A Month of Gratitude with Kids: Teach Kindness, Love, and Thanks

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Holy moly. Halloween is over, Thanksgiving is near, and Christmas is right around the corner. It’s been a whirlwind of a month over here with what seems like a thousand Halloween celebrations and a pretty major trip to Disney World. We are incredibly blessed to be able to travel as a family and provide for our children, they don’t go without very often. I have had this idea of a month of gratitude in the back of my mind for a while now, but with all of the ‘stuff’ my children have received or experienced over the last couple of weeks the idea has been solidified…chiseled in stone. I want to give my kids the world, but I also want to help them appreciate what they have, and the people in their lives. Throughout the month, we will do an act of gratitude a day. Last year for the Christmas season, we made an advent calendar with acts of kindness. Mack still talks about that often, asking if we can do ‘actus kindess’ again. I have a list of activities and prompts that we will follow each day to complete a task. My son loves surprises and unveiling toys right now, so to make this exciting for him, I am creating a gratitude board that he gets to open each day.

As you can see, my board is incredibly basic. I raided the recycling bin and found two pieces of cardboard that I could match up together. Using a box cutter and a sharpie, I numbered squares and cut little flaps (much like a lift the flap book) and wrote our gratitude activity on the piece underneath. With a little glue in between the two pieces, we had a simple DIY gratitude board.

I will be blogging about some of the activities, so make sure to subscribe here or follow us on Facebook to see details about our activities. If I don’t get to full blog posts, I’ll be talking about our activities on Instagram and Periscope 🙂 I would love for you to join us! Use the hashtag #AMonthOfGratitude so that I can see how you are teaching gratitude to your little ones!

So here they are, our 30 days of gratitude for kids!

1. Make a gratitude jar.

2. Create a thankful turkey wreath.

3. Go on a gratitude walk.

4. Make a gratitude sensory bin.

5. Write letters of thanks to community workers.

6. Read books about being thankful.

7. Make a gratitude photo album with disposable cameras.

8. Do some charity work.

9. Donate toys to a family in need.

10. Sponsor a child from another country.

11. Draw a thank you picture for teachers.

12. Bake cookies for firefighters.

13. The Giving Tree activity.

14. Tell someone thank you.

15. Collect your treasures in a basket and talk about why they are important to you.

16. Look through family photo albums.

17. Say a prayer for someone.

18. Read books about other cultures.

19. Make gratitude stones to keep at the dinner table.

20. Make a collage of what you are thankful for.

21. Make a gratitude reinforcement jar, add a marble to the jar when someone in the family shows gratitude.

22. Make a family tree and write one nice thing about each person.

23.  Make erupting hearts, a visualization of overwhelming love.

24. Create potato stamp hearts for a gratitude garland.

25. Look through a toy booklet, add up the prices, and talk about the value of money.

26. Donate warm clothing to those in need.

27. Make a gratitude affirmation dice.

28. Write thank you letters to soldiers.

29. Build a graham cracker house. Discuss being thankful for a home.

30. Bake cupcakes for the dogs.

 

Post this picture and follow along on Instagram using the #AMonthOfGratitude to share in the love. I will be featuring posts on my page.

Do you have anything you would add to our list? How are you teaching gratitude?

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