What is a kindness bucket?
Based on the book "Have You Filled a Bucket Today?" by Carol McCloud and illustrated by David Messing, the idea of a kindness bucket came along. This book encourages positive behaviour and approaches using the concept of an invisible bucket to show how easy and rewarding it is to express kindness, appreciation and love by ‘filling buckets’.
Why is kindness important to cultivate in children at a young age?
Cultivating kindness in children at a young age helps them feel good about themselves and builds a positive and growth mindset. It also helps them understand the differences around them and encourages themselves and others. While it is important to teach children in meaningful ways to be kind, we also have to remind them to be kind to themselves.
How does a kindness bucket work?
Get children to create their own buckets using a paper/plastic cup. Get them to decorate their cups to their own liking. Make wholes on the two sides of the cup and attach a string. Tie the ends of the string so that it can be held like a bucket.
Twice a week, get children to write a kindness note and post it to the bucket. This would usually work best if there are others (adults/children) who have buckets around. Children write a kindness note to a person once a week and place it in the person’s bucket. On the next occasion, children write a note to themselves. This will teach them the importance of loving/caring for themselves.
Notes can be something like thanking someone for something they did, encouraging someone, or telling someone that they did an amazing job at something.
Benefits of kindness bucket?
Children learn how to be thoughtful and look out for others around them.
Children look forward to reading their notes and feel good about themselves.
Children learn how to appreciate people and things around them.
Find out more about Astor International School by booking a tour here.