Monday, May 6, 2013

Stinky Choices and Growing Kindness

If you are reading this, THANK YOU for sticking around. I cannot believe it has been so long since my last post. I think I just was in a funk. I am going to really try and do a better job about blogging. I guess part of me still worries about whether I have anything worthy to blog about.

I love hearing my class talk about Our School Family. Well, the brothers and sisters in Our School Family have been getting a little fussy with each other. So I wanted to take our job of the Kindness Recorder and do something special with it.

This is one of my favorite jobs. The Kindness Recorder looks for kind acts to add a kind flower to our flower pot.


The Kindness Recorder will tell the person who did or said the kind thing
 I am going to add you a kind flower for ________________.
The person it is being added for answers
Thank you for noticing that.

So, I thought we needed to grow some more kindness and trash our stinky, unkind choices. We were going to get some help from Freddy the Friendly Frog.


I forgot to take a picture of Freddy but here are some realistic frogs you could use. The one I have is from Wal-Mart and a little bigger than these. =)


{updated}
Here is the letter we got from Freddy. I forgot to take a picture of the package and all of the goodies.  =(


We needed to start by talking about trash and how no one wants to be around it because it stinks. No one likes to play around trash . If you hang around trash, you might start to stink too. Would you rather be around flowers or trash?

We then talked about how our behavior can be stinky even though we have a kind heart...no one might notice it over the smell of our stinky choices.

Next, it was time to sort the cards Freddy the Friendly Frog left us. We sorted our cards by whether it was something that someone with a kind heart would do or something that a person who was making a stinky choice would do.
In the picture it says stinky heart but in the packet it says stinky choice. I forgot to take the picture after I changed it.


We talked about stinky choices that others had made that hurt and wrinkled our hearts. I told the kiddos that it is easy to think of the things that others have done toward us but we needed to look at the things WE have done that were stinky choices. We then wrote about those choices. Some of them were so funny. It was like a confessional. Some of them went on and on about things they had done. 

Here is where threw away our stinky choices.


Isn't this precious??? =)


After everyone threw away their stinky choices, we talked about growing kindness and how it starts from the heart. We talked about how we can show others we care about them by having a kind heart. The kiddos then made a kind flower and wrote on the petals ways they could be kind.



Freddy also brought us some flowers so we could remember to always be kind. =)



I bought my flower toys that Our Kindness Recorder uses several years ago at the Target Dollar Spot. I think I see them there every summer. If not, here is a link where you can buy some. =)

Click on the Growing Kindness picture above to download this lesson. =)

Be sure and head over to TPT this Tuesday and Wednesday for a HUGE Sale.


Thank you Beth for this adorable sale sign. =)

Be sure and check out her store. She is amazing. =)

I would love for you to leave me some kindness. =)

From My Heart to Yours,