You start your morning excited about what you’ll be working on with your kids. By 10 minutes into your homeschool day you realize that it’s going to be a lot tougher than you anticipated.
The complaints, whining, stalling, and bad attitudes are not what you were hoping for. In fact, it’s starting to rub off and give you a bad attitude of your own.
But what can you do at this point besides grit your teeth and try to get through the day, doing your best to get everyone motivated and happy?
Actually, there is something! And that is gratitude journaling.
There are a number of reasons why gratitude journals are helpful. One of the key benefits is a sense of peace and contentment as a person takes an intentional pause to reflect on what they appreciate.
Entries made by children are often much different than what an adult may write, but there is still value in having children think about their blessings.
Now, here is the thing. I understand that we, as homeschooling moms, really don’t want to add one.more.thing. to our to-do lists. Our plates are already overflowing. However, there are some simple ways that you can add this into the beginning of your day without making a lot of extra work for you or your children.
You can certainly purchase a gratitude journal or print a free printable version that I offer on my site, but there are other options as well. These practices make it even easier for you and your kids to be successful without it being overwhelming. Bonus!
Here are a few suggestion for simple gratitude journaling for your kids:
- Have your child write one to three things they are thankful for on their daily schedule, the margin of their notebook, or some other paper or notebook that they already use on a regular basis.
- Have your child verbally say one to three things they are thankful for before they begin their work. They can share their thoughts with you, a sibling, a pet or even a stuffed animal.
- Write down a collective list as you talk together as a group and discuss the things you are all grateful for that day.
Keep it simple
Remember, this doesn’t have to be complicated to be effective. The most important objective is to get your children thinking about what they appreciate, things they love, blessings they cherish or something they are looking forward to. They should reflect on those things before they get started with anything else for the day.
If writing in a gratitude journal is not already something you personally do on a daily basis, then you too may benefit from this practice!
And if you and your children already do daily morning devotions together this would be a perfect time to add in the gratitude portion.
Try a few other gratitude activities
And after you get into a daily habit of gratitude, you may find that focusing on gratitude is very helpful for you and your children. At that point you may want to try some other gratitude activities with them. There are so many fun things you can do with them. And anytime of year is a good time, not just at Thanksgiving!
So what do you think? Will you give it a try to start your homeschool day with simple gratitude journaling?
