Kidness Week

In an attempt to improve the interpersonal relationships between students, to enhance empathy and encourage a more kind behavior and a sense of altruism we organized a kindness week for the 2nd and 4th graders of our school. Here are some activities:

 Kindness Bingo: Each student was given a personal bingo chart with acts of kindness adapted to the reality of our school. The charts were placed on a big announcement board in each class and students were coloring each act of kindness they completed. There was a time limit of 1 week (adapted from https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Kindness-BINGO-2946306)

The wrinkled heart (or….The power of words): Students watched the story of ʺChrysanthemumʺ by Kevin Henkes  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xffkRIXpnwk  while listening to the story they were folding a paper heart each time something bad, worrying or stressful  was told to the heroine. And they were unfolding the heart when something nice and kind was told. The story had a happy ending however the wrinkles in the heart were irreversible. By the end of the story the message was clear: Before you speak think and be smart, it’s hard to fix a wrinkled heart (author unknown). https://gr.pinterest.com/pin/196399233725602155/

ʺHave you filled a bucket today?ʺ: Students watched the story ʺHave you filled a bucket today? ʺ by Carol McCloud https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EuemNAo6XE and were encouraged  to write down their emotions and thoughts. Two buckets were placed in the classroom one for bucket filling acts and one for bucket dipping. At the end of the week we read their posts and created a poster claiming that we are a bucket filling class that will try to spread the message to the rest of the school.