Plant Kind Roots
Team Care Hard put words to action by spreading seeds of care to plant kind roots in their community.
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An idiom is a group of words that people use all the time, but doesn’t actually mean what they say. Someone that speaks another language that translates the words literally might not have any idea about the BTS meaning of the words. Idioms need to be explained.
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Have you heard the idiom - put down roots? It means you make a place your home. You do this through your actions like making friends and taking part in activities there. It is about gradually becoming a part of a community where you care about the people and establishments there. You also feel like that community cares about you. It's important for people in a community to take part in the wellbeing of a community and to also feel that sense of belonging.
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To kick off the 2019-2020 school year, a group of kids and their parents got together to explore this idea of planting roots. They used this idiom and idea to also explore the value of kindness and the issue of bullying.
To gather supplies for the event, some of the kids in our group including Braden who is 7, asked a few businesses to put up a drive box to collect school supplies. They used the building blocks of putting down roots by coordinating a drive between neighborhood establishments and the community who lives there.
These businesses were fitness studios called Orangetheory. Community action was spread out across San Diego through fitness studios in smaller cities inside San Diego County who helped out to gather supplies. This included Orangetheory La Mesa, Solana Beach, Carmel Valley, and La Jolla. Another kid helped their mom to build an Amazon wishlist that they shared out to their online community of friends to gather a few more supplies.
Our Inlight team was able to reach out to The Home Depot Encinitas, another business known for helping people to get things done. They provided free snacks and a planter craft. The craft was used to connect the idea of planting seeds of kindness to grow strong roots.
To finish up the day, the kids stuffed backpacks with all the supplies they gathered in their drive. These backpacks were distributed through the CCSA - another nonprofit who is a resource for families in need of community upliftings.
In total this was a teamwork between 7 establishments, many participating families, and 12 kid leaders! That’s community, collaboration, and roots.
Read more below about the project we did.
Planting Seeds and Kindness: A project is a great way to learn more and practice our skills. Here are the steps to the Planting Kindness project so you, too, can explore planting kind roots in your community.
1. Build a home.
Kids had to build their own planter. Using some instructions, which provides a key starting point, they were able to work side by side to construct the planter. Seeds need somewhere safe to grow. The planter gave the seeds a safe space.
Deep Thinkers: Where are your planters or safe spaces? How many safe spaces can you count and how do you help to contribute to building those spaces?
2. Work in teams.
It took a bit of time, some teamwork, and reaching out for help to get this project done. The nails were small and the hammers were big. It took two people to hold down the corners and get it together!
Deep Thinkers: Who are the teammates in your safe spaces? Why are you glad that they are there?
3. Be Creative.
It took a bit of time, some teamwork, and some requests for help. The glue didn’t always want to hold and two people needed to hold down the corners! Together, everyone finished their planters. The group considered some connections between the materials we used and the outside world. There were different ideas in the brainstorm, but here is the final descriptions from this group.
- Seeds are like kindness.
- Soil is like your environment.
- People are like pollinators.
Deep Thinkers: How would you connect nature and building materials to your safe spaces and the people in them?4. Positive School Connections.
To complete our planter project, we tied all this together and connected our analogies and safe space brainstorm specifically to school. This is how our group described it: - Seeds are like kindness. Our actions are like seeds of kindness.
- Soil is like your environment. Our spaces are like our soil - school and home are environments we change through our actions.
- People are like pollinators. Our behavior and actions affect the people and our environment.
When we start a school year, we can be a major part of setting the tone of our environment. That is our contribution as a student to making our school environment better.
Deep Thinkers: What are positive words you have to describe school? How can you be a pollinator in your school?5. Take a YUM bite.
Lastly, we thought about YUM which stands for YOU, US, ME. - YOU: I need to recognize others and choose to see their effort as part of the whole community. If I see YOU, then you see ME. If I GOT YOUR BACK, then you got mine. This builds a community where we can all grow.
- US: More good happens when others from the community can be a part of the effort - when they have the opportunity to pollinate and plant seeds. When we work as an US then we spread out and get more done.
- ME: Like our different colored planters, we need room to be ourselves and express our personality and way of showing care as an individual. We can be creative and respect others' creativity. We also must be responsible for ourselves which means we control our output - our actions and behavior. We can control how kind we are, where we plant it, and how we take care of it (but we need to nurture it or it won’t thrive - like a seed into a plant).
Deep Thinkers: Use YUM to think deeper about one of your other safe spaces. How can YUM change the way you contribute to those spaces?
6. Stomp out Bullying.
Our friend Amanda read the book Tease Monster which talks about the difference between teasing vs bullying. This was an interesting book because it talks about how a community can look when it respects each other and is sprinkled with kindness.
Teasing can be a playful way to feel closer to another person or to show friendship. When we feel comfortable, we tease or joke with others. Teasing can be kind.
Bullying is like a weed. We can prevent it with good maintenence. When it pops through, we can stomp it out with a combination of firmness and tenderness.
Remember, bullying is unacceptable. It must be repeated and it must be actions towards another person with the intent to harm, hurt, or intimidate.
Deep Thinkers: Have you teased someone? Have you been teased? How does that feel different than bullying? What do you plan to do if you witness bullying?
Want to stuff backpacks, too? Or, host a different sort of drive using your own creative ideas and interests? Care starts with a plan. Here are some prompts for collecting and stuffing goods to get you thinking.
We are extremely grateful to the team at Home Depot Encinitas for helping make this such a fun and memorable experience for the families. The building of kindness planters left the kids feeling proud of what they created. All the attention we received was beyond outstanding! It warmed our hearts to see your team get in line and help the kids stuff backpacks.
Amanda Gretsch, Occupational therapist, and owner of Personalized Optimal Wellness Did a reading of Tease Monster to help kids understand the concepts of bullying vs. teasing. The kids participated in a Q&A on recognizing the difference between the two with tips on how to stand up for yourself and others.
Images are from our INLIGHT back-to-school event at The Home Depot in Encinitas.
Kids made take-home kindness planters, created backpack kits for in-need youth to be distributed through the CCSA, and talked about social themes, including bullying + friendship.
Event in partnership with The Home Depot Encinitas, Orangetheory Fitness La Mesa, Solana Beach, Caramel Valley, and La Jolla