Activity 1: The Positive and Responsive ClassroomBucket-Filling

Main Idea- The premise is that everyone has an invisible bucket. When it is full, we feel our best. When it is empty, we feel

terrible. Your bucket fluctuates throughout the day based on how you treat others and how they treat you. - Everyone has a bucket so that should influence your behavior toward others all the time.

How your bucket is filled- When others are kind to you, help you, praise you, or give your responsibilities, it fills your bucket! Each time a

person makes you feel good, they put a drop in your bucket.- When you put a drop in someone else’s bucket, your bucket also gets a drop in it. So the golden rule applies:

treat others as you’d like to be treated. If you are kind to others, they will be kind to you!- When you let someone lean on you and you help them.Consequences: You feel great, you are proud of yourself, you fill other people’s buckets (positive outcomes)

How to fill a bucket- Bucket-filling is easy! All you have to do is be kind to others. Examples of bucket-filling:

o Telling someone that they did a great jobo Encouraging someone to try their best. Any type of positive motivation.o Helping a friend, teacher, parent, or anyone with something.

How your bucket is dipped from- When things don’t go your way – you are late to the bus, your dog ate your homework, you trip- When others tease you or are unkind- When others leave you out- When you are unkind to others or you choose not to help them (it dips from both buckets)Consequences: You don’t feel good about yourself, you are in a bad mood, you feel angry (negative outcomes)

In My Classroom- We have a “Bucket Filler Chart” where each child has a “bucket” (section in a shoe hanger). The kids are given

one person at the beginning of the week to observe. By Friday, they need to have put two drops in that person’s bucket. That way, they can “catch” bucket-filling behaviors and praise their friend for it. The students are allowed to fill other students’ buckets as well. We assign a person to watch so that everyone gets at least two drops. The kids can fill my bucket, my assistant’s bucket, and kids buckets from other classes also. As teachers, we also like to fill buckets! On Friday, the kids get to take home all of their bucket drops.

- We do a lesson about Bucket-Filling at the beginning of the year using the books, How Full is Your Bucket? by Tom Rath and Mary Reckmeyer and Have You Filled a Bucket Today? by Carol McCloud. We discuss how to fill buckets and how to dip from buckets. The kids act out scenarios of both. When I see bucket-filling behavior in my classroom, I point it out to everyone. When I am one-on-one with students who have been “bucket-dippers” we talk about how they dipped from someone else’s bucket and what they can do to fill it again.

- Bucket Filling helps me create a kind community. It is a very positive program that doesn’t take much time out of our week, but has very valuable outcomes.

This is the Bucket filling chart in my classroom. Each child has a bucket (with a visual bucket) with their name on it. You can see that there are notes or drops placed in the buckets.

On the next page, you can see an example of a “drop” as well as a closer look at the heading and

the toolbox we use.

This is a closer look at my Bucket Chart

heading.

This is the toolbox for bucket-fillers. It is where we keep the drops for the kids to write on. It is one consistent form.

This is what a “drop” looks like. We got it from Have You Filled a Bucket Today? We do a writing lesson over how to write a clear and expressive description on the note. Not: “You are nice” But rather: “You helped me clean up my work

station when the bell rang.”