Valentine's Day Kindness Challenge for Kids in February

Inside: Use this Valentine’s Day Kindness Challenge to encourage more kindness during the month of February and give kids lots of chances to practice being kind.

Valentine’s Day is filled with chocolate and cards and goodies…it’s also the perfect time for kindness, like when we give Valentine cards to classmates, we give valentines to all of our classmates, not just our friends.

But for some kids, we have to model kindness intentionally, give them ideas on how to be kind to others, give them plenty of motivation and chances to speak and act with kindness, and then give them praise or rewards for that kindness.

Positive reinforcement is a powerful tool to teach a new habit and since the end goal is to not reward kids for kindness, we can wean them off the rewards once the habit has been established.

A simple way to make that happen is to use our Valentine’s Day Kindness Challenge.

More Valentine’s Day Kindness and Social Emotional Learning Activities:

Since kids absolutely love all things holidays, Valentine’s Day is the perfect excuse to sneak in a little learning about social emotional concepts like kindness, gratitude, and thoughtfulness.

Kindness can of course be taught year round (and should be!) but we have great Valentine’s Day activities themed for February to make learning a little more fun and a ton more hands-on.

We count down to Valentine’s Day with this Paper Chain Countdown Calendar where we do one kind thing every day.

You can play our Valentine’s Day Kind or Unkind Sort Game and write about the ways we can be kind during Valentine’s Day.

We use these Printable Valentine Cards to spread kindness.

You can read our Valentine’s Day Kindness Emergent Reader to show kids examples of how they can show love and kindness.

We can spread kindness in early February by making digital Valentine cards for kids in hospitals with chronic illnesses and serious conditions. Get the directions here to do that!

Or you can do it here for St. Jude’s.

We can intentionally practice being kind in different ways with these Valentine’s Day Kindness Role Playing Cards.

We use this sweet 14 Days of Kindness Notes Valentine’s Day Tradition for Families during February.

And we use the Valentine’s Day Kindness Challenge.

Why Should We Use Kindness Challenges?

We shouldn’t need to praise kids to be kind, they should just want to be kind and then do it.

Well, yes, in an ideal world.

But when we’re intentionally teaching kids to be kind, we have to bring out the big guns and use all the tools at our disposal, including positive reinforcement.

When kindness becomes their norm, their habit, and their gut reaction, then yes, we can wean them off the “rewards” and positive reinforcement.

Kindness is a verb. It’s something you have to do, rather than something you just talk about.

So if we are serious about focusing on social-emotional learning and kindness, we have to teach kids how to be kind with role playing strategies and with social emotional learning curriculum and then give them ample opportunities to be kind.

We have to give them situations where they can practice being kind to classmates, siblings, teammates, friends, adults, and people in the service industry (food servers, mail carriers, trash collectors, custodians, retail staff, flight attendants, etc.)

So to make kindness consistent and more of an everyday activity, we can gameify kindness and make it a challenge (because we know most kids can’t resist trying to “win.”)

We have Monthly Kindness Challenges like this one.

We have a Simple Normal Everyday Scavenger Hunt that kids love.

We have seasonal Kindness Challenges so kids do one kind act a week: Summer Kind Kids Challenge, Fall Kind Kids Challenge, Winter Kind Kids Challenge, Spring Kind Kids Challenge.

We have 100 Acts of Kindness Challenge so kids do one kind act a day and by the time they get to the 100th day of school, they’re 100 days smarter AND 100 days kinder.

But to connect kindness to a specific month, we also have monthly kindness challenges like our Valentine’s Day Kindness Challenge.

How to use the Valentine’s Day Kindness Challenge

1. Download and print the version you wish to use: black and white to color in the hearts or color version and cross off the hearts. (download it below.)

2. Every time one child is kind to another child, they get to color in a heart or cross off a heart. If you’re using it for students, every time they are kind to another student they can color in or cross off a heart.

3. When they get to the end of the sheet, they can earn some Valentine’s Day treats, heart shaped cookies, or some quality time doing a “special” activity like extra recess, extra screen time, or a trip to the library to get Valentine’s Day books.

4. Continue with the positive reinforcement with another kindness challenge so kindness becomes a habit, like our St. Patrick’s Day Kindness Challenge for March.

OR… get our Year of Kindness Challenges here all in one place.

Kindness Ideas to Help Kids Easily Act and Speak with Kindness

Sometimes it can be hard for kids to come up with ideas on how to show kindness to others. But it doesn’t have to be hard when you know there are two different kinds of kindness:

big, loud, showy acts of kindness, often random acts of kindness
simple, normal,everyday acts of kindness that can become habit if we practice them enough

Random Acts of Kindness are fun and great, especially for Random Acts of Kindness Day in February. But the much more impactful acts of kindness take no planning, no props, and no money.