Alhambra, Grantfork schools participate in anti-bullying initiative

Students from Alhambra Primary and Grantfork Elementary schools recently did their part to combat bullying.

Over the course of a week, the students at both schools participated in The 2020 Great Kindness Challenge, an initiative to create a culture of kindness and prevent bullying.

All in all, Cindy Tolbert, principal at both schools, said the week was a big success.

“Everything went really well,” she said. “Each day in both buildings we had a kindness quote of the day. And we would talk about that quote and display it. We’d show some type of kindness video to the kids.”

Great Kindness Challenge is a nationwide event that typically takes place in January. To not rush things, Alhambra and Grantfork moved it to February, coinciding with the VIP word of the month — “caring.” Tolbert said she started off the week at both schools showing the moving “Wonder,” which is about a young child born with facial differences. The young boy was shown both acts of kindness and also was mistreated.

“I used it as an instructional tool in both buildings on being kind or not,” Tolbert said.

The event also included dress up day themes to include:

• Monday: Crazy for Kindness! Students could wear crazy hair and socks.
• Tuesday: Kindness Rocks! Students could dressed like a rock star.
• Wednesday: Peace, Love, and Kindess. Students could dress in tie dye, peace signs, or like a Hippie.
• Thursday: Hats off to Kindness! Students could wear their favorite hat.
• Friday: Team Kindness! Students could wear their favorite team uniform or clothes showing their favorite sports team.

Additionally, throughout the week, the students could earn hearts for being kind — such as picking up trash — and those were then displayed in the gym.

“It was amazing seeing the kids being kind ... you could tell they were going out of their way to be kind,” Tolbert said.

Tolbert noted a specific incident at Alhambra where a student was walking by the office and asked to if she needed help picking up something. She did not need the assistance, but certainly appreciated — and noticed — the gesture.

“I don’t think that student would have done that if we weren’t promoting kids to be kind,” Tolbert said. “They were picking things up throughout the week, which was an awesome sight to see.”

Students use Solo cups to display visual kindness

At Grantfork , a “compli-mat” was posted outside the door and students wrote compliments on it during the week. There also was a service project of showing kindness to others focused on collecting food for the Highland Food Pantry. Then, too, third grade students and fifth grade students put “Be Kind” in red plastic Solo cups outside at both schools.

“We wanted to have a visual reminder all around the building, even when outside, to be kind,” Tolbert said. “In each building they were able to do something at home with their family. They could try to do as many acts as kindness as they could. If they brought that sheet back they earned a prize.”

For more information on The Great Kindness Challenge, visit www.greatkindnesschallenge.org.