Health & Wellbeing @ NLPS

Building Empathy Through Kindness: A Whole Family Challenge

As part of our work with The Resilience Project, our school is focusing on the key pillars of G.E.M. (Gratitude, Empathy, and Mindfulness), as well as developing emotional literacy. These important areas help children build resilience, improve wellbeing, and strengthen their relationships with others.

This week, we wanted to shine the spotlight on Empathy! The ability to understand and share the feelings of another. Learning about empathy helps students become more compassionate, kind, and connected to the people around them. When we show empathy or do something kind for someone else, our brain releases oxytocin, a hormone that boosts self-esteem, confidence, energy, positivity, and overall happiness.

Families play a crucial role in reinforcing this learning at home. By modelling empathy and engaging in activities that promote kindness, you can help your child deepen their understanding and practice of this important life skill.

Whole Family Activity: Neighbourhood Kindness Challenge

As a family, choose an act of kindness from the list below that you would like to do for a neighbour or family friend. Each family member can select one to commit to, or you can choose to do one together.

Say hello next time you see them and ask them how their day is going.
Recommend one of your favourite books to borrow and read.
Design them a Thank You card.
Cook them something delicious like a cake, hot bread, or cookies.
Write a note to put in their letterbox thanking them for being a great neighbour or friend.
Pick some flowers to deliver to them.
Choose a little plant from your garden to give them.
Make them a gift from things around your house.
Offer to do a job for them, like wash their car or water their garden.
Offer to take their pets for a walk.
Invite them over for afternoon tea.
Invite them on a walk.
Ask them if they need anything from the shops next time you buy groceries.
Feel free to do more than one and spread the kindness even further!

Follow-up:

Report back to each other in one week and share how your acts of kindness were received and how doing them made you feel. You might be surprised by how much joy it brings to you as well!

Family Habit Builder:

To continue building empathy and emotional awareness at home, try this simple habit at dinner each night:

Have each person thank another family member for something they’ve done or said today, or give a compliment. This daily practice helps build appreciation, connection, and emotional literacy within the family.

We look forward to working together to grow a kinder, more resilient school community. We can’t wait to hear your kindness stories!

Samantha Meddis

Mental Health and Wellbeing Leader