Children helping children one meal at a time

My family just came back from a wonderful event hosted by our church where we packaged meals for families in Kenya, Africa. Hundreds of people from all ages came and volunteered to pack food – from our church, our preschool and our community. It was AWESOME! It was beautiful to see families, boy and girl scout troops, lacrosse teams, EVERYONE … all working together!

And what a great example to show our children how people can come together to help others, and that they can make a GLOBAL impact.

They are NOT too little to help. 
They are NOT too little to let someone know that they care.
They are NOT too little to begin to understand that there are others in need.

I loved seeing families from our preschool at this event! The children were so proud to be able to help, and even to see some of their teachers there too (hair nets and all)! Think about what an impression it must make on a child to see their parents, older siblings, teachers and others working together for people in another country. And that THEY can help too! Yup, these preschoolers were able to scoop and measure salt, dried vegetables, lentils and rice and see that get packaged in a bag. They were able to decorate and write messages on the boxes that the food got packed in. They were able to save up their allowance and learn that each quarter they contributed meant one meal for a hungry child.

They LEARNED that they can make a difference.

The organization which we worked through is called Feeding Children Everywhere. Their mission is to “to empower and mobilize people from all walks of life to help meet one of our most basic needs: FOOD. Through passion, education,inspiration and a little hard work, together we can make a global difference.”

Schools and other groups can work with “Feeding Children Everywhere” to organize events like the one we had here in Connecticut. If your school/group can’t organize a large scale event – how about fundraising and make a group donation? How about helping hunger issues locally by collecting donations for your town’s food pantry?

What are some other tangible and creative ways that you can teach your child/children in your class about helping others?