Volunteer opportunities for young children?

[SASM]

I am trying to think of some volunteer opportunities for our family, which includes our 6.5, 4.5, and 2yos. I would not only love something to focus on the holidays but also something that we can do throughout the year. So far, I have tried the local animal shelter and a local community organization that helps underprivileged children and families...no success with either. :( We DO have the kids pick out a child from our local angel tree and buy a holiday gift for them but we'd like to do something in addition to this. Thank you for any suggestions! Growing up, DH and his family used to clean their church's windows. That is always an option but I'd love to get the kids involved in something with impact...to help those less fortunate, animals in need, etc.

[egoldber]

This is one of the things I like about Girl Scouts. The service projects are integrated into the program and there are lots of opportunities.

[ChunkyNicksChunkyMom]

I will be interested to hear the responses too. My kids and I have been cleaning the beds and raking leaves at our church. I need something less hard on the back!

[ourbabygirl]

We have a really cool program nearby called Feed My Starving Children. I went a couple of times to help; basically you go and pack freeze-dried food to send to needy places like Africa and such. It requires no financial donation (unless you want to give something); they just like your time and hands to measure food (rice, dried soup type stuff, beans, etc.), weigh it, pour it into bags, stick on a label, and pop it in a box to be mailed off. I'm pretty sure they get businesses and such to donate to pay for the ingredients, then individuals and groups (like our school's homerooms, language clubs, church's youth group, school's alum association, etc.) come in to pack it all up. We watch a video beforehand and the director gives a little talk to let us know what an impact we're making, and we also get to taste-test the stuff. All ages can work on it, so it's something that's great for little kids on up (you just need to wear an apron and hairnet or baseball cap). Otherwise, if you don't have anything like that near you, maybe a food pantry to sort food and distribute it to people, or a meal kitchen where you prepare a meal for the homeless and they come in and you serve them and clean up. We did that in my campus ministry class in high school.

[brittone2]

Right now we have stuck to pretty simple things we can do on our own, but I like that they give a rhythm to the year. We shop for non perishable food for the food pantry before Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter. We do Toys for Tots each year (and also donate used toys in November...we do a big toy cleanout pre-Christmas most years). We've donated school supplies before. I make sure we talk about what we are doing and why and the kids shop with me. But yes, I'd like to do more hands-on activities.

DH and I participated in the Big Brother program when DS was young. There was some program they had where couples could be the "Bigs" to a child. Unfortunately our situation didn't work out well, but it is something I'd like to do again in the future. It doesn't really require much from the kids though, but at least they can be kind of involved.

When the kids get a bit older we'd like to volunteer at a soup kitchen...maybe even on Thanksgiving or something like that, but we haven't found a way to make it work as a family yet.

eta: something else that could be done on your own is visiting nursing homes, or making some sort of craft/cards for nursing home residents. I don't know how nursing homes are handling kid visitors this year with H1N1 (perhaps discouraging visits, especially non-family? I don't know. Many hospitals are going to policies with no visitors under age 18, but I'm not sure what the nursing home environment is like currently)

[kijip]

Some places don't have opportunities for families or kids under a certain age. Many places do. The ones most welcoming of families tend to be schools, churches and smaller budget organizations. For example the large food rescue orgs here don't want kids in their warehouse for liability reasons. The smaller places with a lower volume welcome families.

Things we have done as a family (most often in conjunction with my work):

-Sort food for holiday baskets
-Sort clothing and present donations
-Be greeters at events
-Plan parties or other events (graduation was a big one at my last employer- T could help set out plates etc and help clean up).

From age 3 and up T was fully capable of looking at a present tag with a number and matching that to the sign on the wall (so all the presents for one family were places together for distribution). And he loved finding all the tuna or all the cranberries in a box of unsorted donations to put on the assembly line. We also have had him do Trick or Treat for Unicef and Penny Harvest. His school does collections for different things and when that happens, we have him either find the stuff in the house or pick it out when we go shopping. He just used allowance $$ to buy socks for homeless men and women because a classmate was collecting. Pretty fun to see his sense of generosity develop!

The smartest of organizations are finding ways for families to work together throughout the year because research clearly shows that people ages 25-45 most often want volunteer jobs they can do with children and families in tow.

[clc053103]

Any interest in starting one of your own? here's a local group around us that did just that!

http://www.anykidcan.org/anykidcan.org/HOME.html

[mousemom]

I was at our local Food Bank this past weekend and was impressed with how well it worked for kid volunteers of all ages. This is a large operation, so they mostly break down bulk donations and repackage into smaller packages for distribution to food pantries around the region. Older kids helped with scooping and bagging the food or putting labels on it. There were one or two younger kids (maybe around 3 or 4?) and they were helping carry the sealed bags over to the boxes.

[JenaW]

I've helped out with Meals on Wheels before with my little ones! It's pretty easy to do, and they always seem to be looking for help. You pick up the food and drive it to the homes. Nearly all of the people LOVED seeing my kids, and they would often color a picture for them, or sing a song, etc.

[wendmatt]

DD and I did books on wheels for a year. You get books from the library and take them to old people in nursing homes. Ask at your library if you are interested. Good for the older kids, maybe boring for the younger one. The elderly people loved seeing Emily every 2 weeks.