Social Skills Lesson: The Bad Seed by Jory John and Pete Oswald

 

I am a big believer in using picture books to teach social skills lessons to my students. Even my older students seem engaged when there is a good story with exciting pictures to look at. One of my favorite books that I use every year is The Bad Seed by Jory John and Pete Oswald. 

It is a story about a seed who has had a hard life- a life that hardened them and changed the way they felt about themselves and the world around them. The bad seed exhibits negative behaviors that we sometimes see in our students and children: cutting in line, lying, glaring at other people, etc. In the book, the seed has convinced themselves that they are bad and they will just always be that way. Throughout the book, the seed learns begins to heal through the traumas it has been through, and realizes that it feels good to do kind things such as holding doors open for other people, smiling, saying please and thank you, etc. 

Some discussion topics that I used The Bad Seed to discuss are:

-How traumatic events can affect us and the people around us.

-How the way we feel about ourselves can affect behaviors.

-How helping others and being kind actually makes us feel good too.

-How to be easier on ourselves and use affirmations.

We have put together a free lesson that can be used in your home or classroom to teach these themes. It contains discussion questions to use after reading the book, and a worksheet. The worksheet contains a picture of a seed which can be colored. In each section of the seed, have students write a positive attribute about themselves. Teach them to focus on the things they are doing well or their positive attributes, rather than to focus on their negative thoughts about themselves. 

You can buy the lesson here on Teachers Pay Teachers

Getting To Know You Bingo (FREE Printable)

 

This FREE worksheet is a great ice breaker for new classes. "Getting To Know You BINGO" allows your students to get out of their seats and walk around the room to practice speaking to one another and find common ground. They have to ask each other (and you!) questions to find people who can fit the prompt in each square. Each square has facts such as "Someone who is wearing glasses," or "Someone who plays a sport". When they find someone who meets those criteria, they write the person's name in the box with the goal of getting a BINGO/Five in a row. 

This is a quick and easy activity that usually gets kids laughing, and it can be fun for students to see what they have in common with their peers, learn each other's names and even find things in common with their teachers! If you have a smaller classroom, you can allow students to use names more than once but challenge them to do so only after they have used everyone in class. You can also make the game harder by challenging them to get "double BINGO" with 5 in a row in two directions, or to get a horizontal, L-Shape or vertical BINGO.

If you want to use prizes for this game, some cheap and easy ideas are:

Fun Stickers

Candy or Snacks

Classroom Coupons (free time, computer time, homework pass, etc.)

Pencils or other school supplies

Fidget spinners or other small toys

You can download the BINGO worksheet from our Google Drive for free by clicking here

Or download it for free from Teachers Pay Teachers/TPT by clicking here

Free Lesson: A Kid Is a Kid Is a Kid

 A Kid Is a Kid Is a Kid, written by Sara O'Leary and illustrated by Qin Leng is a great book for the beginning of the school year. It opens with a new student who keeps getting asked if they are a boy or a girl. The story continues with children sharing the questions they get asked again and again, such as "Where are you from?", "Why do you always have your nose in a book?' and other questions the children wish people would stop asking them. Instead, they share things that they wish people would ask them to get to know them better or to get a sense of who they really are. in the end, the children come to find that there is one question that all kids want to be asked: Do you want to play?

A Kid Is a Kid Is a Kid is a great book for teaching about diversity and inclusion. I like to read this book to my new class near the beginning of the year to remind them to be mindful in the ways they get to know each other. It can also be used as an opportunity learn more about them by asking them what question they wish other people would ask them to get to know them. This FREE worksheet allows them to create their own cover for the book and write a sentence about a question they wish people would ask them. 

You can download it here from our Google Drive

Or download it here from Teachers Pay Teachers/TPT

Lego Building for Social Skills: Public Speaking

 Legos are a great tool to bring into your social skills lessons. They are usually toys that children already have a connection with, and they enjoy working with them. I have used legos in the path to teach about emotions, team building and many other things. This lesson in particular is focused on building public speaking skills. 

The teacher or a volunteer can roll two dice. Whatever number you roll is what you will have the class build. It works best to set a time limit for building, usually 5-10 minutes in sufficient, otherwise you will have some students who just keep building and building and will never be done! After the students have finished building, allow them to share about their creations.

Solo Lego Building Activities:

Directions: Roll two dice, whichever number you roll is what will be built. Set a timer for students to build, and then allow them to share their creations with the class.

2. Build something that is important to you

3. Build a superpower you wish you had

4. Build your favorite animal

5. Build an invention you wish was real

6. Build something that shows how you feel today

7. Build a place you love to be

8. Build a mode of transportation (car, boat, plane, etc.)

9. Build your favorite game

10. Build your favorite food

11. Build what you want to be when you grow up

12. Build the tallest tower you can before the timer goes off

 I have found that kids who never want to raise their hand or stand in front of the class to speak are surprisingly open to standing up and sharing their Lego creations! These prompts are simple and lighthearted, good for introducing your students to Lego social skills. Follow me for Lego lessons, where I will have some based on team building, accessing emotions and following directions. If you would like an easy print-out of this lego prompt list, you can access it here!

Easy Gratitude Walls for Students

 

Teaching gratitude can be one of the most rewarding things you can instill in a child. Not in a shaking-your-finger "You should be grateful!" sort of way...but practicing gratitude has been proven to improve our health, strengthen relationships, provide feelings of happiness and other positive emotions, as well as helping us focus on the good that already exists in our lives, and build upon that.

An easy way to bring gratitude into your classroom is to make a "Gratitude Board". It can be as fancy or as simple as you wish...even a big piece of paper on your wall that you add to would be enough.

The challenge is to have kids add to it daily. You may want to set a duration for this practice of gratitude...a month is usually a good time frame, but some educators may want to challenge their students to do it every day for a year! It can be part of your morning routine and shouldn't take more than a few minutes. Students can be given pieces of paper to write one thing they are grateful for. You could also go around the classroom and ask students to tell you something they are grateful for and write it yourself, if you have students who have trouble writing.

You may have some students who insist they have nothing to be grateful for- part of the lesson is that we all have something to be grateful for, every day. It could be big things, like a person in their life, a pet, their home, etc. It could also be simpler things, like the weather that day, the cafeteria serving a lunch they enjoy, or a favorite movie or song. By practicing daily gratitude, it will become easier for your students to think of these things. For older students, you may want to challenge them to think of something different every day or not to repeat answers that another student has used. 

So give it a try and see how practicing daily gratitude in your classroom or your home creates change in the children you work with...and yourself! These pictures are examples of gratitude boards I have made in the past. The gratitude tree had leaves that the students wrote on each day. The gratitude garden had flowers, birds and trees that the students wrote their gratitude on. They enjoyed being able to add to the board each day and watching them grow!

FREE Social Skills Lesson: The Good Egg by Jory John

 

When it comes to teaching my students Social Skills, I love to use books as instructional aids.  A book I use to talk about pressure and behavior with my students is The Good Egg by Jory John, illustrated by Pete Oswald. I often find myself grabbing Jory John's books. Pete Oswald's illustrations are also colorful and very fun to look at, grabbing children's attention. 

The Good Egg is about an egg that tries very hard to be good. They follow the rules, they go out of their way to help others, and they always try their best. However, when the eggs around them aren't following the rules, they take it upon themselves to try to make everyone around them behave. Worrying about what other eggs are doing puts a lot of pressure on themselves, and they end up cracking...literally. In the end, the Good Egg learns that it is not their job to try to control everyone around them else's behaviors, and that they need to be easier on themselves and take time to relax.

Lesson Plan:

Read The Good Egg to your students, then use the following questions to spark discussion. (Possible answers are in italics.)

Discussion Questions:

1. What good things did the Good Egg do? Saved a cat from a tree, changed car tires, painted someone's house, watering plants, carrying groceries.

2. Looking at the pictures, do you think the Good Egg was always helpful? Not always. There was too much water in the plants, the strawberry had a hard time holding up the car, the house was not painted well.

3. Has there ever been a time when you were trying to help someone, and it didn't work out well? Answers vary, allow students to share their experiences. 

4. How do the other eggs act? Ignored their bedtime, only ate sugary cereal, crying for no reason breaking their stuff on purpose.

5. How does the Good Egg try to fix the other eggs? The Good Egg tried to take charge and keep the peace by getting the other eggs to behave.

6. What happens to the Good Egg from all of the pressure? Their shell cracked.

7.  What is self-care? Things we do to take care of ourselves and recharge ourselves

        a. How does the Good Egg practice self-care? The Good Egg took walks, read books, wrote in journals, painted, breathed. 

        b. How does it help the good egg? It makes the Good Egg feel better again and heals it's shell.

        c. What sorts of things do you do to practice self-care? Answers may vary. Examples: go for a walk, taking a bubble bath, playing with a pet, reading a book, listening to music, etc.

8. What did the Good Egg learn in the end? The other eggs aren't perfect, and the Good Egg doesn't have to be perfect either.

Enhance your lesson with this printable. Students can decorate the egg to look like themselves and write down one thing that makes them a good egg.: things they do to help others, having manners, being kind, etc. 

You can download the printable from Teachers Pay Teachers by clicking here,

Or you can download it directly from our google drive by clicking here.

 

DIY Diary of a Wimpy Kid Blank Book Cover

 

 If you have a child or know a child, it is likely that you have heard the words 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid" many times. The book series, by author and artist Jeff Kinney, has sold millions of copies and has been made into multiple movies. The streaming service Disney+ even rebooted the franchise with an animated series. 

 

 Whether it is the funny situations that the main character Greg Heffley finds himself in, the relatable family moments, or the lessons on friendship and discovering who you are, there is no doubt that kids connect to Diary of a Wimpy Kid. 

    Little Owl Lessons has put together a blank book cover that you can print out and give to you students or children. Instead of saying 'Diary of a Wimpy Kid", we have left the title adjective blank so that children can use their own adjective that describes themselves. The cover has a blank square where they can draw their very own comic, just like in the books! This would be a great art lesson or summer project for your little bookworms and can easily tie into reading the book. 

You can download the PDF for FREE on Teacher Pay Teachers by clicking here.

Or you can get it for FREE from our google drive by clicking here. 

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