Have You Filled a Bucket Today?- by Carol McCloud

[Mackenzie L]

This is an awesome book for children of all ages! It explains the idea of being kind by referring kindness to an invisible bucket that all people carry with them at all time. It explains throughout the book that by doing kind acts, buckets get filled and by committing mean acts, you are dipping into someone else's bucket. It also explains that dipping into someone else's bucket doesn't help fill up your own. I feel that this is a book that is fun for children and parents to read together but that it also teaches a very valuable life lesson as well.

[FFM2016]

My daughter's kindergarten class read this book and very much enjoyed it.
The class decided to use it in all their activities - my daughter would come home and tell me that she helped to fill someone's bucket today and ask me if I needed help filling mine up too!
It's a very inspiring and helpful book particularly in a group who are struggling to learn some basic morals of sharing and good behavior!

FFM2016

[Heidi M Simone]

When I used to teach the younger grades, each of my students had a little bucket. For kind deeds and right decisions, they got to fill their buckets with pom poms. We tried not to focus too much on the negative, but there were definitely times, when buckets had to either be emptied or less full due to unkind deeds and poor decisions.

It worked great for a while, but then the kids matured a bit and we needed a new system afterward. However, I love the concept from this book and for the younger ones, I think it's a wonderful physical representation of what kind and unkind actions can do!

[Sav Sparkman]

This is a really great book for teaching kids about kindness, especially for ones who have a more difficult time with perspective taking, identifying emotions, or understanding social situations. There are some cute activities you can pair with it as well. Personally, as an adult, I think the writing is a bit wordy and would’ve liked to see more engaging illustrations. But I haven’t found a better book for teaching about the impact our behavior can have on others!