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For the final week of this series about practicing gratitude, I am going to bring it back to the classroom. I will be sharing with you activities for teaching your students about gratitude. Instilling the idea of practicing gratitude in your students will cultivate a kinder community in your classroom that will, hopefully, lead to kinder adults in the future. I know many may feel it is not our job to teach this, but, sometimes, we may be the only adults in a child’s life that will. And for the ones who are taught and shown this at home, it will make the home-school connection grow even stronger.
1. Halloween Kindness Challenge from Coffee and Carpool: Raising Kind Kids
This post includes ideas for teaching students what kindness is. Then, the author shares a FREE pumpkin recording sheet for a kindness challenge. The idea is for students to be caught being kind to someone else, then the student gets to color or cross off a pumpkin. When the sheet is filled up, the student gets a reward like a pumpkin cookie or a piece of pumpkin pie. The post, also, has links to other kindness challenge sheets to use throughout the year.
2. Gratitude Calendar and Journal from Proud to be Primary
My last post suggested starting a gratitude journal. Why can’t students do it, too? The author of this post shares both a free calendar and gratitude journal template by signing up for her newsletter. The journal has two versions: daily or weekly. The calendar has four options to choose from: one that gives a topic, one that the student picks their own daily topic, and one where the student will write what s/he is thankful for.
3. Our Thankful Trees from Simply Kinder
When I was a classroom teacher, I used this one every year! It’s a great math activity coupled with the students writing what they are thankful for. Students get to write, color, cut, glue, and add! My students found it extremely fun and Ioved hanging their trees out in the hallway. Before beginning the activity we always read a book about being thankful and came up with ideas that I wrote on chart paper. That way my students already had a bank of ideas to go off of. Look at the next one for book ideas!
4. 10 Terrific Turkey Day Read Alouds for Grades PreK-2 from Teacher By Day (aka ME!)
One of the best ways to teach about what being thankful means is by reading books where thankfulness is the theme! This post includes two books about gratitude for young learners. The Thankful Book by Todd Parr and Bear Says Thanks by Karma Wilson. It, also, includes 9 more terrific books to read to your students before Thanksgiving!
5. 8 Gratitude Picture Books and Stories for Upper Elementary Students from Think, Grow, Giggle
If you teach in upper grades, this is an excellent list of books to read-aloud to your students! It gives a synopsis of each book and how to use it with your students. Gratitude is my Superpower by Alicia Ortego is especially delightful!
6. 5 Simple Gratitude Activities for the Classroom from Erin Waters Education
All of the activities in the post really are simple and easy to implement in your classroom! I especially like the idea of discussing ways to say thank you in other languages. With the influx of multilingual learners in our schools, this is a great way to promote a sense of belonging for all of our students wherever they may come from.
7. I Am Thankful Writing Freebie from Natalie Lynn Kindergarten
This is a very basic printable, but cute! I used this one when I taught kindergarten. It has space to write what the student is thankful and why. It, also, includes a space inside of a turkey to draw a small picture. Students can, then, color the turkey however they choose.
8. 12 Days of Christmas Kindness from Whimsy Workshop Teaching
This is a great one to print and send home! I reduced the size when I printed to fit two to a page. Students get to cut a piece of Santa’s beard off once the activity is completed that is printed on it. I sent it home right around the 12 days until Christmas, so the students could be kind up until the big day! When using this activity, be sure all the families in your classroom celebrate Christmas or are, at least, ok with their children learning about Santa.
Conclusion
That concludes my round-up of fantastic and free activities for practicing gratitude in the classroom! I hope you found one or more that you want to try in your classroom this year. Let me know in the comments how they go for you.
For more on gratitude, last week I shared 5 Practical Ways to Practice Gratitude and the previous week was about 5 Ways Practicing Gratitude Makes Your Life Better. If you missed them, be sure to click the links to give them a read. Furthermore, with Thanksgiving Break nearly upon us, check out this popular post on Thanksgiving Brain Breaks to Get Pre-Holiday Wiggles Out.
