Random Act of Kindness Day
How did it start?
Random Acts of Kindness Day first became a prevalent in Colorado in 1995 and soon became a worldwide day of celebration- mainly thanks to the internet and social media which allowed people to promote the day even more. #raktivist became pretty big all over Twitter and Instagram, allowing people to promote the day even further.
Teaching Kindness in school
As parents and educators, it’s up to everyone to help inspire kindness and gentleness within those who are younger than us. Subconsciously, we already achieve this on the day to day through our own activities which they witness; social interactions, friendships, relationships, etc.
Kindness Rock Garden
Big thanks to TeachStarter for creating this very helpful blog talking about how to design your own Kindness Rock Garden in the classroom.
Begin by talking with your class “What it means to be kind” and “How it feels when you’re kind”
Explore with your class and have them collect a handful of smooth stones (if you can’t find any then they can be purchased from most arts and crafts stores or garden center).
Brainstorm with the kids what “kind words” that can be written on the rocks. Then comes the fun part.
Painting!!
For some inspiration:
Promoting Random Acts of Kindness
Struggling to think of some ways to promote RAoK Day, take a look at this website for some creative and out of the box ideas.
Take a look here to see some acts of kindness that could be promoted in the classroom- have the children choose some from a list and talk about why its helpful to do selfless acts for others; and if they can think up any examples of their own.
Resources
Here at Teacher’s Pet we have a wide variety of resources related to ‘Kindness’, below is just a tiny selection of what we have to offer.
Acts of kindness go a long way
Acts of kindness are one of the single easiest and most rewarding things that anyone can do for someone else; and yet many people fail to truly understand the impact that simple actions can have on people. Giving someone a smile as you pass them on the street, holding a door for someone, giving someone a text who you haven’t spoken to in a while.
We hope these ideas have given you some inspiration for talking about Random Act of Kindness Day.
How will you be planning on celebrating or participating in your community?
If you have any great teaching ideas for this topic, feel free to comment below (they might even get added into the topic calendar!)
