5 Ways to Make Gratitude a Classroom Habit

Every November, gratitude gets its moment in the classroom spotlight. Paper turkeys go up, thank-you notes go out, and students spend time reflecting on what they’re thankful for. 

But practicing gratitude doesn’t have to be a once-a-year activity. An emerging body of research suggests that cultivating gratitude can help students manage difficult emotions, strengthen relationships, and improve their sense of well-being. And when teachers make gratitude a regular practice in their classrooms, the benefits can extend to learning, too. 

In a 2026 paper, kindergarten teacher Grace Bache-Wiig and her co-author Anna Hall describe how Bache-Wiig cultivated a daily gratitude practice with her students that started after Thanksgiving. What began with simple thank-you notes to family members and friends evolved into a six-month practice in which students spent at least five minutes each day writing or drawing things they appreciated in composition notebooks.

“I explained that gratitude was something that we could express every day, not just on a specific holiday,” Bache-Wiig writes. “I had my own gratitude journal and modeled making my first few entries into the journal until students understood the journaling expectations.” The journal entries are as adorable as you might expect: pictures of rainbows, stick figures holding hands, and wobbly letters spelling out how her students experienced gratitude (“I am thankful for my class because it is fun to play with.”).

Over time, Bache-Wiig noticed changes in her students’ writing, too. 

Students became increasingly confident expressing themselves, their journal entries grew more detailed, and some even reread earlier entries during reading time. Although she never graded their journals for writing mechanics, Bache-Wiig found that students demonstrated more sophisticated word choices in their gratitude journals than in other classroom writing exercises. Her kindergartners also seemed more comfortable experimenting with unfamiliar words and sentence construction in the low-pressure space of their journals.

For Lainie Rowell, a former educator who now speaks and writes about gratitude, Bache-Wiig’s classroom experience  speaks to the power of a sustained classroom gratitude practice. And she says the benefits can extend to older students, too, supporting healthier relationships, academic outcomes, and a more connected classroom community. “We know that gratitude is pro-social, and when we are cultivating pro-social behavior, collaboration is happening easier and people are solving problems,” she says. 

Here are five ways to make gratitude a regular part of classroom life, regardless of students' ages. 

Model Gratitude 

For some students, especially those who are younger or struggling with instability in their lives, recognizing what they are grateful for can be difficult. That’s why modeling—like the kind that Bache-Wiig did when she first showed her kindergartners how to use their gratitude journals—is crucial, says Rowell.

She suggests teachers ask open-ended questions or use prompts to help students figure out how to express their gratitude. One activity Rowell likes is Notice-Think-Feel-Do, a framework developed by Andrea Hussong, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The framework breaks gratitude into four manageable steps: noticing something in your life that could be a source of gratitude; thinking about why it matters to you; recognizing how it makes you feel; and doing something to express your appreciation. 

To make the practice inviting, don’t require students to share their responses, Rowell says. “The invite is important. Mandating it might have the opposite effect and make students not want to take part.”

Teacher Livia Chan takes modeling a step further by expressing gratitude to students as part of her regular feedback. She might thank them for overcoming an obstacle, working hard toward a goal, or helping a classmate. “I love to recognize students for their effort and dedication to their learning and growth,” Chan writes, adding that this simple act encourages students to continue working hard toward their goals. 

Establish a Regular Gratitude Practice 

Modeling gratitude kickstarts the process, but teachers can also create regular opportunities for students to express gratitude alongside their peers. 

Middle school English and social studies teacher Sarah Arenz instituted a “Thankful Thursday” routine, in which students write a short note to someone they’re thankful for and share it with that person. “The difference that these notes have made is remarkable,” Arenz writes.

At Summit Preparatory Charter High School in Redwood City, California, students engage in a daily practice called “Appreciation, Apology, Aha.” Students gather in a circle and take turns sharing something they appreciate, an apology they’d like to make to someone in the classroom, or a moment when something clicked for them. Over time, says Aukeem Ballard, a teacher at Summit Public Schools, these small expressions of appreciation and gratitude become an integral part of the classroom culture rather than something reserved for special occasions. 

“That’s the whole point,” says Ballard, “building community.”

Make Expressing Gratitude Fun 

Creating a regular gratitude practice doesn’t have to mean doing the same thing every single day. In fact, variety can make the practice more meaningful. Students might create collages from magazines to show what they’re grateful for, or talk to a neighboring student about a moment in their day that made them feel grateful. 

Rowell says it’s easy to fall back on the same general answers day after day. “When we’re asked about what we’re grateful for, we often think about the same things over and over again: health, family, home.” To help students think more creatively, Rowell has developed printable dice with prompts that encourage more specific expressions of gratitude such as naming three unexpected things they’re grateful for or three things that make them laugh. 

Gratitude doesn't always have to be directed toward a person, either. Rowell suggests heading to the playground or taking students on a neighborhood walk to practice “savoring,” where students observe and describe something they appreciate about their surroundings. A student might notice a particularly leafy tree, for example, and describe how its fullness offers the perfect patch of shade to read a book in warmer weather. Teachers of younger students might integrate alphabet practice into the activity by asking questions like, “What are you grateful for that starts with A?”  

Rowell encourages educators to vary the mediums students use to express gratitude. “Younger learners may prefer notes and drawings, whereas adolescents may prefer social media posts, emails, or texts.” Teachers can also get creative with how they collect and display these expressions of thanks. Gratitude walls, for example, encourage students to post photos, sketches, or notes about who or what they're grateful for and why. Educator Owen Griffith, meanwhile, has students write things they’re grateful for on sticky notes and decorate the classroom door with their responses, creating a “positive reminder every time we enter and leave the room," he writes.

Tap Into the Power of Journaling 

Gratitude is a muscle: the more students practice, the easier it becomes to recognize and express what they’re grateful for. Griffith points to psychologist Philip Watkins' work, which suggests that people who are least inclined toward gratitude may have the most to gain from practicing it.

One of the most accessible ways for students to exercise their gratitude muscle is to keep a gratitude journal. Rowell says prompts can be as simple as having students list out three things they are grateful for that day or from the prior weekend. For older students, Rowell suggests encouraging students to imagine a world where the most important person was not in their lives at all, or to think about how their lives might have changed had an important event never happened.

Bache-Wiig outlines four steps for establishing a classroom journaling habit:

• Keep journals simple: Composition notebooks work, but so does “handwriting paper with a construction paper cover.” For more creative expression, let students personalize journals with stickers or art.
• Set aside regular time: Give students time to journal daily, adjusting the duration to their age. In Bache-Wiig’s class, students journal for at least five minutes a day. 
• Give students ownership: Let them choose when to journal, whether to write, draw, or combine the two, and whether to share their entries with others.
• Model the practice: Keep your own gratitude journal and model to students how you express gratitude in writing.

If a personal gratitude journal does not fit with your classroom, teacher Vicki Zakrzewski suggests creating a class gratitude book, which goes home with a different student each week. Each family adds a page of pictures and descriptions of what they’re grateful for.  

Don’t Go Overboard With Gratitude

The most effective gratitude practices are those that feel authentic and voluntary. Rowell says it’s important to recognize that students who are struggling may have days when it’s hard to find something they’re thankful for. 

If a student resists, don’t push. Give students opportunities to participate in ways that feel comfortable to them, and make space for difficult emotions alongside positive ones. As Rowell puts it: “Gratitude isn’t about ignoring what’s hard. It’s about refusing to overlook what’s good.”