Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Sowing the Seeds of Kindness
This week all across the country people are celebrating National Kindness Week. Our awesome case worker has planned some activities for students and teachers; the main feature of the week being a door decorating contest. Each classroom was given the task to choose a children's book that exemplified kindness and decorate the door accordingly. My students and I pored over stacks of books in the classroom. So many possibilities. How would we ever choose? We wanted everyone to take part in the door design, so that would be a determining factor. Through our literacy work together this year, students have been digging deeper for meaning, noticing metaphors and symbolism, so I was hoping to choose a title that nudged our thinking. We decided to mull it over for the weekend. Some time Saturday, during a browse through one of my favorite quilt shops, the book came to me. Hmmm, I thought how about Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney? The Lupine Lady a beloved character, finds a way later in life to make the world a more beautiful place, certainly a kind act. As we talked about the book, we realized that The Lupine Lady made her mark in the world in many ways as she traveled, making friends and helping others. She was sowing the seeds of kindness long before she planted those lupine seeds. We found our book and children have been busy writing kindness quotes, decorating seed packets, making tissue paper lupines and much more. Of course, like so many projects, this has taken way longer than I anticipated, but like I told the children, I really don't mind. The work they are doing is priceless. We can catch up on math and science tomorrow. Their words of kindness and satisfied feelings of accomplishment made it a memorable day for sure. "I can help with that." "I'm done, so what else can I do?" "Wow, that looks great!" "Our door is going to look great!" "I'm having so much fun, it doesn't even matter if we win." As one wise student said, sow the seeds of kindness wherever you go.