Today is November 1, which means that it is now officially National Adoption Awareness Month. President George W. Bush issued the official proclamation that November 2007 is National Adoption Month, yesterday. In the proclamation President Bush calls upon "all Americans to observe this month with appropriate programs and activities to honor adoptive families and to participate in efforts to find permanent homes for waiting children." You can read the entire proclamation here.

A few weeks ago I wrote this post, Start Planning Now for National Adoption Month, and hopefully you have already put some thought into some of the things that you are going to do to help promote adoption during the month of November. If you haven't, I highly suggest you check out Adoption.com's National Adoption Awareness Calendar, which is full of ideas for families to celebrate adoption and advocate for adoption for waiting children.

My suggestion for today is to contact your child's teacher or principal (or one of a local elementary school if you do not have any children yet) and see if you can do a short program on adoption one day in the classroom. There are many children's books on adoption that could be read, and depending on the age of the children in the class, a short talk or lesson on adoption could also be done.

If your child is in the class, make sure you involve him in the preparation. Ask him about what he thinks his class should know about adoption. Ask him what he would feel comfortable sharing or not sharing (and teach him how to say "that is personal" or "I don't want to talk about that" as a response to a question he is uncomfortable answering). Ask him what kind of questions he thinks his friends would have. Let him help choose a favorite adoption related book to share with the class. Make a list of "positive adoption words" you want to use and teach the children to use.

I will have more posts throughout the month with suggestions on ways to celebrate National Adoption Month, and stay tuned for a really fun giveaway contest related to National Adoption Month (more really soon on that).

And if you have something planned for the month of November to celebrate or advocate for adoption, please leave a comment and share it with us. :)

Here are some more resources with information on National Adoption Month:

Childhood Can't Wait

November is National Adoption Awareness Month on the Vietnam Adoption Blog

How to get involved with National Adoption Awareness Month on the Stepparent Adoption Blog

National Adoption Awareness Month - Write Your Legislator on the Foster Adoption Blog

National Adoption Month - a call for stories on the Adoption News Blog

November is an important month for foster care on the Foster Care Blog

National Adoption Month: White House Decree on the Adoption News Blog

*Photo from Liquid Library