How to make a Kindness Tree: Practicing Kindness with Toddlers

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Kindness can be a difficult concept for kids to grasp. Being considerate of others does not always come naturally. Just like any other virtue, it must be modeled and practiced. Making a kindness tree with your kids provides a visual representation, ignites motivation, and encourages positive habits.

Playing is learning.

With this in mind, creating a kindness tree gives an element of play to learning and developing a life skill. Teaching the life skill of kindness to your kids helps instill a deeply rooted attitude of tenderness and compassion towards other people. While a kindness tree is beneficial for any day of the year, we chose to build our kindness tree at the beginning of February, leading up to Valentine’s Day.

Let’s create a kindness tree together. Scroll down for instructions and activities.

First, Explore. Then, Collect.

First, get outdoors, seek treasures, and gather inspiration for your kindness tree. It is the middle of winter. So, flowers are few. But, there are pine cones galore which is great because my kids adore pine cones. Therefore, we collected sticks and pine cones for our kindness tree. I did end up glueing pine cones to sticks and also snagged some clearance flowers at the market.

My kids wanted to keep making kindness trees, so we decorated pine cones with leftover craft scraps and planted sticks in a jar. I present to you: our cute mini-kindness trees. Honestly, one of my babies hugged them after she made them.

What is a kindness tree?

A kindness tree is a visual representation or rather a teaching tool to encourage and motivate kindness. There are many methods of creating a tree. I remember seeing brown construction paper twisted into branches while walking down the halls of my elementary school. The knotty paper branches were scattered with kind deeds written all over the leaves. While it is a most excellent thing to teach kindness in the classroom, we as moms and caregivers need to assist with this most weighty task of instilling this virtue in our kids. Do not feel confined by my instructions and activities. Rather, modify the kindness tree craft and the activities for your home.

How does a kindness tree work?

So, the basis of a typical kindness tree is discussion, discussing and creating lists of kind actions that kids can do. But, lecturing and listing does not necessarily create a positive habit. We need to put legs to those words.

Activity Ideas for a kindness tree

• Brainstorm and write down ways you can demonstrate kindness to others.
• Plan a 14-day calendar leading up to Valentine’s Day, writing down a kind act on each day.
• Every time a genuine kind act is displayed add a heart to the tree.
• Write a kind act on a heart and when that kind act is performed hang that specific heart on your tree.
• Label hearts with kind and encouraging words. Hang the hearts on your kindness tree and each day grab a heart and give it to someone who needs a word of affirmation or encouragement.
• Write portions of a memory verse on paper hearts. Hang the hearts on the tree and every day unscramble and recite the verse.
• While decorating your kindness tree, allot this time for discussing kindness or reading the Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37).
• Place your kindness tree somewhere in your home that you frequently pass by, reminding you to focus on kindness throughout your day or before you leave your home.

All of these activities encourage the habit of kindness while providing an element of play to learning a life skill. Associating the kindness tree with a mission assists us as moms and caregivers at being intentional and making the most of those teachable moments throughout the day.

What is the real meaning of kindness?

A quick search on Google reveals that kindness is being “friendly, generous, [and] considerate.” But kindness is more than being friendly; it is “goodness of the heart,” the serviceable good, gracious acts, pleasant company, generous words, and a merciful attitude. Kindness is the basic law of conduct instructed by Jesus in Matthew 22:39, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (ESV).

Kindness proceeds from godliness. It is choosing not to react in anger when we are hurt, irritated, or annoyed. Often kindness can be confused with weakness, but kindness is meekness.

Further, kindness found alone is permissible of all actions, tolerate of things that are deceitful and evil. It should be accompanied with other friends, fruitful friends such as: love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Kindness is a breath of fresh air in a world where smothering fears and anxieties are continuously growing.

Consequently, those last words left me feeling heavy. That’s not my intention. My intention is to walk alongside you as you teach your kids kindness. As adults and caregivers, we are to carry this heaviness. It is not the time to load our kids with the weight and burdens of the world’s fears and anxieties. Rather, it is the time to prepare and amend the soil of our children’s hearts. Childhood is the time to plant seeds of kindness and build positive habits.

What are 30 simple acts of kindness for kids to do?

This list of kind acts focuses on things that kids can easily do. Often times, I see lists of kind actions but they don’t seem very doable for young kids. So, here is our brief list that we brainstormed:

1. Help your siblings
2. Offer tissues to someone upset or sick
3. Teach someone a game or a skill
4. Weed the garden
5. Greet people with a smile
6. Place objects in the recycling bin
7. Allow others to go before you
8. Read a book to someone
9. Color and give someone a picture
10. Help your family cook and clean
11. Keep your toys and room organized
12. Offer hugs and high fives
13. Give compliments and words of encouragement
14. Listen to others talk and tell stories
15. Sit with someone who seems lonely or upset
16. Open the door for someone
17. Help someone carry objects
18. Share your toys
19. Take turns with others
20. Go on a walk with a friend
21. Leave happy notes around for others
22. Pick up trash
23. Send a letter
24. Return someone’s grocery cart
25. Say thank you to a Veteran
26. Practice good manners
27. Wave at a neighbor
28. Make a homemade gift for someone
29. Visit someone
30. Laugh with someone

How to teach Kindness to toddlers?

Teaching kids kindness is quite difficult and takes time. Kids truly learn the best when things are modeled for them. For this purpose, taking the time to put words into action alongside your kids will help instill the virtue of kindness. Creating a visual representation or a reminder like the kindness tree helps keep us accountable and focused.

Kindness Lesson in a nutshell:

• Define Kindness for kids with simple words
• Model Kindness alongside your kids
• Practice Kindness with your kids and with others
• Read and tell stories filled with kindness
• Make a kindness tree or other visual representation
• Memorize scripture with your kids
• Encourage kind actions even when it’s hard

What if my kindness is not reciprocated?

Unfortunately, kids will notice when others aren’t being kind and sometimes this is difficult to explain. Of course, our negative response to kindness is rooted in our sin nature. Just the other day while we were at the grocery store, my kids observed someone being rude and snappy with me when I was trying to be kind and help them find something in the store. My oldest child stated, “Mama, she doesn’t want to talk to you. She doesn’t like you.” These are the little teachable moments. It is good to remind kids that their kind acts are not always going to be reciprocated BUT we should continue on in kindness and love.

Why Continue in Kindness and Love?

Hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

Romans 5:5 (ESV)

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love on another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

John 13:34-35 (ESV)

Disclaimer: All activities on mudpieswithsprinkles.com require adult supervision. Some materials used in the crafts or play-based activities pose a choking hazard. Nobody knows your child better than you. Please modify all activities appropriately for your child. 

DIY: How to make a Kindness Tree

Materials:

• Container (vase, jar, cup, flower pot etc) to hold the kindness tree
• 2-4 sticks to create into a tree
• 1 brown paper sack (or recycled paper) for the hearts
• string to make the heart shaped ornaments for the tree
• scissors to cut out paper hearts

Optional: Add flowers, leaves or other nature finds to personalize your kindness tree. Craft pom-poms could be used to resemble colorful berries or budding flowers. Trim the tree with yarn, fairly lights, or even paint the sticks. You could even thread beads onto the string for more color. I have small kids. So, simple is best for us in this season of life.

Step by Step Instructions for a Homemade Kindness Tree

1. First, cut out the desired number of paper hearts from a brown paper sack. Snip a small hole in the top of each paper heart. You could paint, add text or numbers to the paper hearts, if desired.
2. Second, thread one piece of string (approximately 4-6 inches) into the hole you snipped on a paper heart. Tie the ends into a simple knot, making a paper heart ornament. Repeat this task until each heart has a string threaded through the hole and tied.
3. Next, place sticks into a container to form the tree. Add fillers as desired to personalize your tree. Hang the paper hearts onto the branches of your sticks.

I hope you enjoy your kindness tree like we do. Ours is on our mantel. And, boy does the testing of kindness come when you are intentional about building a gospel-centered home. Hang in there! I am still learning daily along with my kids. Seize those teachable moments, come alongside your kids, learn to be kind together, and seek direction from God for your family.

PIN IT FOR LATER!

Finally, I want to thank you for stopping by! Please say Hi in the comment section. Have you ever made a kindness tree? What visual methods have you used to teach kids to be kind?

– With Great Joy, Katie

Fun and Simple Crafts to do with your kids:

Pine Cone Snow Owl Craft

Simple Pine Cone Bird Feeder

Pine Cone Gnome