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.