In addition to your efforts to build communities of thankfulness in your classroom, it is important to extend those concepts to students’ families to strengthen the school-home connection. There are a few ways you can do this. One way is by encouraging them to read stories about thankfulness at home. You can identify books or create a thankfulness reading list that can be shared out in your class newsletter or website. We can verbalize through phone calls to families some good things we are observing being done by their children in the classroom that we are grateful for, such as showing kindness to their peers or helping with a task in the classroom.
These can alternatively be shared out as emails or notes home. To provide opportunities for families to demonstrate their gratitude, we can welcome them in the classroom to volunteer, as well as provide jobs that can be done from the home, for those unable to come in. Home jobs can include cutting out shapes, preparing photos or coordinating classroom events. This helps to further strengthen the connections to the home, through practice of thankfulness and gratitude. You can then model your thankfulness and that of the class, when you schedule volunteer celebrations at the end of the year to show how much the volunteer’s work is appreciated.
These practices demonstrate how as educators we can experience a shift in mindset to positive thoughts associated with thankfulness. By sharing these strategies and additional opportunities for students to practice thankfulness, we are also helping their personal development. Recent research suggests 10 to 19-year-old students who practice acts of gratitude feel more positive emotions and connected to their community.**
As we continue with our month to recharge our thinking on thankfulness, we will be sharing some thoughts from faculty and staff on gratitude in the field of education. Want more? Check out all of the articles from Teaching Tuesday and return each week for a new post. Learn more about Grand Canyon University’s College of Education and our education degree programs and join in our efforts to elevate the education profession.
Retrieved from:
*James Stanfield, Teaching the Gratitude Mindset in November 2021.
**Colorado State University Extension, Role-modeling Thankfulness in November 2021.