How to Teach Kids to Serve Others: Simple Family Service Ideas

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One of the greatest gifts we can give our children is the habit of seeing others and choosing kindness. If you want to teach kids to serve, it doesn’t require grand gestures—it begins with small, consistent actions. Through service, children learn empathy, gratitude, and compassion. In this post, I’ll share how our family discovered the joy of serving through Meals on Wheels and offer practical ideas for helping your children develop a heart for others.

I often stop and think of how much I have and feel grateful. I have way more than I need and I am well aware of that. Being thankful for all that we have should cause us to want to help others by giving of our abundance. I am trying hard to teach my children this concept as well as live it myself.

Why Teach Kids to Serve?

• Builds empathy and emotional awareness

• Helps children recognize their own blessings

• Encourages gratitude and a selfless mindset

• Strengthens family bonds through shared purpose

• Connects kids to their community

• Sparks joy and confidence through contribution

Service teaches children that they can make a difference—even in small ways.

Our Family’s Experience with Meals on Wheels

This past year, our family began volunteering with Meals on Wheels. Once a week, we deliver meals to elderly, homebound individuals in our community. The experience has been profoundly meaningful for all of us.

Our kids look forward to each visit. They take turns going to the door with me, chatting with our elderly friends, and delivering the meals. We often talk in the car about the people we visit, why service matters, and how good it feels to help.

“I feel so happy and good when we do this, Mom!”
—My 6-year-old, after a visit

Through these visits, my children are learning that serving others brings connection, joy, and perspective. And those we serve? They are blessing us right back—with their warmth, stories, and gratitude.

On our delivery route, we have three people who are over 100 years of age. These people are beautiful and kind and wonderful to visit. They are so grateful to see us each day. They want us to stay and talk. They love seeing my children and are so loving to them. They hug them and give them treats. They let them play with their toys and their dogs. They express such loving things to me and my children. We are helping them out of the desire of our hearts to serve and they know that.

On the flip side of that, they are helping us so much, and I don’t think they know that. When we go on our weekly deliveries, my children take turns visiting the different people. I have four kids, but I only take one in with me at most of the houses. There are a few that tell me to bring them all in to visit, so we do.

My kids beg to go in to each house. They love these people and talk about them all week long. They are happy to help and jump out of the car with excitement at each stop. We talk in the car about how this helps these people and why we are doing it.  They feel it in their hearts just as I feel it in mine.   We are loving this service. It has changed our lives.

Easy Ways to Teach Kids to Serve

You don’t have to volunteer with a formal organization to teach kids to serve. Opportunities to give are all around us!

At Home:

• Do a sibling’s chore without being asked

• Write kind notes or draw pictures for family members

• Read to a younger sibling

• Help clean up after meals with a happy attitude

In the Community:

• Visit a retirement home to deliver cards or sing songs

• Bring flowers or baked goods to a neighbor

• Donate gently used toys, books, or clothes

• Walk a neighbor’s dog or water their plants

• Make blessing bags for people experiencing homelessness

• Volunteer with organizations like Meals on Wheels or a food pantry

• Help at food banks, shelters, or community clean-up days

Inspiring Books About Service & Kindness

Pair your acts of kindness with books that reinforce the message:

• Have You Filled a Bucket Today? by Carol McCloud

• Ordinary Mary’s Extraordinary Deed by Emily Pearson

• What If Everybody Did That? by Ellen Javernick

• Because Amelia Smiled by David Ezra Stein

These are great conversation starters and help kids see that everyday kindness matters.

A few other things we have done in the past are donate toys to children in the Philippines, and Operation Christmas Child boxes. We also did our Service Tree as Christmas time.

Faith & Service

For families of faith, serving others is deeply spiritual. One of my favorite scriptures says:

“Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.”
—Matthew 25:40

If I teach my kids to serve it is one way to help my family become more Christlike in their actions and attitudes.

Teaching kids to serve doesn’t require a program or a lot of time. It starts with modeling small, sincere efforts and inviting them to join you. Whether it’s delivering meals, making cards, or simply noticing who needs a smile, service creates ripple effects of love that reach far beyond our homes.

Let’s raise a generation who sees, serves, and shines.

This video is a wonderful story and an example of a kind heart. This is the kind of heart I want my own children to have.

I love the words of this Hymn:

Have I Done Any Good

Have I done any good in the world today?
Have I helped anyone in need?
Have I cheered up the sad and made someone feel glad?
If not, I have failed indeed.
Has anyone’s burden been lighter today
Because I was willing to share?
Have the sick and the weary been helped on their way?
When they needed my help was I there?

[Chorus]
Then wake up and do something more
Than dream of your mansion above.
Doing good is a pleasure, a joy beyond measure,
A blessing of duty and love.

2. There are chances for work all around just now,
Opportunities right in our way.
Do not let them pass by, saying, “Sometime I’ll try,”
But go and do something today.
‘Tis noble of man to work and to give;
Love’s labor has merit alone.
Only he who does something helps others to live.
To God each good work will be known.

Text and music: Will L. Thompson, 1847-1909, alt.

Alex Boye & Carmen Rasumsen sing it well! 🙂

See Also: 50+ Random Acts of Kindness Kids Can Do

Random Acts of Kindness Coloring Notes for Kids