There’s nothing like playing the piano, singing with kindergartners and having to sneeze.  I’m trying to lead an activity with a classroom full of five years olds when the nose starts to tickle.  I hold it as long as I can but just as I finish the song, AAACHOOO!  Unfortunately I don’t have a quiet feminine sneeze, but I sneeze like my dad.  Explosive. And I was wearing a mic.  Sorry kids.  Anyway, I continued teaching when I noticed one of my little girls walked over to get a tissue  and brought it over to me.  I thanked her for it, blew my nose and continued teaching.  The next thing I know, she is walking towards me with the sanitizer.  Another “thank you” and now I could officially continue.

Simple kindness is incredibly easy but apparently hard for a lot of people to do.  I was reading today that in Japan, being kind and respectful is just apart of the culture.  People standing still on escalators stay to the right so that people on the left can go faster.  No signs, they just do it.   There is no litter because people pick up after themselves.  Food service workers smile and bow when they hand patrons their food.  None of this is difficult, it’s just a way of life.

The beautiful thing about kids is that I see them demonstrate incredible kindness to each other every day.  I also see them do and say some of the most unkind things as well.  Where do they learn this?  And how do we teach them to adopt kindness as a lifestyle?  Well, first of all, they need to think of others before themselves which is difficult when the culture tells us to do otherwise.

Commercials tell us “you’re worth it” or “you deserve it”, all in the effort to get us to do or buy things for ourselves, certainly not for others.  They tell us we “need” things that we certainly do not need.  And it starts early.  My students believe they need every new gadget on the market and they have things like their own cell phones.  I’m not sure how I survived my childhood without one, but apparently kids today cannot.

But it’s not just things, my kids believe they deserve everything first.  They want to be in line first, they want a turn first, they want to play the instrument first.  And some of my students actually have toddler-like temper tantrums when they don’t.  There’s no such thing as offering something to a friend first for most of them.  They want and believe they deserve to be first all the time.  And again, it’s hard to be kind when you’re always thinking about yourself.

So what happens if we allow this to go on?  Well, I believe we’re seeing this in our so-called leaders today.  True leaders always think of others first.  It’s a conscious effort to help others and to let them know they matter.  It’s not about them and what they can get from something or what kind of name they can get make for themselves.  It’s about building up or taking care of others.

At my school we have something called “Wysong Wow Tickets”.  We give these to students who have some done something well.  I tend to use mine to reward kids who show kindness to one another and I make a big deal about it.  It’s just one little thing I can do on a daily basis to make kids aware of the importance of kindness.  The best thing I can do however is to demonstrate it to them on a daily basis.  I can demonstrate putting them first before myself, I can open doors for them, pick things up when they drop them, etc.  I can also make them aware of things they can do for others.

As I was sharing with my practicum students the other day, as teachers, we no longer just teach the subject we were trained for.  We’re teaching our students how to be good people.  Because in the end, when my students are adults, while I want them to appreciate music, I first want them to be good people, people who contribute positively to society and think of others first.  And that begins by teaching them little things like “the right side is the polite side”.