12 Ways To Teach Gratitude To Kids In The Way That THEY Want To Learn

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Let me start this by saying that I am far from the perfect mother or perfect person. But if there is one thing I am utterly determined to do right for my kids, it’s making sure that I remember to teach gratitude every chance that I get.

I know that I have a lot to be grateful for, I just don’t always remember it when things get rough.

When I had postpartum depression hard, I mostly neglected to talk to my son enough/very much and am dealing with his late talking now. I’m grateful that he’s as smart as he is, and all we really seem to struggle with is his speech (which will catch up in its own good time, I’m sure).

Through a cancer ordeal with my husband I’ve neglected to take much care of myself, leading to over-anxiety, stress, and frustration that often manifests itself as irritation and anger at nearly anything, depending on the day.

I struggle to not let depression overtake me when I think about how we may never be able to have any more kids because of his radiation treatments. Instead of dwelling about what could have been but may never be, I thank the lord for and hug my two existing babies tight — something so many people might crave desperately, a fact not lost on me.

Despite the hurdles it’s put in our path to our dream life, I’m infinitely grateful that he survived it, and that he’s generally ahead of where most patients are at this point. I try hard to always remember what I told him on the day he was diagnosed and said we may never have more kids:  that I’d trade all our future kids to keep him with us, no matter what.

And yet every day, it seems that even when I think I’ve seen the worst, I can find something that makes me realize that “it could be worse.”

What does gratitude teach us?

Often enough, we’ve all thought “my life sucks.” But deep down, I suppose we know that’s not really true.

Because you are an adult and have had sufficient time to practice your attitude of gratitude and put your life into perspective, you’re capable of making that realization that it’s not as bad as it could be (and thank God for that).

With that well-developed attitude, you also know that gratitude isn’t, in fact, a THING that you learn from, it’s the attitude you use to learn about the world around you.

According to an article from UC Berkeley, gratitude can be considered a 4-part experience:  

• Awareness:  we notice what we have to be thankful for
• Understanding:  we try to think about why we have those good things
• Perception:  we process how we feel about them
• Expression:  we use appropriate ways to indicate our appreciation for these good things.

If you can think of gratitude in multiple pieces like this, you suddenly see how much easier it can be raising a grateful child by teaching gratitude as a process versus considering it to be one big, looming concept.

Your goal is to teach gratitude by teaching your child to view the world from a perspective of appreciation rather than an opinion of a deficit – i.e. what you DO have matters more than what you DON’T have.

As an adult, with this process in your interpersonal skill set, you’ve got everything you need to know how to raise an appreciative child, so long as you’ve got the patience to do so!

Why should we teach gratitude?

The first, obvious, yet weak answer to this question is “because we’re supposed to.”

I think you can see the holes in that approach.

We all know that failing to teach gratitude to our children will likely result in us watching our children become a selfish, ungrateful teenager, and eventually an inconsiderate, egotistical adult.

If I’m being totally blunt, parenting can often suck enough as it is, so I’d much rather know how to raise a humble child than deal with ungrateful children for years.

If we don’t teach our kids gratitude, we end up with kids that we constantly struggle with, and adult children who are distant from us or who aren’t around as much as we’d like them to be.

Would you recognize the signs of a spoiled child in your own little loves?

You’d most likely see things like:

• Frequent, hair-trigger tantrums
• Rude and inconsiderate behaviors like hitting, biting, yelling
• Always complaining and never seems to be content with anything
• Noticeably missing manners (lack of the words “thank you” or “please”)

But what about some of the more subtle signs?

• They always talk to their parents as peers (lack of respect for an obvious authority figure)
• They have a way about them that tends to make people avoid them, and they don’t play very well with others.
• Maintain a “picky eater” attitude well past the toddler/preschool learn-their-limits phase.
• Verbal expression of displeasure after receiving a gift they don’t want/like.
• Always wants to be the center of attention.
• Bribery may be required to do routine things (ice cream to get them to go to the dentist; new toy if they behave while you run errands; etc.)

I know you might argue and say something like “well why shouldn’t they get a reward for tolerating running errands with me?”

And the answer to that is because even if you mean well when you offer it, you’re setting your child up to expect a reward every time MUNDANE, ROUTINE tasks are completed.

You don’t treat yourself to ice cream after every dentist appointment, and I doubt you reward yourself with a new magazine every time you go grocery shopping (and if you do, we might need to have a talk about your budget and your spending habits).

If as an adult we have things we just plain need to do, without getting a reward afterward, then why do we set our kids up for disappointment and accountability struggles in their futures?

Everyone knows that being thankful makes you happier. Why WOULDN’T you want that for your children? If that’s not enough of a why — happier now, lower risk of mental health issues later in life — then nothing will be.

When should you start teaching gratitude?  

It’s never too early to start to teach gratitude to your children, and it’s also never too late to turn things around if you find yourself with an unappreciative child.

When your children are first born, you can literally start teaching on day one. Many parents do it without even realizing it!

When your baby smiles at you, tell them something like “I love your smile; it makes me feel happy!”

When your toddler cooperates during a diaper change, tell them “thank you for letting me clean your bum! Now we can go play!”

When you want your preschooler to go put their coat and shoes on, instead of saying “go put on your coat and shoes,” try asking “can you please help me by putting on your coat and shoes? I’d like that so much!”

Maybe these phrases seem silly to you, but they are packed with value for your children.

The baby is already starting to be exposed to the concept that their moods have an effect on the emotions of the people around them.

The toddler is learning that sometimes un-fun things have to happen before we can get to the fun stuff.

The preschooler is becoming aware of the concept of helping other people through their actions.

Older children and teenagers that need a little catching up obviously won’t be quite as easy to work with as an infant, but the underlying principles are the same.

Even if they roll their eyes, you can still tell your 15-year old that you love their smile and it makes you happy. Just make sure you’re offering that comment at a time when you aren’t just feeding their ego.

How can you teach gratitude?

There are literally countless ways that you could approach teaching gratitude, and it’s going to depend on their age as far as what methods or techniques you choose.

The important thing to remember is to tailor these ideas to the way that your kids will (subconsciously) want to learn them. Younger children will learn best through play, whereas older children will learn better through experiences.

That said, whether you’re wondering how to teach your teenager appreciation or how to teach thankfulness to preschoolers, you’ll find methods below that can apply to any age. These are bigger, general concepts; precisely how you choose to implement them is up to you!

1. Talk about gratitude.

Not as ridiculous as it sounds, talking about gratitude can be one of the best ways to teach this attitude since it can be done with literally every age. Just use the right level of language.

Use the 4 parts of the gratitude experience we talked about above (here, using the example of unwrapping Christmas or birthday presents):

• Awareness:  A day or so after unwrapping, ask your child what their favorite present was.
• Understanding:  Ask them if they know why they got that gift.
• Perception:  Talk to them about how it made them feel when they opened it.
• Expression:  Ask them how they want to express that good feeling to the person who gave them the gift. It might be a phone call or a thank you note, depending on their age.

Now I do want to point out that the goal here is not to make your child focus on their favorite gift and ignore the rest. Once they’ve done this exercise in processing their gratitude, there’s no reason you can’t continue (and you should do so) with all the other gifts they received.

Another approach to talking as a way to teach gratitude is to make an example of it yourself.

Be aware of the language you use in a day, and of how often you do (or don’t) remember to thank your spouse for picking up kids or groceries after work, tell your child how much you appreciate them putting their dirty dishes in the sink, or use good manners to strangers in public or on the phone (customer service reps, anyone?), like thanking them for their help and wishing them a good day at the end of the interaction.

2. Use good manners.

While talking about and modeling gratitude is the very best way to teach it, sometimes you need to “kill them with kindness” to get through to them. Don’t underestimate the power of overusing “please” and “thank you.”

(Spoiler alert:  It’s impossible to do so!)

Think of it this way:  if you regularly say thank you for everything, you give your children the sense that you don’t feel entitled to what you have or what comes your way.

3. Give to others who are less fortunate.

Building off that sense of entitlement (and also avoiding raising greedy, stingy children), giving of yourself to others in need is an excellent way to really show your children how fortunate they are.

Offer free yard work services to an older neighbor on your street.

Include your (older) children in the knowledge that you tithe 10% of your income to God’s work, be it straight to the church or to an organization providing goodwill to those less fortunate.

Prepare for (or respond to) the inevitable influx of toys from grandparents at Christmas by requiring that at least a few of their old toys get donated per child, to offset the new ones coming in. You could also be sure to give to the Toys for Tots program each year, but having your child choose one item from their own wishlist that they’re willing to give up for someone else.

The holidays are an especially good time of year to act on this when the “I wants” start flying and the ability to think of others tends to take a back seat. Consider things like volunteering at a soup kitchen or ringing a charity bell to give your older kids perspective.

4. Write thank you cards.

After receiving gifts, when someone went above and beyond, or just because you’re thankful for their existence. Thank you cards NEVER go out of style.

A post-gift thank you card helps solidify the idea that no one is entitled to a gift.

An appreciation note when someone went out of their way for your benefit helps offset some of their “cost.”

Sometimes a best friend is a better friend than you ever thought could exist. Have your child make sure they know it.

5. End your day with a family gratitude session.

Whether it’s at the dinner table or the last thing before bed, have your children tell you about something that was especially awe-inspiring that day, or something extra good that happened to them. Being able to teach gratitude as a multi-person experience is excellent for helping kids absorb the value and the lesson.

On at least a weekly basis have your entire family express why they are thankful for what they have. Include why they’re thankful that week for each member of the family, including a heartfelt compliment if they can. This encourages your child to develop their expression of gratitude.

6. Keep a gratitude journal.

This can be as simple as buying each family member a little dollar store notebook to use.

Adults and older children can write about the four aspects of gratitude. Younger children can be prompted to draw something that makes them feel happy.

What matters more than the specific content is the developing habit. If you train yourself to look at the world with an appreciative, thankful eye, you also train yourself to forget how to see the negative things first.

7. Create a family gratitude expression system.

You might decide to have a single, family dry erase board/frame (this peel and stick board can hang anywhere!) where one person gets to be the focus each day – “today we are thankful for [insert person’s name] because….” and each person adds a reason as they think of it.

(This is my favorite option because it helps teach the concept that you can’t always be the center of attention — sometimes you’re the support team and sometimes you’re the star!)

Alternatively, you could hang a frame or small dry-erase board for each family member — together in one place in the house, or on each person’s bedroom door. Then there’s no need to wait for a certain day to express appreciation for any one person.

8. Build a family gratitude journal.

As an alternative (or in addition) to the dry erase board, have a central notebook where those dry erase thoughts or any random appreciative comments can be recorded.

Gratitude is unrestricted and expressed real-time instead of waiting for another day or another board.

If you’re the parent of very young children, like us, having a family drawing session each night would be an excellent way to foster togetherness, peacefulness, and a teamwork expression of things that make everyone happy.

9. Teach your children to give more than they receive.

This one can be tricky to implement, but it’s incredibly valuable.

Have your children donate two old toys for every one new toy they receive. Make sure your family always gives gifts to people that don’t always give back.

Show your children how to give of yourself (in acts of kindness, quality time, etc) and expect nothing in return.

Older children can be guided to earn a certain amount of money specifically to reach a donation goal or to purchase something for someone in need. Since summer is a great time for kids to earn a few dollars, tie this back into idea number 3 and have your children purchase school supplies for those in need as they get ready to return to school themselves.

10. Appreciative play

Younger children learn best through play, so turn their play into an experience that can teach gratitude.

Play pass the ball, and each time they catch the ball they have to say something nice to the person they’re about to throw it to. If they can’t think of something they’re out of the game.

Write “nice” words on a few blown-up balloons (words like smart, sweet, helpful, kind, etc). Have the kids try to keep all of their balloons off of the floor, because sometimes being nice takes work!

When this fun gratitude game is over, let them pop the balloons (if they’re old enough)!

11. Have patience (and teach it).

Patience is a virtue, after all.

Teaching gratitude takes a while, regardless of the age of your children. You’ll need the patience to see it through, but you’ll also need patience so that as your children come around, they start to realize just how quiet and cooperative YOU have been with them as they struggled to change their perspective on things.

Teaching children that “good things come to those who wait” is a lesson in itself, but over time they’ll find that some things are worth waiting for.

Maybe they really want a new video game or a certain toy they saw at the store. Instead of indulging them immediately, or only making them wait until your next paycheck, exercise your “no” muscle and give them a goal to reach to earn the thing in question.

Offer older children allowance for doing chores, and have them earn twice the cost before they can have it. Give younger children some if-then scenarios to help them understand that not everything they want can happen immediately. Something as simple as having them make their bed every day for a week to earn the item can teach volumes.

12. Pray — a lot, often, and together.

Often times we teach our children to pray for the things in their heart. But what about after they get that which they prayed for? 

I’ll admit that it’s in my prayers that we can someday afford to build our dream house. Should that ever happen, well, what then? Do I stop praying about that house, now that I have it?

No, I don’t. I continue to pray, but now IN THANKS, for the thing in my heart that I was given.

If we can’t teach our children to continue to appreciate things after the moment has passed, then we’ve failed them.

13. Set limits

I know it’s sometimes hard to tell your kids no. But really, it’s probably the best thing for them.

Limit how many toys they can have, how long they can play with them, how often they can go to a friend’s house, and how many extracurriculars they can do.

When we have too much of any one thing, the simple value tends to get lost in the “noise.” When something becomes rarer, we as humans have a tendency to perceive an increased value and develop a higher appreciation for it.

(And the fewer toys to pick up every day, the better, am I right?)

14. Teach them to appreciate the unpleasant things, too.

For every birthday and Christmas, we get our children a “thank you anyway” gift.

Scratching your head? I’ll explain.

When I was 16, my grandmother gave me fancy, shaped soaps, a shower pouf, and a bottle of witch hazel — “you’re growing up, becoming a woman!” she had said.

Since my grandma is my hero and I love her to pieces, I hugged her tight and very much meant my “thank you,” even if I felt like her gift was a little bit odd. I swapped out my washcloth, used the witch hazel as a face toner, and stuffed the soaps in the back of the bathroom cabinet.

Fast forward to now, when I really am a “big girl” now, with my own home and occasional house guests. Turns out having some fancy soaps to put in the guest bathroom is a pretty nice thing.

At the time, even though I didn’t really want those gifts, I still understood that someone had gotten me a gift that they thought would be valuable to me in some way.

At the time, being 16, I told my grandma that her gifts were “a little weird, but thank you anyway.”

Each time they receive gifts from us, our kids have gotten anything from a snow brush/scraper to a dish drying mat. As they grow up, this will continue — gifts they never saw coming, most likely don’t want, and probably give us some sass about.

Someday, when they’re even older, they’ll understand that what matters more than WHAT they got, is THAT they got something and that the WHO it came from matters more than anything in the world. If we’ve done our job right, they’ll say thank you and mean it.

Yes, my children will grow up thinking I’m a bit crazy (aren’t all moms a little bit nuts?). That’s fine with me.

Because someday they’ll move out (while I ugly cry), and they’ll open a giant, unlabeled moving box and find inside all those random household item gifts they didn’t want. Someday, they’ll realize that sometimes we get crap that’s worth a lot more than we imagined.

I hope in its own little way, these strange gifts will help them realize as they grow up that you can choose to be grateful, or you can choose to be bitter. At the moment, things may seem pretty crappy; things may not be what you wished for. But who knows what they may bring to you in the future.

Putting it all together

An attitude of gratitude doesn’t have to be learned with just somber stories and melancholy surroundings. Sometimes we can use a little planning and humor to raise a child who learns to appreciate whatever life has for them, no matter how it looks at the moment.

ALL children learn by example, so how YOU choose to express gratitude (or your lack thereof) is the way that they’ll learn to express it (or not), too. Make sure that your gratitude is present, sincere, and obvious to your children.

Developing an attitude of gratitude in your children might just be the most valuable thing you can give them. Don’t be a cheapskate. 

How do you teach your children to have an attitude of gratitude? Which of these ideas do you want to add to your family’s routine? Leave me a comment and let me know!

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