Have Courage and Be Kind

This week I planned and implemented another one of my activities. This is probably the one I am most proud of. I centered the activity on kindness. Once all the kids had arrived and eaten their pizza, we read them two children's books on kindness. We asked them about kind things they had done and that had been done for them and what kindness was. After that, we gave them tin cans that had been cleaned out and let them decorate them with scrapbook and construction paper, markers, and stickers. Once their cans were decorated, they wrote nice notes to each other to put in others' cans.

It was really interesting to see how some of the kids had been affected by the domestic violence around them. One child, in particular, had a skewed definition of kindness that sounded more like obedience and respect for authority. Interestingly, even though he was so emphatic about the importance of not interrupting and not misbehaving, he was incredibly disruptive and rude at times. I think this activity was helpful though.

In the future, I would like to do more activities like this one. Because fewer children are coming on the weekly basis, we can have more meaningful activities like this instead of chasing down kids and running to Little Caesars for more pizza. I also like that it helps the children to develop social skills and talents that may be hindered because of their situation. Furthermore, doing this activity has helped the children grow closer together and improve our understanding of them as volunteers.