Bucket of Love: Teaching the Golden Rule
(I am re-posting this online journal from one of my favorite NYC spots for kids and parents called Moomah. It is a art studio, restaurant and for me, a magical spot to connect with my child.)
-----As a parent I love when I find opportunities that help illustrate the beauty of “The Golden Rule.” It’s for this reason that I love the book, “Fill A Bucket: A Guide to Daily Happiness for the Young Child” by Carol McCloud, Katherine Martin & David Messing. I designed a craft project to do with my kids that I thought was a nice complement to the book. It was really sweet to see how excited my kids got about the idea of sharing love, and watching them hand out their hearts to their loved ones (their classmates, their babysitter, the family dog).
How to do the project at home:
1: Read your child the "Fill A Bucket" book or our text below.
2: Find a bucket. (We found ours in the gardening section of our local hardware store).
3: Decorate the outside of the bucket with hearts (you could use heart stencils, free-form hearts or even cool anatomical hearts from online printouts or old books. Use Mod Podge to collage paper onto your bucket.
4: Cut out hearts from colored construction paper to fill your Bucket of Love.
5: Color, paint and decorate your hearts however you please.
6: If your child can write they can write messages to the recipient of the heart or you can always help them.
7: After all the decorating is done, tell the kids that now it’s time to go out and give out the hearts from their Bucket of Love so that they can fill other people's buckets.
Imagine we all have a bucket inside of us that holds all our feelings. When our bucket is full of good feelings, we feel great. When our bucket is empty or has bad feelings we feel sad. We can fill someone’s bucket with good feelings when we say or do nice things. We can empty someone’s bucket when we do or say mean things. Decorate your bucket and the hearts and go out and share your love with others.
Here’s some examples of things you can say to fill someone’s bucket with good feelings:
“I love you”
“Would you like to play with me?”
“I really like your drawing”
“You make me laugh”
“Thank you!"
Here’s some examples of things you can do to fill someone’s bucket:
Give someone a hug.
Help someone clean up.
Make someone a card.
Make someone laugh.
This idea was inspired by the book Fill A Bucket: A Guide to Daily Happiness For Kids
By Tracey Stewart-----------------
I will just add one more book that is great for families "SIMPLE FUN for BUSY PEOPLE". As a parent myself I think connection with our families and friends is the most important thing in our lives. I am not always successful in this endeavor and am always searching for new ways to connect. This blog is a mirror of my successes and struggles; dedicated to helping inspire ways to help people connect daily for a happier life. Thank you for all the new ideas I find by other moms, like Tracey Stewart above.
Cathy Riva