4 Tips on Involving Your Kids in Community Service
*I am partnering with RITZ on this post to support their efforts with Feeding America and all opinions are my own.
Most of us a parents are doing our very best to ensure our children grow up to be thoughtful, generous members of society that contribute to the communities around us. When it comes to putting those tiny little boots on the ground and getting involved, it can feel a little overwhelming and many of us don’t know where to start. My husband and I have always felt strongly that we want serving the communities around us to be a lifestyle that we bring our kids up in so I am partnering with RITZ in their support of Feeding America to share a few tips I have found helpful to get little ones involved in serving.
1. Start the conversation at home- Begin talking about what your child might encounter when serving and prepare them for what they will see. Reading books is one helpful way to prepare younger children and I found a great resource on poverty and hunger related books for you HERE. Depending on their age, it can also be helpful to talk about some reasons these issues exist so kids grow up thinking about justice from a deeper systemic perspective. For example, providing one meal will not solve hunger. Help kids to understand there are many reasons hunger exists and many approaches are needed to decrease hunger in the US (increase in living wages, greater access to mental health servives, etc). Providing a meal is one part of a larger solution.
2. Find a way to make the greatest impact- You will find that some organizations may have a generous donor doubling charitable gifts or that a particular brand is giving part of their proceeds to charity. One way you can make a greater impact during the month of March is to join us in purchasing RITZ brand products at Walmart and donating to a local food pantry. This month RITZ is donating $.10 from every purchase up to $1,000,000 to Feeding America to support kids that depend on school lunches. You can both support hunger locally with a food pantry donation while increasing your impact by helping RITZ to ensure Lunch Goes On for hungry kids across the nation. It’s a fantastic way to make your donations stretch farther and have the greatest impact. If you're thinking about loading up your cart to make a donation, you can easily do that HERE!
3. Encourage your children's interests and passions- Talk with your kids about what issues are closest to their hearts. Do they care about hungry kids and families? Are they concerned about the environment and caring for our physical world? Do they leap at the opportunity to help an animal in need? Whether you are making food pantry donations, teaming up with local animal shelters or picking up trash at your local park, your kids will be the most invested if you're listening to the issues that most concern their hearts. Their compassion will grow when you get them involved and give them an outlet for all that care and concern they feel.
4. Talk about what it means to be a part of a community- It’s important for kids to understand that a community is a group of people who live and work in the same area. The great thing about being in a community is that we are able to support each other and help when someone is having a hard time. Sometimes we are the ones giving to the community and other times we receive from the community.
I hope some of these tips are helpful for you as you get your little ones out serving in the communities!
Xo,
Kelly
