Secret Kindness Mission

What you need

• Paper (optional)
• Crayons or markers, a few (optional)

How to do it

Grown-up prep: Suggest a few ideas: make someone's bed, leave a drawing on a pillow, put a sibling's shoes by the door.

1. Accept your mission, secret agent: three kind surprises today.
2. Listen while a grown-up reads some ideas from the list.
3. Pick three kind things to do for someone in the house.
   Ask: Who could use a surprise today?
4. Plan when and where you'll do each one.
5. Do them in secret, and remember the agent rule: don't get caught!
6. Leave a secret agent mark: a little drawing or a smiley face.
7. Watch quietly. Did they notice the surprise?
   Ask: How do you think they felt?
8. At dinner, everyone guesses what the secret agent did.

Ideas to try

• Make someone's bed while they brush their teeth.
• Leave a drawing on someone's pillow.
• Put a sibling's shoes by the door, ready to go.
• Hide a happy note in a grown-up's bag or coat pocket.
• Put toothpaste on someone's toothbrush for them.
• Tidy a sibling's toys back into their bin.
• Fold a towel and leave it by the bath.
• Line up everyone's slippers neatly.
• Draw a smiley face and stick it on the fridge.
• Fill the pet's water bowl, with a grown-up's OK.
• Set a cup of water at someone's place at the table.
• Make a thank-you card for a neighbor or a teacher.
• Tuck a stuffed animal into someone's bed to say goodnight.
• Pick up three things from the floor that aren't yours.
• Draw a chalk hello on the sidewalk for the mail carrier.
• Tuck a joke into someone's lunch box.
• Bring a blanket to a grown-up who is reading.
• Water a plant that looks thirsty.
• Save the last snack for someone else.
• Say thank you to someone for something they did today.

Play it again

• Double agents: two kids team up for three surprises together.
• Neighbor mission: plan one surprise for someone outside the house, with a grown-up.
• Everyone's an agent: the whole family does secret kindness for a day, then guesses at dinner.