A Nice Kind of Month

The guidance department at my school sponsors a month of activity in February that we call Life, Love and Learning Month: value life, value love, value learning. This is the seventh or eighth year we have celebrated LLL. In addition to the overall theme, we have a sub-theme. This year, we are stealing the idea of Operation Nice founder, Melissa Morris Ivone. I sent Melissa an email today to let her know how the kick-off went:

Hello, Melissa,

I would like to tell you that Day #1 of Operation Nice started quite nicely. We introduced the idea a wee bit and will give them a little more each day. I filled a fish bowl with strips of daily Nice assignments and will pull one out each day of February. Today's assignment was "Tell someone they look nice today." I wasn't sure how all of this would go over, but I was warm-the-cockles-of-my-heart-pleasantly-surprised. I walked by one of my eighth grade girls in the cafeteria and she said, "Hey, Ms. D-M!" I turned to look. She smiled sweetly and told me I looked nice today. I gave her a big hug not because she said it to ME, but because she was promoting Nice and got a kick out of it. She was only the first of quite a few kids I caught in the act. It was fun. During second lunch, I made an announcement over the microphone---"Hey, 7th and 8th graders! Have I told you how nice you look today?" This brought on an outburst. They all "got it" which meant they were paying attention to announcements this morning :-) and they carried on with it, too. What a kick. I think one part that was the most fun today was being able to say it back to them and watch the smile light up their faces.

I hope you all had a wonderfully Nice day. Pass it on. :)

Oh, by the way, have I told you how nice you look today?

jdm