Schools join national kindness challenge ahead of the big day
‘The feeling you get from being kind is like no other’ young farmer advocate says, as Aussie schools join hands to log more than one million kindness acts before World Kindness Day
READING LEVEL: GREEN
Australian schools are joining hands to spread as much kindness as possible to reach a massive 10 million acts of kindness target, as kindness advocates suggest there is no better feeling than helping someone or being helped.
As a boy, Jack Berne, raised more than $1 million for drought-impacted Aussie farmers in 2018. Aged just 10 at the time, Jack said one small act of kindness can do wonders in the community, changing someone’s day, week or entire year.
“The feeling you get from being kind is like no other,” Jack said. “I always struggle to describe that feeling, but the rush you get from helping someone is just the best.
“That feeling of helping someone is honestly probably my favourite feeling. The way that kindness works is just kind of crazy, and I have seen it first-hand … if kindness is the number one value in a community, it (the community) can go so far.”
“I’ve seen people rebuild other families’ fences and help them rebuild their houses after fires. Those are all acts of kindness, and that’s what makes the community. I think the community is built on kindness, so it is really important,” he said.
In a national campaign* started by former cricketer and Australian of the Year Kath Koschel, Aussie schools are now being encouraged to participate in a challenge to find the country’s kindest school.
Founder* of the Kindness Factory, Ms Koschel is leading the nationwide kindness race ahead of World Kindness Day to prove small acts of kindness can make a big difference.
“We’ve recorded 8.5 million acts of kindness so far, and now we’re asking Australians to help us reach 10 million,” Ms Koschel said, encouraging everyone to log any gesture*, small or big onto the tracker.
“Every kind act, whether for yourself or someone else, is a step towards bringing people together,” Ms Koschel said.
“Ten million is a big number, but it’s built on small moments. One moment in your day can change someone’s whole story.”
According to Ms Koschel, kindness should become part of our daily lives, rather than an annual celebration or something people would do in moments of hardship in life.
“Kindness strengthens the social fabric of our communities, and when it’s taught in our schools, it shapes how this generation and the next treat each other for life,” she said.
To kickstart the challenge, Ms Koschel returned to her childhood school, St Declan’s Catholic Primary School in Sydney’s Penhurst, where she encouraged more than 700 students to spread kindness.
Students filled a wall with the coolest handwritten stories of kindness. One message read, “My friend helped me when I fell down,” and another said, “I picked up rubbish to keep my community clean.”
Ms Koschel said the secret to becoming Australia’s kindest school was not being the biggest one.
“We measure acts of kindness against the number of students at each school, so the school where the most kids get involved comes out on top,” she said.
“That means a small country school can beat a big city school!”
SMALL ACTS OF KINDNESS
A kind gesture doesn’t need to be big; sometimes it takes something as simple as a smile or a kind word to make someone’s day. For Ms Koschel it was when a stranger pressed a button in the lift that gave her a renewed “sense of hope”.
She broke her back twice in her twenties, and was told by doctors she would never walk again. Describing it as the “hardest time” of her life, Ms Koschel said kindness got her through that difficult period.
“Small, everyday things people did for me, very often people I didn’t even know,” she said.
“I was in a wheelchair, waiting for a lift, when a stranger stopped and pressed the button for me. That was all.”
Ms Koschel said that small, passing deed renewed her sense of hope.
“He reminded me to believe in myself again, and I became determined to walk again. That’s why I believe no act of kindness is ever too small,” she said.
Ms Koschel said an act of kindness could be anything – something as simple as thanking your teachers and canteen staff, or picking up rubbish in the playground. Being kind to others and yourself all count too.
Jack also said it was small acts of kindness that really mattered most.
“Being in school and a classmate inviting you to play in their soccer game or their handball game and just all of those little things kind of just made my day,” he said. “It’s a good feeling when someone does something nice for you.”
Students are logging* their kind gestures on dedicated school trackers to see how their school stands against others running the kindness race across the nation.
The national campaign will wrap up on World Kindness Day on Friday, November 13, and will be celebrated by a Free Dress Day for participating schools, where students can ditch the school uniform and come to school in mufti. The kindest Aussie school will also be revealed on the day.
Iconic landmarks* across the country including Queensland Country Bank Stadium, Tasman Bridge and Matargarup Bridge will light up in blue and green next Friday to mark the special day and remind the community of how important kindness is.
Your school can join the kindness race through Kindness Factory website where they can log your cool kindness stories and register to participate in the Free Dress Day event.
For more information and to get involved, visit kindnessfactory.com
POLL
GLOSSARY
- advocate: someone who stands up and speaks out to support a cause or help others in their community
- campaign: an organised effort that brings people together to reach a shared positive goal
- founder: a person who takes the initiative to start an organisation or a movement, in this case, the Kindness Factory, which is a not for profit organisation
- gesture: an action, a symbolic act, big or small, done to show care, kindness, or goodwill
- logging: recording, writing down
- landmark: a well-known site building that has historical or cultural importance and represents a community
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QUICK QUIZ
- When is World Kindness Day?
- What school did Kath Koschel go to?
- Do small acts of kindness matter?
- How many acts of kindness have been logged so far?
- Why is kindness important?
LISTEN TO THIS STORY
CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES
1. A moment of kindness
Can you think of a time when somebody did something kind for you, or you did something kind for somebody else, that gave you a really great feeling? Write a paragraph to describe what happened and how it made you feel.
Time: allow 20 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum links: English; Personal and Social Capability
2. Extension
To remind yourself that it doesn’t need to take a lot of time or effort to do something kind, set a 10 minute timer and work with a friend to brainstorm a list of kind deeds that are fast. Categorise your kind deeds into Under 10 seconds, Under 30 seconds and Under 2 minutes.
Time: allow 10 minutes to complete this activity
Curriculum links: English; Personal and Social Capability
VCOP ACTIVITY
Summarise the article
A summary can be a really good way to grab the main idea plus some key points in the article as a highlight. Think of the summary like a little advertisement or extract you could use to encourage people to read the article in detail. You want to give them an overview of the article that includes the main idea (being able to tell the audience what the article is about in one sentence), plus a few of the key points of the information.
Remember to re-read your summary to check that it is clear, concise and makes sense to the audience who haven’t read the article yet. You need to make language choices that allow you to explain the information in only a few sentences.