Helping My Bigger Family

To encourage the children to look for ways to help members of their extended families

The children will explain that we help our families by working together.

• Tell the children that this activity will give them an opportunity to share ways that they have worked together to help members of their bigger families.
• Say that in addition to sharing love with our immediate families, we often have opportunities to touch the lives of other family members.
• Divide the children into small groups. Invite the group members to take turns relating special times that they have shared with their bigger families and ways that they have reached out to help them (helping grandparents with yard work, playing with little cousins, celebrating an aunt's birthday).
• Encourage the children to conclude that their actions made them and other family members feel closer because they all worked together.
• Remind children to look for ways they can show their love for all their family members.

People Smart, Self Smart

Make sure children understand the idea that an extended family might include grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and so on. Give examples from your own family.

Encourage children to be respectful of cultural differences in extended family groups.