. Take a moment to read these suggestions out loud with your kids. Choose a time of day to regularly spend a few minutes talking about kindness.Ask: How did you share kindness today? How did your kindness make you feel? How do you think it makes others feel? How did someone share a kindness with you? Like Minna in the story, gather scrap paper and glue to create backgrounds for the “Kindness is…” squares. Then tape them on your wall to create your quilt.
Children’s Picture Book
The Day You Begin (Penguin Random House) by Jacqueline Woodson