When it comes to creating a classroom culture and community, you want kindness to be a central part of it. To help promote this in my classroom, I love to do different kindness activities with my students.
We talk about it so much that I know my students really understand what it means to be kind. It helps build a classroom community in a positive way. I’m sharing the kindness activities I do with my elementary students.
Kindness Activities
Get your students thinking about kindness by doing kindness activities in your classroom.
Make it Kind Activity
This is a great way to help kids understand what things are kind and what are not. Do a sort with your students. Read a scenario and sort them if they are kind or not. If they are not kind, ask students how you can make them into a kind action.
Help your students see that kindness is a choice. Students can learn how to make good choices with this kindness activity.
This is a great opportunity to have a classroom discussion with students. To increase student engagement, have students share ideas with a partner first. Then bring students back together to share what they talked about as a whole class. For other engagement strategies, read this blog post here.
You can also take this a step further with Make it Kind Worksheets. Now students individually complete a worksheet where they read a scenario, change it to make it kind, and draw a picture to go with it.
Kindness Posters
This is a great way to promote kindness in your classroom and school. Talk to your students what it means to be kind. Have them give some examples.
Help your students actively participate in making the world a more kind place with this kindness activity.
Then give them the Kindness Posters Template and have them make a kindness poster. They should include a catchline and picture.
Then you can hang these up in your classroom or in the hallway.
Kindness Begins with Me
It’s important to show students that it’s good to be kind to others, but we especially need to be kind to ourselves.
Teach your students that one way to be kind to ourselves is the way to talk to ourselves. Give them some examples of positive affirmations. Then brainstorm other positive affirmations you can tell yourself. You can even look up some meditation and mindfulness kid activities on YouTube to do as a class.
When it comes to kindness activities, I like to help students see that kindness begins with them. They need to be kind to themselves and to others.
Then have students complete Kindness Begins with Me worksheet. Students write things they like about themselves. Then they write about how they can be kind to others.
Because if we expect our students to be kind to others, they first need to be kind to themselves.
Kindness Notes
As a fun classroom kindness activity, have students write kindness notes to each other. I like to help my students brainstorm a little deeper when writing these notes to their classrooms. I want them to write things that are more meaningful than “You are the best!” or “You are awesome.”
Students love writing notes. Why not help them learn how to write notes of kindness.
Then I print out and cut out a ton of these Kindness Notes for my students. Then each of them write notes to their classmates.
I love how we can combine a kindness activity with a writing activity.
Kindness Acrostic Poem
This is another activity that is really great to hang up in your classroom or in the hallway.
To get started, brainstorm some words that can be associated with kindness.
Use these kindness activities to help decorate your classroom and promote kindness.
Then explain to your students what an acrostic poem is and show them a couple of examples.
Then get them started on the Kindness Acrostic Poem. I know for younger grades, they will need more support. That is why I like doing another brainstorm with words that start with each letter of kindness. Then students are more independently able to write the poem.
Kindness Activities and Crafts
My students love crafts. That is why I love to incorporate different kindness activities and crafts into our kindness lessons. Here are some ideas on kindness activities and crafts you can do in your classroom.
“I Can Be Kind” Writing Craft
Brainstorm as a class kind things your students can do. Give students three hearts. They write down three things they can do to be kind. Then they draw a picture of it and glue everything on a red piece of construction paper.
I love to hang this kindness craft up in our hallway for all to see. Find this craft here.
Valentine’s Cards
Another way to have students show kindness is to make valentine’s cards for someone in their family. Students make these cute heart cards. They are a great activity to do around Valentine’s day.
Have students write notes to friends and family members with these fun Valentine’s cards.
After making the card, students write a little note inside to a family member. Then I let students take them home. Find these Valentine’s Card Templates here.
For other Valentine’s Day activities for the classroom, read this blog post here: 5 Valentine’s Math Activities That Are So Fun
I hope that you have been able to find ideas on how to promote kindness in your classroom. Find my Kindness Activities Unit with all of these kindness activities here.
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