It's World Kindness Day

KINDNESS IS THE HEART OF JESUS
Our Chapel theme this Term has been ‘The Heart of Jesus’ and each week, this has been aligned with our Claremont College thinking, learning, and intellectual character dispositions. This morning I was thrilled to have the opportunity to speak to the children about empathy. I explained that empathy is the key that unlocks the door to our kindness and compassion. Today happens to be ‘World Kindness Day’, so what a lovely alignment with this theme.

Today, our Deputy Principal and School Counsellor have delivered social skills lessons to all grades (K-6) with the goal to promote and understand kindness. Three key outcomes of the lessons were;

Compassion is the desire to want to help someone in need.
Ways to show kindness and helpfulness to others.
Being grateful when people show kindness to us and others.

As we head into the Christmas Season, we will be focussing on kindness and compassion as we respond to the needs of others. We are inspired by the fact that God demonstrated His kindness by sending Jesus into the world - this is what Christmas is all about. So how can we respond?

“Now, this is the goal: to live in harmony with one another and demonstrate love, sympathy, and kindness toward each other.” 1 Peter 3:8

“Be happy with those who are happy, and weep with those who weep." Romans 12:15 

Here at school we have chosen to do some exciting and special things over the next two and a half weeks.

‘Kindness at Home’
We have been inspired by so many children, who have asked if they could raise money to help Australians who have been impacted by the bushfires. Over the coming weeks, many children will be working on kindness projects with the goal of setting up stalls, holding guessing competitions, small raffles and the like, which will all be held in Week 8 (check next week’s newsletter for details), the last week of school. We are sure to raise an impressive donation. The children’s enthusiasm and genuine kindness is such a pleasure to be a part of each and every day, here at school.

‘Kindness Overseas’
Next Friday, we will have a special Christmas Mufti Day, as well as our Kindy Nativity Pageant in Chapel. As part of the celebration, all children and staff are invited to wear a Christmas outfit, in the colours of red, green, white, gold, silver or any combination of those colours. For participation in the mufti day, we ask that each child brings in $5. This money will be directed to the children at ‘Project Help India’ to pay for a Christmas gift for 260 children and 12 teachers, as well as for them to have a class Christmas party celebration. For many of the children this will be their first ever Christmas present and for most, it will be the only Christmas present that they receive this year, as their parents are too poor to purchase one.

As part of the ‘Kindness Overseas’ Project, the Year 3 Pixie Post will give all Claremont students a blank Christmas card, and a small fact sheet, for you and your family to write a special message to each of the ‘Project Help India’ kids. I will hand deliver these cards to India in the week before Christmas (I am heading there for a wedding).

‘Kindness to the People we Know’
Today in Chapel I also shared a story about the power of random acts of kindness done in secret. It’s good to ‘pay it forward’, and God loves it when we do these things without being in the spotlight and drawing attention to ourselves. The challenge is out there for students, staff and families to be strategic in showing kindness to one another. If someone is kind to you, or if you are impressed by your children, please let us know.

Lastly, how wonderful it was to hear the stories of our Year 5 students visiting the Dorothy Boyt Nursing Home at Malabar this week. Their kindness, and gentleness with the elderly folk was impressive. The students will be visiting the nursing home again over the coming weeks.

So there you go! Let’s extend ‘World Kindness Day’, so that every day is kindness day, especially as we celebrate Christmas, and what has been a wonderful year. Thank you for your part in making our school such a very special school community.