Kindness Ideas For Kids?

--by twiceblessed, posted Dec 5, 2007

My aunt just asked me for some kindness ideas, so I tossed together this list ...

Free Car Wash: I saw this story for a 10th birthday and it seems like a grand time!

Miles of Smiles: stand on busy street intersections with "smile" posters. Non-stop fun. :)

Clean-up Public Places: help clean a beach or a local park, adopt a highway. Extra credit if you can take some of that waste and create a public art piece (see garden-art from trash).

Balloon stand: hand out free balloons with smiley-art on the balloons and perhaps even on your faces. :)

Plant trees: visit Arbor Day Foundation -- "We inspire people to plant, nurture, and celebrate trees" -- to find local organizations that can help you plant. You could also volunteer to help out with a community garden -- small plots of land, farmed collectively.

Lemonade stand: a gift-economy lemonade stand that has a role for people of all ages! (On a related note, Stopping at Every Lemonade Stand is a great book that talks about lemonade stands as an investment in the next-generation's civic engagement and leadership).

Volunteer to mow your neighbor's lawn and clean up their yards. Picking flowers from their gardens, you can flower arrangements that can be anonymously dropped off on various doorsteps.

Creatively share stories of inspiring kids. Watch videos of inspiring kids like 6-year-old Ryan who started an entire movement of bringing clean water to African villages.

Collect unused greeting cards from family and friends, decorate them with personalized "have-a-nice-day" messages and send it to random addresses from the white pages, or give to someone unexpected. Alternatively, you can make thank-you cards for the bus-drivers or other underappreciated public servants.

Visit a local orphanage or a homeless shelter, and do some activities with them. You could also donate toys (some "old" and some favorites) to commemorate a birthday, or perhaps bake some brownies collectively and gift it to the group.

Issue a challenge to all kids to visit a mall and make someone's day for under 5 bucks.

Print out Smile-Stones poem, put smiley faces on some stones, put it in an envelope and hand them out to strangers in a public place. Or leave them on tables at a coffee shop. Depending on your budget, you can even hand out different things, like Raisinettes. :)

Lots more ideas are online at helpothers.org/ideas.php

If you have any to add, do leave a comment and I'll keep this list updated!

6721 Reads

Posted by twiceblessed
Dec 5, 2007
Comments (6)

Readers Comments

sydney wrote: This is a great list! I especially like the one about handing out free balloons with smiley-art on the balloons.

Another idea could be a free bake sale with smiley-art decorating the cookies and cakes.

katlampi wrote: These are really great ideas! I especially like the part about lemonade stands :)

harry wrote: wow that's a good idea .thanks for making such a list and sharing it with us

Alraisi wrote: Nice list. These are very simple things but the effect will be very big. Thanx for sharing...!!! Keep It Up...!!!
Alraisi...

Nakamura216 wrote: Adding to the Miles of Smiles idea. As an everday kindness act, you could decorate a piece of paper with smiles or just the word smile, and tape it to your car window or your bumper. I've seen some great responses from this. Also, it takes a bit more space, but you could put "Smile, It's Contagious" of course you would look up the spelling because I'm pretty sure that's not it.

Stories of Kindness from Around the World