Once again, we celebrate Kindness Week at Wellington. Every year at this time, we encourage our teachers and pupils to give special attention to this core Wellington value and find ways of putting it into practice with mindfulness and intentionality. Of course, we strive to uphold all five Wellington values of courage, integrity, kindness, respect and responsibility. But there is a power in kindness that we believe warrants our attention for an entire week. It is uniquely intertwined with our other four Wellington values. Being kind sometimes requires us to be vulnerable, which takes courage. Holding ourselves accountable for our kindness is a reflection of our integrity. The respect we have for others is often an expression of kindness. And, naturally, we all have a responsibility to be kind to each other.

Kindness can mean taking action. It can mean looking outside ourselves and being of service to others, whether we hold the door open for a classmate, help them study for an examination or simply offer them words of encouragement. Moreover, kindness is a fundamental element in any thriving community. It builds strong relationships founded on trust and maintains networks of support among us all.

To help cultivate this Wellington value, our pupils have been taking part in several fun and enriching activities all week. Our pupils in Pre-Prep, for example, have been crafting kindness paper chains. Each link is a slip of paper with a random act of kindness written on the inside. Every day, they tear a link from the chain, and they perform the act of kindness written on the inside.

Likewise, our Upper Prep pupils have been making kindness rocks. They are encouraged to paint small stones with vivid colours, designs and inscriptions.

"These are rocks that you can create and give family and friends when they feel lonely," year 6 pupil Jing Jing explains. "Each one is different. You can be very creative. I am going to give this one to my mum, because shes does all kinds of stuff just for me, and I think she is very special."

Beatrix of year 7 says, "I think I will paint a rock and put an inspiring message on it, too. I want to leave it somewhere for someone else to find. Whoever finds it can use the rock as a reminder to just be proud of themselves.