Character Counts Week

Family Activities

TrustworthinessTrustworthiness

Grades K-5 Family Activities

  • Watch “Making Tough Choices with Kid President.”
    • Give the following prompts to discuss as a family: 
    • What are the values in our home? 
    • What is the type of world our family wants to live in?  
    • What happens when our decisions help build that world? What happens when they do not? 
    • How can our family make sure our decisions and values match? 

Grades 6-12 Family Activities

  • Tech Time  
    • Send a Snapchat to your child about being trustworthy. 
    • The next time your child does something trustworthy, post it on social media or text them kudos and a heartfelt message. 
  • Pillar in Action  
    • Volunteer as a family at the Animal Rescue League or another local area to show trustworthy character.  
    • Play Blind retriever- blindfold one person and guide them with words to pick up an object across the yard or room.  
  • Dinner Discussions 
    • Who is a person in your life that you trust? 
    • What about their character makes you trust them? 
    • What is challenging about being trustworthy? 
    • How can you work as a family to become more trustworthy?

RespectRespect

Grades K-5 Family Activities 

  • Just like a school or a workplace, families have a culture of respect. Ask families to discuss the kind of culture of respect they would like to create in their home. It can be a culture of kindness, love, caring or a word that means something to the family. Encourage them to think about the kind of behaviors they want to see everyone do every day, as well as how they will think.The following prompt can help: 
    • In our family, we have a culture of ________________________. We show this culture by:
      • Describe actions 
      • Describe words used 
      • Describe attitudes expected 
  • Ask your family to write these things down and keep it in a visible place. No one is perfect and there are going to be times when someone is acting or speaking in a way that is inconsistent with the culture the family wanted to create. Encourage families to use this to help give feedback and set expectations to help get things back on track. 

Grades 6-12 Family Activities

  • Tech Time  
    • Download ThinkUp app to receive positive daily affirmations and motivation in your own voice.
  • Pillar in Action
    • Make a list of all the things you love about each person in the family, and share aloud together. 
    • Spend time celebrating achievements, successes, and actively participate in activities your child is interested in.
    • Tell your children something positive you love and respect about them daily. Try 50 Positive Things to Say To Your Child.
  • Dinner Discussions  
    • What do you love about yourself?  
    • How does showing respect for yourself help you to show respect for others? 
    • If you love and respect yourself, how do others treat you? 

ResponsibilityResponsibility

Grades K-5 Family Activities

  • Encourage your family to think about a goal they want to complete together. It could be a project in the home, a service project or something they would like to achieve like playing more games together. Ask the families to plan how they will complete the goal and the responsibilities of each member. Once they have established the plan of how to execute their goal, encourage families to discuss a plan for reflection and assessment of that goal. That reflection plan will answer these three questions: 
    • When will we reflect?  
      • Will it be after the goal is completed or throughout? 
      • Be specific with the time.
    • How will we reflect?
      • How will we give each other feedback? 
      • Talk about what went well and what did not. 
    • How will we modify? 
      • What could we do better or differently? 
      • Look forward and see if you need to make changes to your current plan or for the next time. 

Grades 6-12 Family Activities

  • Tech Time  
    • Anydo is an app that helps organize and prioritize tasks when you are overwhelmed and stuck with too many things to do 
    • Sam App is an app to help you take ownership over your own health and manage the anxiety of dealing with the stress of the day to day.
  • Pillar in Action  
    • Play a game of chess to determine strategic ways to stay out of checkmate 
    • Write a 100-word poem about being thankful for problems  
    • Use an object from your home and try to come up with as many ways to use it as possible  
      • A spoon 
        • Dig a hole (slowly) 
        • A party trick for your nose 
        • To carry an egg  
    • Watch Stuck on an Escalator as a family 
    • Read “What do you do with A Problem” by Kobi Yamada and discuss  
  • Dinner Discussions  
    • Describe an experience when you had to solve a problem in your life? 
    • Discuss how responsibility plays a role in finding solutions to everyday problems. 
    • Share why you feel it is important to take responsibility for your own actions and problems. 

FairnessFairness

Grades K-5 Family Activities

  • Encourage families to create a compact of how they will treat one another fairly at home. In order to create the compact, discuss the following: 
    • What does fairness mean in our house? 
    • What does fairness look like? 
    • How will we act if things are unfair? 
    • How will we resolve unfair situations?  
    • Once you decide how your family will treat each other fairly at home, write down the plan. Ask everyone in the family to sign the compact of fairness.

Grades 6-12 Family Activities

  • Tech Time  
    • Daily Positive Quotes can be delivered to your phone and used to discuss with your family. 
  • Pillar in Action  
    • Take turns playing games. 
    • Share ideas about how fairness is seen in your own home. 
    • Share ways you see fairness in the world. 
  • Dinner Discussions 
    • What is your definition of fair? 
    • What is your favorite quote about fairness and why? 
    • Why is fairness important in our world? 

CaringCaring

Grades K-5 Family Activities

Grades 6-12 Family Activities

  • Tech Time  
    • Follow your favorite non-profit organizations on Twitter. 
    • Create a GoFundMe page to support a local charity.  
  • Pillar in Action  
    • Volunteer as a family once a month at a local organization your family is passionate about serving.
    • Perform a random act of kindness for a neighbor or stranger in need of care this month. 
    • Find ways to connect to organizations for fun runs or charity runs and train as a family. 
  • Dinner Discussion  
    • What organization would you like to serve? 
    • Why is volunteering a good way to show you care? 
    • How do you grow if you volunteer and serve others? 

CitizenshipCitizenship

Grades K-5 Family Activities

  • Discuss what it means to be a citizen within your home. Use prompts such as: 
    • How does a good/bad citizen in our home contribute to chores? 
    • How does a good/bad citizen in our home respond to rules? 
    • How does a good/bad citizen in our home treat others? 
    • What impact can one member of the family have on the whole family? Both positively and negatively.
  • Recycling is an easy and powerful way an individual can make a change in their community. As a family, pick a recycling activity to engage everyone in the commitment to improve their own citizenship: https://www.naturespath.com/en-us/blog/19-activities-kids-learn-recycling/  

Grades 6-12 Family Activity

  • Tech Time  
  • Pillar in Action  
    • Go to a public mall or store and hold open doors for customers. 
    • Find opportunities to do something helpful as a citizen of your own home.
    • Take over someone else’s chore or task for a day or week to see what it feels like to be in their shoes.
  • Dinner Discussion  
    • How does it make you feel to have someone hold the door open for you? 
    • Why is it important to model good citizenship? 
    • What does a good or model citizen look and sound like to you?

Download a PDF version of these activities.