8 March 2023
Charitable activities for children
Four reasons why charitable activities can help children grow into giving people
Giving to charity is one of the kindest and most selfless things you can do, and instilling charitable behaviour from an early age is one of the best ways to ensure children follow your path. There are numerous ways you can encourage this sort of behaviour from an early age, from talking to your children about sponsoring a child to donating to a cause like ending world hunger or fighting child labour.
Read on to find some of the simple ways in which you can encourage children to become more charitable and to think more about donating to, and supporting charities, they care about.
Ways to help your children grow into charitable people:
Let them support causes they care about
Supporting charities and being a charitable person is great, but one of the best ways to encourage your family to become charitable people is to let them support charities they actually care about. It has been proven that people who are allowed to choose the cause they want to support are more likely to stay charitable for longer.
If you are just introducing your children to charities, sponsorship and donating then make sure you are sensitive to their age. Be careful not to talk about causes that they may find upsetting or disturbing. Why not talk to them about children that can be sponsored through World Vision? You can explain how to sponsor a child, why they need help, and pick out some children that are of similar ages to your own.
READ MORE: How child sponsorship works
Teach them the value of items and time
One of the best ways to teach a younger audience the reasons why giving and supporting charities is so important, is to teach them the value of everyday items and the value of time. As children are often unable to give money, why not teach them how they can give their time and how equally important this is?
They can start small, by donating their time to friends, family and neighbours, doing small jobs to show their support. Alternatively, you could encourage them to volunteer at a local club or event with you. We have a great range of fundraising tips which can help inspire you if that’s something you’d like to do with them.
READ MORE: How to fundraise
Make it a family cause
Children might find the thought of volunteering or helping charities daunting to begin with, so why not make it a family affair and take on some charitable work with loved ones? This will encourage the younger members to get involved without feeling shy or overwhelmed.
Lead by example and set a standard for children to follow. If you have always been a charitable person and you talk about it often as a family where you share updates, then children will pick up on this and want to follow in your footsteps. You could also look to create family traditions that younger members of the family can then take into their adult lives. At Christmas or on birthdays, why not make it a tradition to choose a charity gift to donate instead of buying an extra present or that extra food that may not be necessary?
Celebrate their charitable achievements
One of the best encouragement tactics is to make sure you celebrate one another’s charitable achievements. If your children take on some small tasks around the neighbourhood or get involved in some volunteering, then make sure you acknowledge their achievements. You could create a chart that inspires them to do charitable or helpful things in order to maybe win a treat, these sorts of incentives can really drive people to want to help others.
Ways to donate to World Vision
If you want to introduce your children or family to World Vision and want to get them involved in some charitable work, then there are numerous ways that they can get involved and help.
Firstly, you can talk to them about sponsoring a child. Sponsoring a child is a long-term way to hugely benefit the life and living conditions of children living in poverty. Secondly, you can talk to them about potentially organising a fundraiser to raise money for World Vision. They could organise a bake sale at school, get involved in a walk or run or organise an event at school so all of their friends can get involved.
If you want to introduce your children to World Vision or to charity work in general, then hopefully the above points have given you a little insight into how you can encourage them to grow into charitable humans.
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