On the last day of school before Thanksgiving break, we thought we’d organize special events for our sixth-grade kids. We had three different fun workshops on gratitude, ending the day with an outing to the movie Wonder. It was such a meaningful day for all, more than we had anticipated.

The workshop my colleague and I led was to create gratitude stones. Kids had to paint on the stones things that they couldn’t imagine their worlds without. As they dove into the activity, the things they came up with at times, left me speechless and happy. Many wrote the name of the school! Other things they wrote and drew were intense and emotional. A simple task turned to be a very deep experience for all of us. I also painted my own stone. I didn’t think long, as I shared the pens with them. I drew a heart and wrote Hope on it. I truly cannot imagine a world, my world, our world without it. These kids give me hope that there is still kindness and love to be had and they are perfectly reflected on these simple stones.

Those gratitude stones will end up outside, placed in a space where we can go back and remember what is important to us.