Lindsay Erin: 26RAK Project

Monday, January 14, 2013

26RAK Project

Tales from the Teacher's Lounge

Shortly after the sad events at Sandy Hook, I came across a website about sending ornaments to the town for the trees outside the school in honor of each victim. I immediately dropped what I was doing in my own classroom and got out all the glue, glitter, construction paper, and markers I could get my hands on and set up a station in the room for kids to make their ornaments to send.

Sweater: Gap (old, similar), Dress: Target, Tights: Bass (old), Boots: Jessica Simpson via Amazon,
Jewelry: Stella&Dot

I was very impressed with the response and compassion my students showed for the victims. We had many discussions about the horrific event and I know that my students were truly touched by it.

As most teachers do, we take these moments in time and turn them into teachable moments using them to create learning experiences that are captivating and inspiring. After seeing the way my students banded together to create the ornaments in a very short time, I started thinking about Ann Curry's 26 random acts of kindness tweet that has since gone viral.

I figured they would really hop on board with a project that revolved around charitable acts. I am so impressed with the way things are taking off. I can't wait to share more with you as we work on the project and choose an appropriate way to present it.

I encourage all teachers reading this to take these real-life situations and turn them into more teachable moments. I have students that "don't care" about anything truly invested in this. They have come up with acts of kindness ranging from taking the neighbor's trash to the road to going into the self-contained special education classroom to work with the students and read them books.

It's a valuable lesson for all of us to realize what a little kindness can do for someone. Even more valuable to know that a random act of kindness is free and rewarding for both giver and recipient.