This week, our school is proudly participating in The Great Kindness Challenge, a week-long program dedicated to creating a culture of kindness and compassion in communities worldwide. (Our regular SELF Talk Newsletter will resume next week.) Please enjoy the 2025 Great Kindness Challenge Kickoff Video here.

To help our students practice kindness and put their compassion into action, there are activities and Great Kindness Challenge checklists linked in this newsletter. We encourage all students to complete as many acts of kindness as possible at school and at home and hope they feel inspired to celebrate their kindness by sharing with us! Email photos and art from your week of creating kindness to SELF@cottonwoodk12.org. All students who submit photos, posters, art, or kindness creations will receive a Great Kindness Challenge Certificate and will be entered for a chance to be nominated Cottonwood School’s Kindness Ambassador!

Together, let’s lift each other up, cheer each other on, and show the world that KINDNESS MATTERS!

With Kindness,

Kelly McIntosh

SELF Coordinator, The Cottonwood School

I look forward to seeing your students in the Mindset Monday Zoom class as we participate in the Great Kindness Challenge this week! No sign-ups ups needed; just join at the time for your age group listed below! This means your student can join us at any time, with or without having attended before. Invite your friends to join you too!

Students in attendance at next week’s Mindset Monday Zoom sessions will have an opportunity to vote on the art and kindness acts submitted throughout this week! Winning students will be nominated as our school’s Kindness Ambassadors!

You will find the class times below. Classes are arranged by grade levels as follows:

Grades K-2: 9:30 am Zoom link

Grades 3-5: 10:30 am Zoom link

Grades 6-12: 11:30 am Zoom link

You can also go directly to your Clever dashboard and click on the Mindset Monday tile to join the class easily!

The lessons are approximately 45 minutes long and designed to be interactive group lessons; however, because we recognize the importance of students attending comfortably, each student may choose their level of participation in the lesson.

“How do we change the world? One random act of kindness at a time.” – Morgan Freeman

During the Great Kindness Challenge week, students are challenged to complete 50 acts of kindness (alter some of the acts of kindness as needed). Kind acts listed on the kindness checklist focus on key kindness concepts such as respect, gratitude, inclusiveness, and caring (including self-care). The Great Kindness Challenge is an action-based week, and the kindness concepts are internalized through hands-on experiences. I’ve also included an optional Family Challenge Checklist for you to join your students and create kindness as a family in addition to your students’ 50 acts of kindness!

Grades: K-3

Grades: 4-12

Family Kindness

Colorful Creations for Kindness: Easy and Fun Crafts for Families and Classrooms

Five Great Kindness Challenge schools have burned down (or are severely damaged) as a result of the catastrophic wildfires in Los Angeles. Let’s lift them up!

The Great Kindness Challenge is calling on our kind Kids for Peace and Great Kindness Challenge communities to send them our collective love and support.

3 ways you can contribute:

1. Write notes of love and attach them to new youth- and adult-sized socks and ship to Kids for Peace HQ: Ship to Kids for Peace HQ: P.O. Box 1836, Julian, CA 92036
2. Write notes of love and support and mail them to Kids for Peace HQ
3. Send a 15 second (or less) video with messages of love and support to meg@kidsforpeaceglobal.org (see recording instructions here).

Send your contributions by Valentines Day, February 14, 2025 Alternatively, you may choose to send monetary support directly here. 100% of donations will go directly to the affected schools.

Learn more & support at TheGreatKindnessChallenge.com/LoveforLA

Each year there is a new theme for The Great Kindness Challenge celebration week. The Great Kindness Challenge is thrilled to share that the 2024 – 2025 Great Kindness Challenge theme is KINDNESS MOVES! This year, they’re partnering with Jazzercise—a brand committed to health and community—to promote wellbeing and kindness worldwide. Get ready for an abundance of joyful, inspiring and feel-good content. Jazzercise is the iconic dance fitness program that combines high-energy dance cardio with strength training, Pilates, hip-hop, yoga, and kickboxing, making it the most exhilarating and effective way to stay fit. As the original dance party workout, they’ve been unleashing people’s best selves since 1969. With motivating instructors and a supportive community, the goal is to introduce you to a workout program that makes you feel so good that you stick to it — for life.

Here are some happy ideas to put this year’s KINDNESS MOVES! theme into action:

• Inspire a kindness flash mob

• Choreograph a TikTok-style kindness dance and share it on social media.

• Empower students to teach the above-mentioned kindness dance to adults, including teachers, administrators, parents or civic leaders.

• Lead a park-wide kindness dance parade.

• Highlight “Entertain someone with a happy dance” – a kind act on our checklist.

• Incorporate cooperative games into PE time. “Entertain someone with a happy dance.”

• Encourage giving compliments during play or park time.

• Host a compliment relay, where students divide into teams and run while giving compliments.

• Start each day with a positive and uplifting dance song.

• Display KINDNESS MOVES! posters throughout the neighborhood.

• Invite each home in your neighborhood to create a KINDNESS MOVES! sidewalk chalk design.

Cool down after completing a Kindness Moves activity with this Kindness Moves Coloring Sheet

• Please share with us and email any act of kindness from the Great Kindness checklist that your student or family participates in! All students who submit photos of their posters, art, checklist completion photos, or kindness creations will receive a Great Kindness Challenge certificate and will be entered for a chance to be nominated as one of Cottonwood School’s Kindness Ambassadors! Students will vote for Kindness Ambassadors during Mindset Monday Zoom classes on February 3!

  Email SELF@cottonwoodk12.org for submissions and questions.

These Big Life Journal printable activities, purchased by Cottonwood for your students, offer additional opportunities to extend learning as students focus on learning more about becoming aware of their emotions and continuing their exploration of creating kindness!

Big Life Journal Activity for All Ages: Be Kind