February 17th kicked off Random Acts of Kindness Week, and we’re here with some suggestions for what you can do. Take this opportunity to teach your kids to be kind with actions instead of words, by committing to doing one every day with them.
Want to earn some some bonus kindness points? Do them without blasting the news across social media, which will prove to your kids—and yourself—that you’re doing this for the acts, themselves, not the accolades. Here are 21 easy acts of kindness to get you started.
21 Things You Can Do for Someone During Random Acts of Kindness Week
1. Find a particularly good photo you’ve taken of them at some point, print it out, frame it, and give it to them on a day that’s not a holiday or birthday.
2. Cut all the Box Tops off of everything in your home, and give them to a teacher you know whose school could use the additional funding.
3. Make a busy friend a full day’s worth of meals for their family in freezer-ready packaging with reheating instructions included, from breakfast bread to soup to lasagna and dessert.
4. Leave a pretty, low-maintenance potted plant or something plucked from your own herb garden in a hand-designed pot on the doorstep of someone you hear is having a hard time.
5. Help a solo parent carry a stroller up/down stairs at the subway.
6. Over-tip your server.
7. Shovel their driveway after a storm without them needing to ask.
8. Rave about their small business/work/store/services publicly to help drum them up some new customers.
9. Know a graduating senior applying to colleges for a degree in your career field? Write a letter of recommendation that praises their potential for success and their character, make a few copies, then leave it in their mailbox.
10. Keep extra umbrellas in your car, so if someone walks by without one on a rainy day, you can simply give them one.
11. Volunteer with your kid(s) anywhere that could use some extra hands.
12. Give a genuine compliment to a total stranger.
13. Teach a senior citizen how to be more tech-savvy so they can better communicate with their family via cellphone and social media.
14. Give a coffee shop gift card to the person outside the shop looking in like they wish they could be in there buying something (not the person behind you who has the money in hand to buy something there, already).
15. Stock up a little free library that’s not in your neighborhood, or the “take one, leave one” bookshelf in a local café.
16. Offer to walk a neighbor’s dog.
17. If people are trying to take a selfie, offer to take the photo for them.
18. Go to the park, playground, beach, or other public area, and pick up litter.
19. Let someone go ahead of you in line, even if you’re in a rush. (We’re all in a rush.)
20. Pay attention to those around you, so if someone needs a tissue, toothpick, toilet paper plucked from their shoe, you can be the person to help them out.
21. Write a thank you card to the mom friend who means more to you than you have ever articulated to them before. Have your kids do the same to someone who means a lot to them.
