The first book we read was Do Unto Otters by Laurie Keller. “Do Unto Otters” by Laurie Keller is a delightful children’s book that uses humor and illustrations to teach the golden rule: “Do unto otters as you would have them do unto you.” The story follows Mr. Rabbit, who is anxious about his new neighbors, the Otters. With the help of wise advice from a wise owl, Mr. Rabbit learns about the importance of kindness, respect, and understanding in building friendships and fostering a harmonious community. The book presents essential social skills in a fun and accessible way, making it a valuable resource for teaching empathy and manners to young readers. As we read the story out loud I paused to reflect on ways to be kind. After reading the story the students responded to the reading by answering the question “How can we be kind?” with an example from the story.

For our next kindness activities for preschoolers, we read the book Be Kind by Pat Zietlow Miller and discussed the problem and solution in the story. “Be Kind” by Pat Zietlow Miller is a heartfelt picture book that explores the many ways children can show kindness in their everyday lives. The story follows a young girl who reflects on what it means to be kind after witnessing a classmate spill juice on her dress. Through simple, thoughtful examples, the book emphasizes empathy, compassion, and the impact of small acts of kindness on others. With gentle text and charming illustrations by Jen Hill, “Be Kind” encourages readers to consider how their actions can make the world a better place. Once we discussed the problem and solution the kids illustrated them on the worksheet.

On Wednesday we read the book The Big Umbrella by Amy June Bates. “The Big Umbrella” by Amy June Bates is a charming and inclusive picture book that celebrates kindness and acceptance. The story revolves around a big, friendly umbrella that offers shelter to anyone in need, regardless of who they are or where they come from. As the rain falls, the umbrella welcomes a diverse group of characters, emphasizing that there is always room for everyone under its wide, protective canopy. With its simple yet profound message and heartwarming illustrations, the book teaches young readers the importance of generosity, inclusivity, and community. For this book, we talked about character traits. I discussed character traits in a preschool-friendly way and then had them illustrate the main character and write some traits around it.

The final of our reading kindness activities for preschoolers was our alphabet, emergent readers. This week’s focus was the letter K for kindness. The students tracked the print as they read through the book.

For our kindness activities for preschool, we did 5 days of literacy activities. Our first literacy activity was a kindness write the room. This is a great activity to get students up and moving around! I placed the kindness cards around the room and students had to search for them correctly copying them on their papers when they found them.

On Tuesday we worked on letter recognition with this cover the letter mat. This activity focuses on identifying the lowercase letter and matching it to the uppercase letter on the mat. Students will cover the letters with a small object for this activity I used small pink pom poms that I found on Amazon.

We used our heart letters to do some tactile writing in our sand tray. The kids picked up a letter, said the name out loud, and wrote it in the sand. After writing the letter they cleared the sand and moved on to the next one.

The next of our kindness activities for preschoolers was secret picture tiles. These fun sheets focused on upper and lowercase letter matching. Depending on the level of your students they may need assistance to cut out the tiles. When the tiles are matched up a secret picture emerges. There are two versions in this kindness unit.

The final kindness literacy activity is kindness writing prompts. There are 3 included prompts for students to respond to about kindness and what they have learned this week. They can illustrate and write responses and a teacher can help as needed with the responses.

For our kindness activities for preschool, we did 5 days of math activities beginning with mail-counting clip cards. These clip cards focused on identifying and counting the numbers 0-10. The kids used their fine motor skills to clip clothespins to the cards to show which number they chose as their answer.

Our second math activity for our kindness unit was a roll and cover. We used two dice and a bingo marker. The students took turns rolling the dice, adding the numbers on their dice, and then covering the number on their board with the bingo marker—the student who covers all their numbers first wins.

We combined math and art with our color-by-number in our next kindness activities for preschoolers. This activity focused on the numbers 1-10. The kids had to match the numbers and color in the area where that number was located leaving a nice picture colored in.

The fourth of our math kindness activities for preschoolers was a shape sort. We started this lesson by talking about different shapes, their names, and their characteristics. Then the students had to match the shapes with the corresponding card.

Our final math activity was kindness ten frames. I laminate these for future use. The students use a dry-erase marker to trace the number. Then they place the number of objects into the ten frame. Finally, they count out another of that number to place it in the heart.

The first of our kindness activities for preschoolers in our sensory, science, social, and art was a kindness calendar. This obviously takes longer than one day and can span the month. There are 30 squares on the calendar with small kindness tasks. Some of the tasks are repeated. It is the goal for your students to fill out the calendar completely.

Our next activity was a kindness sort. In this activity, students had to decide which things were kind and which things were unkind. Before we began the sort we had a discussion about what it means to be kind.

We discussed our community and those living in it. We talked about how we can spread joy to others and one way to do that is to create cards to send to members within. The students spent some time creating cards for people in our community. We brought them to our senior center but there are many places where you can deliver cards within your community.

The final of our kindness activities for preschoolers was a symmetry heart. I had precut hearts from white paper, paint, and paintbrushes. This is a great activity for fine motor practice and discussing symmetry. The finished hearts make a great bulletin board display as well!