Parent with Purpose
DGT’s Big-Hearted Families™ Toolkit
Our growing collection of projects, printables, book lists, and research-based wisdom will help your busy family grow big hearts. Kindness is a muscle: the more you practice, the stronger your child’s compassion grows.
“A guide for positive parenting, for anyone who is going to be around children. I can’t begin to imagine what a wonderful world it would be if everyone practiced this kind of kindness with kids.”
Let’s get started!
Browse by Project Type!
Check out our collection of creative, compassion-building projects below!
Make a plan to practice service or share kindness monthly, weekly, or on all of your favorite holidays. Have fun crafting your family’s big-hearted adventures.
Inspire kindness with recommended reads.
As a new school year begins, picture books can help children build empathy, welcome new friends, and create caring classroom communities. These stories encourage readers to notice others, celebrate differences, and discover how even small acts of kindness can make a big impact.
Spend lazy summer days curled up with a book! Summer is a chance to take a deep breath, even when the schedule can feel full with fun, camps, and vacation. Slow down and spend some time reading about kindness with these summer-themed chapter books about kindness.
Squeeze every last ounce of sunshine out of summer. The season is a chance to take a deep breath, even when the schedule can feel full with fun, camps, and vacation. Slow down and spend some time reading about kindness with these sweet, summer-themed stories.
Give thanks every day with this growing collection. Research shows that people who regularly express gratitude are happier and healthier than their counterparts, regardless of measurable wealth. Plus, regularly practicing gratitude shines a spotlight on the abundance of gifts in our lives, gifts we might otherwise overlook.
Shape hearts and inspire action with these read-aloud picks for elementary kids. Perfect for sparking meaningful conversations, whether you're starting a book club at home, reading together as a class, or simply looking to connect over a great story.
Teach your child to be an "upstander,” not a bystander. The books on this list will give them the tools to take a stand.
This growing collection of resources provides the perfect starting place for a conversation about challenging social conflicts. Pick a book that interests your family. Read it together. Then, use the discussion questions to take the concepts further.
Serious or sudden illness can be a scary issue to deal with at any age. Yet caring for and reaching out to those who are sick is an essential lesson in compassion, even for very young children. Whether you are caring for a loved one or volunteering to provide comfort, this collection of picture books will help your whole family get started.
What is peace? Is it something you feel in your heart? Is it something to try to create in the world around you? Help children of all ages answer these questions with this growing collection of picture books.
Connect with DGT’s blog for our newest tools and inspiration.
As you are mapping out your summer bucket list, Doing Good Together is here to help with ideas for meaningful kindness.
50+ kids’ gift ideas with kindness at their core! Gift giving opportunities pop up throughout the year, from annual holiday, birthday, and anniversary celebrations, to one-time milestone moments like graduations, major accomplishments, or just because. With the overabundance of consumerism in our culture, it’s natural for parents who care about the world to want to be mindful of what they're purchasing, not wanting junk to accumulate in their homes. That’s why we assembled this tried-and-true gift guide of favorite presents with kindness at their core. You’ll find special projects and tools that keep kids busy, encourage reflection, and encourage conversations; activities, items, and games that help them explore and understand the world around them; apparel that supports good causes, and more.
Everything is better with friends and a party!
How about friends and a party and an amazing book? As a parent, September feels like a fresh start, a new year. It’s full of opportunity as the school year gears up along with a new season of activities and sports. I’m going to suggest one more thing to start this year - a big-hearted book party club!
Learn ways to include kindness lessons in educational settings and beyond! Through learning about kindness, children learn empathy and compassion and can begin viewing the world around them through the eyes of others as they appreciate diverse perspectives. By building kindness activities into regular educational practices, we prepare kids for life as an adult who cares and contributes to the world around them. If action speaks louder than words in early childhood, why not get their bodies, minds, and hearts involved in caring for their communities?
Learn ways to include kindness lessons in educational settings and beyond! Through learning about kindness, children learn empathy and compassion and can begin viewing the world around them through the eyes of others as they appreciate diverse perspectives. By building kindness activities into regular educational practices, we prepare kids for life as an adult who cares and contributes to the world around them.
Valentine’s Day often stirs strong feelings, often over-celebrated with material gestures. Our guest contributor shares how her view of the holiday was shifted by a homemade card, revealing the day's deeper potential. Learn how teaching young children about varied forms of love can foster empathy and enrich lives.
February is the perfect time to gather your child’s school friends, invite your neighbors, and host a party to celebrate compassion.
We might apply the idea of a “messy middle” to much of life–switching careers, engaging in social change, even parenting/family life itself. Most of our lives happen in this space, when you stop to think about it–we haven’t yet “arrived” at the metaphorical place of organization and tranquility, but are constantly evolving our processes to be responsive to needs. How might we help our children understand the messy middle–its necessity, its tension, its gift–in a developmentally-appropriate way?
As parents and caregivers, you likely know all too well the daily stressors you face. The surgeon general’s report outlines the specific challenges we face at each stage of a child’s development, from sleepless nights with newborns to navigating the troubled teen years. The stress doesn’t just affect us as parents, it spreads to impact the whole family unit. And when we worry that our stress is affecting our kids, the cycle feels never-ending. The surgeon general’s report calls attention to this vicious cycle and offers actionable ways to break it.
In today's fast-paced information cycle, issues are often presented as black or white, right or wrong. When parents actively listen and support diverse perspectives on various topics, from child care to nutrition, they model for children how to understand and appreciate differences, encouraging a more nuanced and empathetic view of the world.
Discover expert advice in DGT’s latest newsletter.
July brings warmth, sunshine and the full summer experience. The hallmark of July is the warmth of the bright sun, the growth of flowers, and the energy all around us. Just like sunshine, kindness has the power to spread goodness all around and improve health in the process. Whether it is the simple sharing of a smile, lending a neighbor a helping hand, giving back to your community or creating a ripple effect of positivity, kindness provides an opportunity to spread sunshine in people’s lives. How are you and your family spreading sunshine this summer?
As the summer starts, I have been thinking a great deal about how few summers we as parents have with our children. We only have one summer when they are infants, a few when they are toddlers, eight when they are children. The times I remember most from my childhood are the family activities done together in the times away from the routine of every day. When kindness is infused into those family activities, it makes them even more meaningful. Every summer is another opportunity to embrace this special, less-structured time we have with our kids, and a chance to enjoy the simple joys that a purpose-filled summer has to offer.
In May, many families are preparing for summer travel, mapping out routes, planning fun excursions and dreaming about time together as a family. What if, in addition to making plans for travel, we made plans for kindness as well? There is space for kindness to strangers and one another, generosity towards others, patience at stressful moments, and connection through new experiences. This summer, let’s make kindness part of the plan.
Trees actually communicate with one another through this vast network, responding to needs in the community of trees. Just like plants, I think people are interconnected in the way our kindness ripples outward to the world and to one another. As we think about Earth Day approaching, I am intrigued by how our kindness can mirror nature and how we can work together for the common good.
Music is a powerful tool. The lyrics can help us teach children compassion, caring, acceptance, connection and even empathy. Research shows that music is stored in long-term memory, which means that even when other memories fail us we can still access the melodies and lyrics of beloved songs to find comfort. Combining social justice with music creates an even more powerful tool to spread kindness through our communities.
In these uncertain times, I am trying to hold fast to the notion that kindness matters. Research shows that even small acts of kindness make a greater impact than expected. So this year, I am trying not to diminish the little things that I can do. Kindness matters and every little act of kindness makes an impact.
Stay in Touch!
Subscribe to the DGT Volunteer Listings, Newsletter, and blog.
Join our Facebook group to connect with like-minded parents.

As a new school year begins, books can help children build empathy, welcome new friends, and create caring classroom communities. These stories encourage readers to notice others, celebrate differences, and discover how even small acts of kindness can make a big impact.