It’s hard to fix a wrinkled heart
At the beginning of the school year, we decided to partner with one other family with two children the same age as ours and do school together for the year. It has proven to be the best decision we have ever made.
To break up the monotony of school work and zoom I like to set up activities we can all do together.
Wrinkled Heart Activity
This is a simple activity that doesn’t require much and only take s about 20 minutes. It highlights how words can leave a permanent mark on our hearts.
We each cut out a paper heart. Then we went around the table and gave examples of unkind words we have heard or said or read in a book. We wrinkled our hearts for every unkind word someone shared.
By the time we were done our hearts were folded up tightly.
Then we went around the table saying nice things about each other. At first, the kids were embarrassed, because who wants to say something nice about their sibling in front of their friend? But once they got over that, the compliments started to flow a little easier.
Each time we heard something nice we unfolded our hearts until they were completely open again. We took note of how there were still creases in our hearts showing that the bad words never really go away. We then used colorful washi tape to “heal” our hearts.
The kids really enjoyed this simple activity. We had a really great conversation about kindness and it gave us the opportunity to be creative.
I love how each heart turned out differently showing the personality of each of us. The two girls used bright colors and had straight lines, one of the boys used as much tape as he could, mine was more minimalist, and Owen… well, he just wrote a couple of nice words on his folded heart and called it a day.
What boredom busters are you doing with your kids these days? Drop a comment below.
