Character Development-Kindness

Kindness

“Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.” – Ephesians 4:32

I am really enjoying focusing on one character development trait each week with the boys. This week we are focusing on kindness.

At the beginning of each week, we make our character development card to add to the refrigerator.  I allow the boys to choose the colored note card and sticker letters to use.

I then helped them sound out "kindness." Then I write the Bible verse on the card.   We'll spend this week learning the word, meaning and memorizing the scripture.

JP did a great job sounding out kindness. I was happily impressed!

All 7 character traits so far. I love seeing them all each time I enter the kitchen. It really keeps me accountable too!

As I wrote the scripture on the card for the boys I then remembered other places this verse is in our home. A few years ago I was inspired by  Deuteronomy 6:5-9  which says "⁵ Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. ⁶ These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. ⁷ Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. ⁸ Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. ⁹ Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates." At that time I typed scriptures that were important to my husband and I and placed them above the light switches in our home. I did this in our first home over ten years ago. When we moved into this current home, I didn't hang them again, no real reason why. Recently, my husband asked me if I still had those cards and if I could hang them up again. Thankfully, I knew right where they were and happily placed them above the light switches again. He and I have both enjoyed seeing the verses again. As I wrote Ephesians 4:32 I remembered that it is hanging right here in our living room:

Not the greatest pic with all the white, some day we hope to add some color to our home and paint. :)

I also use this special tile board that was given to me years ago as a gift to write our memory verse each week. This sits in a prominent place in the kitchen where we all see it.

Kindness in Books:
Each of these books have challenged us to be kind.

Kindness with Toothpaste:
I found this visual demonstration of kindness with words at Meaningful Mama.

We talked about the importance of words.  We talked about how you can say something, but once it’s heard the bad effects have already started to take place.  We talked about what nice words look like and how they make us feel.  We also talked about how mean words might make us feel.  Next, I told the boys to start squeezing the toothpaste out of the tube.  Then, I had them try to put it back in.  I gave them toothpicks to help. Of course, this was a blast but unsuccessful.  After that exercise, we talked about our words being similar.  Once our words come out of our mouths, we cannot stop what has been heard, and it can have really hurtful effects on the people around us.  You can ask for forgiveness, but those words can still can still hurt others. 

JP is quite perplexed that the toothpaste won't go back in!!

Kindness in random acts:
We decided to leave our faithful mailman a bag of cookies as a random act of kindness. We have left treats for him before, so thankfully he will accept baked goodies from us. :) The boys were so cute as we were returning home they ran to the mailbox to make sure he had gotten the cookies!

I loved browsing ideas for random acts of kindness at http://www.randomactsofkindness.org/. There are so many ideas there! We will have to continue to work on this skill.

I also found another great resource at When You Rise to help with scripture memorization for young children. She has a printable with this exact verse! I am so excited and can't wait to print it and show it to the boys!

I have also been diligent this week in noticing kind things that they boys are doing for each other or for me and I have heard them say to each other, "That was kind, Bubba!" So heartwarming!

Linked up at these parties this week!

Thoughtfulness-Character Development

This week we have focused on thoughtfulness. I want to train my boys to be thoughtful, kind, and considerate. We discussed the meaning of being thoughtful is showing consideration for others; considerate. We have also been focusing on learning this verse: 

"So in everything, do unto others what you would have them do to you." - Matthew 7:12

We made our thoughtful card together. This week I printed the word, meaning and verse on card stock. Then JP decided he wanted to decorate it with apple trees! Quite thoughtful of him! I found clear plastic magnetic frames that we aren't using anymore and thought these would be perfect to hold our cards and keep them on the refrigerator. Then we can all see them on a regular basis.

We then baked homemade brownies to go with our color of the week. As we were quickly getting ready to go see Daddy at work one afternoon I reminded the boys that we could be thoughtful and share these brownies with the other coaches at Daddy's school and the boys were so thrilled to be thoughtful. I think they truly enjoyed thinking of someone else. We talked a lot about how the treat would make the other person feel. And oops, I forgot to take a picture of our baking adventure and our giving of the treats. Oh well. :)

I also decided to start an "I caught you being good!" chart. I wrote "JP can..." and "CA can.." although I used their real names on it instead of their blog names, therefore I won't be able to show you a picture of it. Sorry. :( I have then been putting a sticker with an affirmation of what they did right on the chart. One thing I learned from my teaching days is that children love validation, affirmation, and positive reinforcement.   So far today, JP's chart says "JP can give compliments." During calendar time this morning JP told CA what a great job he was doing being the calendar helper. It was precious! CA's chart says "CA can say please.". I plan to keep this posted on the refrigerator as a way to see their progress. This is also helping me to praise the boys specifically. I hope this makes sense even without a visual.

Hoping my children become more thoughtful,
Trina

Self Control-Character Development

I have found another amazing blogging mama who has inspired me! Her name is Jodi at Meaningful Mama. Her blog is a 365 day challenge to be intentional. She writes because she wants to be a meaningful mama. And so do I. Each day she shares an activity, a parenting tip and a character development idea. How she finds the time to blog 3x a day I don't know!

One thing that has really inspired me are her character development tips. She has shared about perseverance, patience and self control. This week I jumped on board with her in teaching my children about self control. Who could use more of that? Me and my precious boys!

It was fun to make a "self control" card with our scripture for it on the back.  We talked about the definition of self control and what it looks like in our family and home. We watched a character builders dvd with self control highlighted in it. We read books from the library and we role played a lot. Once when one of the boys were in time out for hitting I asked him, "What did you do wrong?" To which he replied, "I hit and didn't use self control." I thought, well it's working.

Front of our card that we've kept on the fridge.

Back of the card with 1 Peter 5:8 on it.

The Character Builders dvd we watched.

 Here are a few of the books we've read this week. Some of them discuss feelings but that's ok too. My favorite was Keep Your Cool! which really discussed examples of ways to use self control.

I want to develop the character of our children and teach them the Fruits of the Spirit. Even self control is hard for me on certain days, especially when I am trying to be gentle and not yell. I have to control my own urges to not lose my temper.