If you happen upon our home in a quiet corner of Kent in England, you’ll see two colourful rainbow paintings in our front window. Like children from across the world, our two boys painted these displays to symbolise a sense of collective hope and connectivity to friends and strangers amidst the coronavirus pandemic. Similarly, on Thursday nights, like many in our community we’ve stood proudly on our doorstep, clapping for key workers and those in the National Health Service who are on the frontlines of the crisis.
Whilst these acts vary in style, similar displays of kindness for the collective good are happening all across the globe. As children engage in them more widely, we have a great opportunity to help them understand how empathy, compassion and solidarity play into long-term social change, orientated around ideas of social justice, fairness and equality.
Almost overnight, much of our society became motionless. Most children stopped going to school, after-school activities were halted, events cancelled or postponed, and days out replaced by time at home. New conversations about compassion and empathy have sprung up in these radically-different circumstances. Beneath the sheen of anxiety, fear and concern, we are inundated by stories of kindness, voluntary action and everyday heroism.
