The importance of teaching children kindness and taking care of their fellow man is being stressed more and more these days — and with good reason.

It is, of course, still important for children to learn academic subjects and career skills. But more and more, people are realizing that kindness needs to be intentionally taught in a world that often feels like it is so full of the opposite.

Perhaps realizing that the best way to teach kindness is to model it and to get children involved, the leaders of Cub Scout Pack 73 recently led their young charges in a great community service project that resulted in a win-win for everybody.

The Scouts handed out hundreds of brown paper bags in several Suffolk neighborhoods on a recent Saturday and returned the next Saturday to collect donated non-perishable goods in those bags.

Altogether, the Scouts collected about 200 bags of food to donate to the organization ForKids, which supports homeless families and individuals in Western Tidewater with food and housing assistance.

Through this project, the Cub Scouts, who are ages 6 to 10, learned a lesson that will serve them well throughout life.

The young Scouts put in a lot of hard work to show kindness to people they don’t know and will likely never meet, simply because it was the right thing to do.

“I think they really appreciate just being part of the community,” Pack 73 Master Dan Boehning said.

That’s a good lesson for any young child. Well done to the Scouts and their parents and leaders.