Tanner Laudenslager may be a small child, but he's got a very big heart. He's banking on the belief that many other Catasauqua area boys and girls are just like him, wanting to help out others whose lives have taken a tragic turn for the worse.

Television coverage of the Boston Marathon bombings aftermath last month made him think about how dramatically different from his own the lives of the victims and their families would now be.

The son of Gary and Shelly Laudenslager, the 10-year-old's happy life on a quiet cul-de-sac near Sheckler Elementary School currently revolves around Mr. Burker's fourth-grade class and after-school youth baseball and karate classes.

"I was watching TV four days after [the bombings] and I felt really, really bad for the people, and especially the family of that 8-year-old boy," he told The Press in an interview last Thursday.

"So I walked up to my mom and said, 'Can I please do a fundraiser?'"

Actually, he wanted to do two.

A typical boy, Tanner was in almost constant motion in the family room of his home as he talked about his ideas. Sinking in a large beanbag chair in the middle of the room, he relaxed backward until fully reclining, then popped up to sit on the edge of the cushion.

"The first idea I had was one fundraiser for Boston, and one separate thing as a jar donation for the family with the 8-year-old boy," he said.

His mother insisted one fundraiser would be enough to handle and soon the two of them were planning the Tanner's Fun Run fundraiser, now set for June 15.

Tanner had participated in fundraising walks before, including a one-mile walk in Bethlehem for mitochondrial disease, in support of a friend with the condition, and a Buddy Walk at the Trexlertown velodrome for Down syndrome.

His eighth birthday party had also been a fundraising event.

"I got dog food and cat food instead of birthday gifts and donated it [to an animal shelter]," he said.

His mother sought help to begin planning the fun run.

"A friend of ours, Maryjo Smith, has the Bruiser 5K Run every year for canine cancer, so we included her to help us organize this a little bit," she said.

As his mother describes the details of the fun run planning, Tanner is in motion, rolling off the edge of the cushion, perching in the edge again, careful to give polite attention to the conversation even while twisting and stretching.

This tendency to want to help others is not something new for Tanner.

"He always wants to help others. He understands that he's fortunate to have the things he has," his mother says. "Whenever he sees something that to him doesn't seem right, he always wants to help out."

He has a soft spot for the daughter of a family friend who has Down syndrome and is good with younger children, helping them by tutoring.

When his mother took part in a powder puff football game last fall in Hokfor breast cancer support, Tanner made a donation with his own money.

He is also planning to help his mother with vacation Bible school this summer, where his class will be making blankets to donate to a homeless shelter.

"I'm pretty good at making those blankets," he said.

For Tanner's Fun Run, his karate school, Leading Edge Martial Arts, will be a sponsor, donating bottled water and paying for the cost of the T-shirts the participants will wear. The Wawa store on Schoenersville will provide juice and soft pretzels.

Flyers and registration forms announcing the event were distributed to students at Sheckler Elementary and Catasauqua Middle schools last week.

Online registration is also available at www.active.com/event_detail.cfm?event_id=2095693. The $15 registration fees will be donated to The One Fund, Boston 2013, formed by Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino.

The One Fund is a long-term care fund, to assist not only with medical needs now, but the psychological and physical needs of the injured down the road.

"We figure we want to try to get close to $1,000, so if we get 75-100 kids, we'll definitely be in that ballpark," Shelly said.

Children ages 5 to 15 are invited to participate in the event, set to take place at the track at Alumni Field, on the Catasauqua Middle School campus off Pine Street.

"The youngest ones will do a rabbit run," Tanner said. "It's about a quarter-mile. Older kids will run a half-mile or a mile."

Adults will not be running.

"Our theme is 'small feet taking big steps in making a difference,'" Shelly says. "Kids don't think they can do anything, that their ideas don't always count, but they can and they do. So, this is just kids making the donations."

What would Tanner say to his school friends to encourage them to help others by participating in the fun run? For Tanner, it's a no-brainer.

He rolled over from a prone position on the beanbag seat, pushing himself upright again.

"There's no reason not to," he said.