Teaching Children About Kindness

Kindness is one of the most valuable qualities we can nurture in our children. At its heart, kindness is about noticing when someone needs help and choosing to do something about it. Not because we’ll get a reward, but simply because we care.

While this might sound complex, even the youngest children are naturally wired for compassion. Our job as parents is to help that natural impulse grow and flourish.

What Makes an Act Truly Kind?

True kindness has two essential ingredients: intention and action. When your child helps someone, they need to do it because they genuinely want to make things better for that person, not because they expect praise, a treat, or to avoid getting in trouble.

Think of it this way: compassion is what we feel in our hearts when we see someone struggling. Kindness is what happens when we let that feeling guide our hands and feet to actually help. Your five-year-old might feel sad seeing a classmate sit alone at lunch (that’s compassion), but kindness is when they walk over and invite that child to join them.

How Children’s Understanding of Kindness Grows

Your child’s grasp of kindness will naturally deepen as they grow:

Younger children (preschool through early elementary) tend to think about kindness in very concrete, visible terms. For them, kindness might mean sharing a toy during playtime, helping someone who fell down, or giving a hug to a friend who’s crying.

Older children and teens begin to understand the more subtle aspects of kindness. They can see beyond the surface action to the intention behind it. A teenager, for instance, might recognize that a friend who honestly tells them their behavior is hurtful is showing care, even though hearing the truth stings.

Where Kindness Comes From

Kindness springs from two main sources in our children’s hearts:

Empathy helps children care about people they know and love. When your daughter understands how her brother feels when his tower gets knocked down, she’s more likely to help him rebuild it. This emotional connection drives much of the kindness children show to family and friends.

Moral values help children extend kindness beyond their inner circle. As children internalize beliefs about right and wrong, they begin to care about helping people they’ve never met, whether that’s donating toys to children in need or standing up for a classmate being excluded.

Two Ways Children Express Kindness

Proactive kindness is when children seek out opportunities to help without being asked. There’s no obvious cry for help. They just notice a need and act on it. Examples include:

• Offering to help a parent cook dinner without being asked
• Saving part of their allowance to donate to a cause they care about
• Making a card for a grandparent just because

Responsive kindness happens when children notice clear signals that someone needs help and they step in. Examples include:

• Opening a door for someone whose hands are full
• Offering their seat to an elderly person on the bus
• Helping pick up papers that someone dropped

Both types matter. Responsive kindness helps children learn to read social cues, while proactive kindness develops their ability to think ahead about others’ needs.

Ways to Nurture Kindness at Home

1. Help children understand emotions: their own and others’

Before children can be consistently kind, they need to understand how feelings work. Try these approaches:

• Name emotions as they happen: “You look frustrated that your drawing didn’t turn out the way you wanted.”
• Talk about what causes different feelings: “When someone excludes us, it can make us feel lonely and hurt.”
• Point out emotions in others: “Notice how your sister’s face lit up when you offered to help her? That’s what joy looks like.”

2. Practice noticing needs

Kindness starts with awareness. Help your child develop the habit of looking beyond themselves:

• During daily activities, ask: “Do you think anyone here might need help?”
• When reading books or watching shows together, pause and discuss: “How do you think that character is feeling right now?”
• Model this yourself by thinking aloud: “I notice our neighbor is carrying a lot of bags. I’m going to hold the door open.”

3. Create opportunities for kindness

• At home: Invite your child to help with tasks that benefit the whole family, like setting the table, sorting laundry, watering plants. Emphasize how their help makes everyone’s life easier.
• In the community: Involve children in age-appropriate service. A young child might help bake cookies for a neighbor; an older child might volunteer at a food bank.
• With friends and classmates: Encourage your child to include someone new, offer to share, or help someone who’s struggling with something they find easy.

4. Make gratitude a daily practice

Gratitude and kindness go hand in hand. When children appreciate what others do for them, they’re more motivated to do kind things in return.

Try these simple practices:

• At dinner, share something kind someone did for you that day.
• Help your child write thank-you notes that are specific: “Thank you for lending me your colored pencils when I forgot mine. It helped me finish my art project.”
• Model appreciation yourself: “I’m grateful that you helped your little brother find his shoes. That was thoughtful and saved us time this morning.”

5. Teach children to express appreciation meaningfully

Help your child move beyond generic “thank yous” to expressions that show real understanding:

• Instead of just: “Thanks!” Try: “Thank you for sharing your toy with me when I didn’t have anything to play with.”
• Instead of: “You’re nice.” Try: “I appreciate that you waited patiently for your turn. I know waiting can be hard.”

6. Acknowledge kindness without making it transactional

When you notice your child being kind, acknowledge it, but be careful not to create the expectation of rewards. Instead of “Good job!” which can make kindness feel like a performance, try:

• “I noticed you invited the new student to play. That probably made them feel welcome.”
• “Your brother looked so happy when you helped him with his puzzle.”
• “That was a kind choice you made.”

This type of acknowledgment helps children see the impact of their actions without making kindness about earning praise.

7. the “cost” of kindness honestly

Sometimes being kind requires sacrifice, like sharing a favorite toy, giving up time, or doing something uncomfortable. Acknowledge this reality:

• “I know you wanted to play with that by yourself, and it was generous of you to share.”
• “It took courage to sit with someone you don’t know well. That wasn’t easy.”

This validation helps children understand that kindness can be challenging, and that’s okay. It’s still worth doing.

You’re the Role Model

Children learn kindness primarily by watching the adults in their lives. The way you treat your partner, how you speak to the cashier at the grocery store, whether you stop to help when you see someone struggling… All of this teaches your child more than any lecture ever could.

Kindness isn’t about being perfect or self-sacrificing. It’s about recognizing our shared humanity and choosing, again and again, to help make someone else’s day a little bit better. That’s a lesson that will serve your child, and everyone they encounter, for a lifetime.