Sharing and Caring

What is sharing

• Sharing is giving, service, love, helpfulness.
• Sharing is kindness, generosity, unselfishness, sacrifice.

Ways to show you care and can share:

• With your actions
• With your words
• With your thoughts
• With material gifts

With your actions

• You might make your parents' bed, rake leaves off the lawn, tutor a younger child, open a door for someone, or sit with someone unpopular at lunch.
• Spend an hour listening to a lonely person.
• Be helpful and kind to someone who needs a hand.

With your words

• Say kind things to and about other people.
• Offer advice when it's wanted and sympathy when it's needed.
• Don't spread gossip, rumors, or cruel stories, even if they are true.
• Sometimes silence is golden; sometimes the kindest words are those that aren't spoken.

With your thoughts

• Positive thoughts and prayers can be very powerful.
• You can do an act of kindness for another person merely by thinking good thoughts about him or her.
• Other people will feel the positive thoughts you sent their way.

With material gifts

• Try giving household items to the homeless or poor, donating trees to your community, buying a shirt for your brother or chocolates for a friend.
• Don't limit your gifts to special occasions (charity drives, birthdays, holidays).
• Give when you're in the mood and when you're not. Do it just because.

Activities

• Write in your journal about a time when someone was kind to you or did a service for you. How did you feel?
• Read a biography about a famous philanthropist - someone who has dedicated his or her life to improving the lives of others.
• Learn about the welfare system.
• Research how other countries have cared for their citizens through history in times of greatest need such as disasters, wars, poverty, illness.
• Do a "secret service" or a project in which you do something nice for others without telling them.
• Write your own "random acts" of sharing book.
• Brainstorm a list of possible needs and wants for various people. Help fulfill those needs.
• Start a kindness "chain reaction."
• Write a skit about sharing and ways to serve others.
• Make "I Care" kits - for a new student, for people who have suffered a misfortune such as a loss of a pet, home.
• Collect songs about caring and sharing.
• Be a caring team player. Brainstorm ways to support team members when they make mistakes, have poor skills, or insult each other.

Start a service project

1. Research your project.
2. Form a team.
3. Find a sponsor.
4. Make a plan.
5. Consider the recipient.
6. Decide where you will perform your service.
7. Get any permissions you need to proceed.
8. Advertise.
9. Fund-raise if necessary.
10. When your project has ended, evaluate it. Reflect and see what has been accomplished. Are there things that can be improved the next time?

For Grades K-3

The Giving Tree - Silverstein

One Gift Deserves Another - Oppenheim

Tit for Tat - Van Woekrom

Harriet's Halloween Candy - Carlson

One of Each - Hoberman

The Boy Who Dreamed of an Acorn - Casler

Dragon Scales and Willow Leaves - Givens

The Mitten Tree - Christiansen

The Eagle's Gift - Martin

Alejandro's Gift - Albert

Angel Child, Dragon Child - Surat

The Doorbell Rang - Hutchins

The Legend of the Bluebonnet - De Paola

The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry and the Big Hungry Bear - Wood

The Mother's Day Mice - Bunting

The Rainbow Fish - Pfister

What Mary Jo Shared - Udry

The Velveteen Rabbit - Williams

Little Drummer Boy - Davis

Through Grandpa's Eyes - MacLachlan

Emmet Otter's Jug Band Christmas - Hoban

Apple Picking Time - Slawson

How Many Days to America? - Bunting

Want to Play - Moss

Thomas the Tank Engine books - Awdry

Ribbon Rescue - Munsch

The Table Where Rich People Sit - Baylor

Giving - Hughes

Sam and the Lucky Money - Chinn

The Book of Giving: Poems of Thanks, Praise, and Celebration - Chorao

For Grades 3-6

A Christmas Carol - Dickens

The Value of Sharing: the Story of the Mayo Brothers - Johnson

Dominic - Steig

The Gift of the Magi - O'Henry

The Patchwork Quilt - Flournoy

Robin Hood - Pyle

Sarah, Plain and Tall - MacLachlan

Summer of the Monkeys - Rawls

Johnny Appleseed

The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar & Six More - Dahl

Guests - Dorris

Dicey's Song - Voigt

Monkey Island - Fox

Sarah Bishop - O'Dell

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