According to a Canadian study, it takes ten seconds to stop a bully. Can you guess how many people it takes to stop a bully in ten seconds? One! The study found that if even one student spoke up to express disapproval of the bullying incident, the bully typically stopped within ten seconds. 

Bullies gain power when no one challenges their behavior. An estimated 85 percent of bullying happens with other students watching. Bystanders often passively watch the incident or aggravate the problem by cheering on the behavior and/or joining in on the behavior. 

Here are three strategies you can use to help empower bystanders:

1:Role Play.
Role play incidents that can foster peer malice and then have a discussion about what a bystander should do to help the situation. 

• Stick to incidents that have happened on your campus. Create an assignment that asks students to anonymously write out situations they’ve witnessed on your campus. 
• Create actionable steps to help with empowering the person who is witnessing the event. 
• Discuss what the bystander should do if the situation starts to attract attention and a crowd is beginning to form. 
  
  

2: Classroom Discussions.
Start the discussions by asking open-ended questions and writing down the answers. Tackle each answer to find a solution that can cultivate kindness, foster friendships and build community. 

• Example questions: “What do girls do when they want to be mean to each other?” “What kinds of things do they say to each other?" “Why are girls mean to each other?” “What do boys do to be mean to each other?” “What kinds of things do boys say to each other?” “Why are boys mean to each other?” “What do boys and girls say to each other that is mean?” “What do boys and girls do to each other that is mean?” “Why do you think this happens?” “What are some ways we can stop these mean things from happening at our school?”
  
  

3: Empower Students.
Many schools have reduced bullying incidents by empowering their student leadership or advisory team to take on the issue of peer malice. Here are some ideas on how to utilize your student leaders or student advisory team:

• Give the entire student body a survey twice a year. Choose three to five topics and only ask two to three questions related to each topic. With this feedback, you are then able to tackle the issues that your students feel strongly about. Thus, ensuring their cooperation with improving your schools' climate. 
• Ask your student leadership team with the assistance of a teacher or a school counselor to brainstorm strategies to combat the issues on your campus.
• Annually develop a school creed or touchstone with your student leaders - make it lighthearted but powerful.
• Promote inclusivism - Create monthly or quarterly activities to involve the entire student body. For example, your student leadership team can host icebreaker events to mix up peer groups and debunk cliques. A top rated event for the young and old is a donut eating contest. A simple way to find a list of icebreakers is to Google it!
• Teach leadership skills to your student leaders. Reach out to parents or members in your community. Invite them to come and talk to your student leaders about what leadership means to them. 

Peer to peer teaching is extremely powerful and effective when it comes to changing school culture. Schools that take deliberate steps to create a caring community make lasting changes in the lives of their student and meet the deep human need to belong. Every school should strive to create a place where kindness and respect are the norms; where every student feels valued, cared for, and safe.
 

We often get the question, "When should I hold my school's 21 Day Kindness Challenge?"

​We say, "Really, whenever it works best for your school!"

The Kindness Challenge is designed to fit within your school's schedule.  You and your student leaders decide when will be the best time to hold your school's 21 Day Kindness Challenge.  That said, we do suggest you consider a few factors that may come in to play.  Here are some of our suggestions for optimal planning:

• The 21 Day Kindness Challenge works best when it can be held over 21 consecutive school days. We recommend scheduling your Kindness Challenge so that it won't be interrupted by any lengthy breaks or holidays.

• Some schools have tied their 21 Day Kindness Challenge to other school events or celebrations. For example, some schools plan their Kindness Challenge to correspond with Back to School night in the Fall or Open House in the Spring so that they can showcase their school's efforts to the entire community.  Other schools have found that February is a fun month to celebrate Kindness in correlation with Valentine's Day.  One school held their Kindness Challenge in late October/early November and celebrated by giving thanks for kindness.  

• We recommend scheduling your 21 Day Kindness Challenge separate from your school's state testing dates.  That said, depending on when your school holds their testing window, you could kick-off your 21 Day Kindness Challenge immediately following testing.  For many students and teachers, testing is a challenging and difficult time. Studies have shown that acts of kindness can reduce the effects of stress.  The 21 Day Kindness Challenge is a way to release some of that anxiety by doing kind acts for others!

• The 21 Day Kindness Challenge provides all the materials, support, curriculum, and training you need to run a successful Kindness Challenge on your campus.  You should know that there is a 3-week planning process (1-2 hours planning/week max!) in advance of your actual Kick-Off date so it's good to give yourself a little cushion for planning and prep.  During this time you are recruiting kindness leaders from within your student body and helping them plan and launch the 21 Day Kindness Challenge.

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For more thoughts on planning, or for more information about how to bring the 21 Day Kindness Challenge to your school, please join us for our LIVE Q&A  session.  We meet the second Tuesday of every month from 9:00 to 9:30 a.m. PST.  The 21 Day Kindness Challenge team is available to answer all your questions and help get you started on making a change on your school culture!  More information is also available on our website or by watching our Webinar.  In just 24 minutes, we explain all about the 21 Day Kindness Challenge.

Character Matters by Dr. Thomas Lickona, a developmental psychologist and professor of education emeritus at the State University of New York at Cortland, is a must read for any school administrator that has a strong desire to create a character focused campus. There are more than 100 strategies for building school partnerships with parents, teaching academics and character at the same time, creating a character-based discipline program, preventing peer cruelty and promote kindness, and much more! 

Please let us know your thoughts about the strategies in this book and what you’ve implemented in your classroom or on your campus in the comments below. 

​Kindness really does make a difference in our world.  The 21 Day Kindness Challenge team is proud of this teen who is reaching out and doing what he can to spread kindness in his community.  With a simple yet very helpful act of kindness, this teen made a difference for his neighbor.  Thank you, Brett, for reminding us how easy it is to be kind! 
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We encourage you to share Brett's story with your students, and see what kind acts you can inspire in them! 

​Do you want to give ideas to your students on how to spread kindness in their neighborhoods, too?
Here are 5 easy ways to say thank you or just let people know that you care.

• Bring flowers to a neighbor
• Leave a handwritten note in a neighbor's mailbox saying something nice about them
• Bake cookies and leave them for your mail delivery person, garbage man, utility worker, etc.
• Host a clean up day at a neighborhood park
• Take your neighbor's garbage cans to the curb

​Do you have some other ways that you or your students spread kindness in your community? We want to hear from you! Share them with us by commenting on this blog post or by sharing on our social media channels Facebook and Twitter. 

​Becoming a change agent in the world isn’t an easy thing to do, especially if you are a young child. The Founding Fathers of the United States, Dr. Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Gandhi are all great adult examples of change agents but what about kids? Can kids make an impact in their community and their world? Our video pick for this month answers this question. 

Leah Nelson, a 10-year-old girl, is challenging others to pass on kindness in her West Sacramento community. Watch the video and be inspired! 

Kindness Challenge at Valencia
by Caryn Lane

The Valencia School Community kicked off the second half of the school year with a 21-Day Kindness Challenge that ran from Tuesday, January 12 through Tuesday, February 16.

This is the third year that the school has taken part in the challenge, started by Aptos/Rio Del Mar parent, Justina Bryant.Author Roald Dahl said, “I think probably kindness is my number one attribute in a human being. I’ll put it before any of the things like courage or bravery or generosity or anything else.”
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The Valencia staff and parents agree, and were excited to bring the 21-Day Kindness Challenge program to the students again this year. The children were equally fired up about trying to make their school a kinder place to be.
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This year’s Kindness Coach, Caryn Lane (a parent and teacher at the school) and Valencia School Girl Scout Troop 10056 helped to organize the Kindness Challenge materials and get them out to the teachers and classrooms. Girls from the troop also helped with the 21-Day Kindness Challenge Kick-Off Assembly on Wednesday, January 13, where they explained how the challenge works and modeled different ways that students could show kindness to others. They encouraged the students to “throw kindness around like confetti” throughout the 21 days of the challenge.Students helped to spread the kindness message during the 21 designated school days by making inspirational posters to hang around the school, and recording acts of kindness on strips to be linked together to form class kindness chains. Sixth grade student leaders also used the school’s loudspeaker system to share reported acts of kindness during the morning announcement period. Teachers showed daily video clips to inspire and motivate the students to notice the goodness going on around them. The “Kindness Boomerang” and Kid President’s “20 Things We Should Say More Often” were two of the favorites.

Valencia families were encouraged to keep the Kindness Challenge going on the home front to support what was happening at school. A sheet with home extension weekly kindness project ideas (included in the program materials) was provided to each family to foster more kindness in students’ lives outside of school.

Sixth grade student leaders worked with the Kindness Coach to lead the Kindness Challenge Celebration Assembly. Students, staff, and parents gathered in front of the school mural to celebrate the end of the challenge on Wednesday, February 17. Every class brought their kindness chain to the assembly to be linked together into one GIANT school kindness chain. As each class sat with their kindness chain across their laps, the student leaders reminded the students of the importance of keeping the kindness going on campus and at home through the rest of the year and beyond. Students were excited to see all of the chains of kindness around them and celebrated everyone’s efforts with a special Valencia School clap for all of their schoolmates.

Once all of the chains were linked together, the school kindness chain measured 540 feet and encompassed 4,320 acts of kindness. One of the favorite quotes posted around school during the challenge was, “The world is full of KIND people. If you can’t find one, BE one.” The students of Valencia School certainly took that to heart.

Way to go Seastars!

And way to go Mrs. Lane!  The 21 Day Kindness Challenge applauds you for your commitment to your students and school.  Thank you for all of your efforts.  Congratulations on your new position as Principal.  The Valencia Seastar Family is indeed lucky to have you.  

If you would like more information about how to bring the 21 Day Kindness Challenge to your school, please join us for our LIVE Q&A  session.  We meet the second Tuesday of every month from 9:00 to 9:30 a.m. PST.  The 21 Day Kindness Challenge team is available to answer all your questions and help get you started on making a change on your school culture!  More information is also available on our website or by watching our Webinar.  In just 24 minutes, we explain all about the 21 Day Kindness Challenge.