You could say Waller is wise for his age — he’s a first-grader in Jeanna Gronbach’s class at Cooper Elementary School.

This week at Cooper has been a week of Random Acts of Kindness. Students and staff completed kindness challenges, made cards for local first responders and collected donations for local food pantries.

On Thursday, students made and decorated cards to give to teachers, substitute teachers and bus drivers.

Gronbach’s students got to practice writing their sight words like “thank.”

-Messenger photo by Kelby Wingert
Lindsey Naber, a student in Jeanna Gronbach's first grade class at Cooper Elementary, picks out the perfect crayon to continue decorating her card to give to a teacher to thank them for all they do on Thursday afternoon. The students were making cards as a random act of kindness.

Brielle Grady covered her card with a large, vibrant rainbow.

“I wanted to make a pretty picture, because people like it,” she said.

The concept of being kind is pretty simple to Grady.

“Kindness means helping people,” she said.

Grady said she shows kindness by being brave when someone gets hurt. It’s important to be kind, she said, because it teaches others to be kind, too.

-Messenger photo by Kelby Wingert
Frankie Lyon, a first-grader in Jeanna Gronbach's class at Cooper Elementary, sports a Kansas City Chiefs hat while he decorates a card to spread kindness on Thursday afternoon. Students were encouraged to wear their favorite hat for "Hats off to kindness" day during Random Acts of Kindness week.

Each day of the week had a different dress-up theme, like “Dream of Kindness,” when they wore pajamas to school; or “Team Kindness,” when they wore their favorite sports gear; or “Hats Off to Kindness,” when they donned their favorite hat.