Quantum Shift TV
School Video Contest
Project ActivitesSocial Skills Help Combat Bullying and
School Violence
Teaching social skills and emotion management is the first step in a successful violence prevention campaign. Reflecting on these skills and knowledge in personal and concrete ways helps students transfer the learning into their daily lives. Many of these activities can be adjusted up or down a grade.
Skill: Empathy
Recipe for a Good Friend (Grades 1 and 2)
Have students create a class recipe that lists all the ingredients needed to be a good friend. This activity supports children's understanding about how others feel and the ability to show concern for others.
Fascinating Faces (Grades 1, 2, and 3)
Put large pieces of butcher paper around the room labeled with the six basic feelings words: happy, sad, mad, surprised, scared, and disgusted. Have students look through magazines and cut out faces to match each category. Then have them create a collage on the butcher paper for each category. This activity supports children in learning to identify others' feelings by their facial expressions.
Recipe Boxes (Grades 4 and 5)
Have each child design a box front with his or her name on the label. The box front should also include a list of "ingredients" that describe the child positively (for example, "good listener, funny, tries new things"). Emphasize that each individual, not others, should choose his or her own ingredients. The ingredients should be what the child wants others to know about him or her. As students discuss their box fronts with the class, point out the similarities and differences among classmates. Discuss how positive labels can facilitate friendships by helping students move beyond prejudice and hurtful labels.
Cultural Conflict (Grades 4 and 5)
Read Yang the Third and Her Impossible Family by Lensey Namioka. Discuss what clues the author gives to show Yang's conflicting feelings. Ask the class, "How do Yang's family's perceptions differ from those of her American friends and neighbors in the story?" See the list of more activities involving this book.
Skill: Problem Solving
Thought Bubble Theater (Grade 3)
Pair two of your students with two students from an older "buddy" class. Have the foursome make "thought bubbles" that show the SECOND STEP calming-down and problem-solving steps on stiff paper. Then have the group plan and perform a skit demonstrating their use of these steps in solving an interpersonal conflict or problem that they have observed. This activity supports the development of impulse control, including calming-down and problem-solving skills.
Montgomery Bus Boycott (Grade 3)
Have a group of students reenact a meeting that Martin Luther King, Jr. might have had with his advisors when planning and organizing the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Encourage students to use the SECOND STEP problem-solving steps as a guide for the skit. This activity helps children learn to see the importance of using the problem-solving process.
Problem Solving in the News (Grade 3)
Have students bring in newspaper articles that present a problem and a solution. Have one student present only the problem part of his or her article to the class. Then have the class go through the SECOND STEP problem-solving steps to pick a possible solution to the news article's problem. After the class chooses its solution, have the student who brought in the article read the published solution. Have the class compare its solution to the one actually used.
Community Matters (Grade 5)
Have the students pick a community problem that both concerns them and is being addressed in a local election. Have them investigate what solutions different candidates suggest to solve the problem. Then have students use the SECOND STEP problem-solving steps to come up with their own solution. Compare and contrast the class's solution with the candidates'. Follow the election and see what happens. This activity supports the concept that problems can be solved using the SECOND STEP problem-solving process of clearly identifying what the problem is, thinking of several possible solutions, evaluating each solution, then choosing one and using it.
Skill: Anger Management
"Ways to Calm Down" Memory Game (Grades 1 and 2)
Have students play a progressive memory game about different ways to calm down. The first child names one way to calm down. The second child repeats the first child's way and adds another. Then the third child names the previous two ways and adds yet another, and so on. As a variation, this game could be played with each student naming the feeling he or she is experiencing at that moment.
Calm Down, Count Up (Grades 2 and 3)
Have students keep running tallies at their desks of every time they have managed a strong feeling by calming down (for example, when they have been frustrated by a math problem and done deep breathing). Record individual tallies on a master tally for the class, and make a graph showing the total number of tallies for each day. Discuss the different ways students calmed down. This activity provides opportunities to discuss the value of knowing how to calm down and to reinforce the many ways students can calm themselves down.
Catch the Beat (Grade 3)
Take the class outdoors. Have students find their pulses and measure their heart rates. Then have them run in place or follow a specified route for one minute and check their pulses again. Have them compare their resting and elevated heart rates. Remind them that our heart rates can also increase when we have strong feelings, and that one way to deal with strong feelings is to do deep breathing, or belly breathing. Have students do deep breathing for 30 seconds and check one more time to see if their pulses have changed again. This activity demonstrates how deep breathing can help students calm down.
Sitcom Sleuths (Grades 4 and 5)
Have students watch a favorite TV sitcom at home. Have them count the number of "put-ups" (positive statements or compliments) and the number of put-downs. Have students bring in the data and express the figures as a ratio of put-ups to put-downs. Create a class chart of the overall results. This activity will help students become more aware of the number of put-downs they witness and can lead to the students learning about and dealing with put-downs in their own lives.
Skill: Respect
Present the following STEPS TO RESPECT definition of respect to students: "Respect means treating people the way you want to be treated. Everyone deserves to be treated with respect."
- Invite students to brainstorm a list of specific behaviors that demonstrate respect.
- Encourage students to pick a respectful behavior to use throughout the week.
- Ask students to observe respectful behaviors outside of school and document them in a journal.
- Organize a school concert, assembly, or parent night where kindergartners sing SECOND STEP songs.
- Have students create posters highlighting SECOND STEP and STEPS TO RESEPCT skills they've learned. Take digital photos of the posters and display them on your school Web site.
- Ask older students to "adopt" kindergartners or first graders. As mentors, they can help the younger children create a booklet inspired by stories from program lessons.
- Ask for student volunteers to highlight program skills or vocabulary words during the daily morning announcement.
- Send the SECOND STEP Family Overview video home with students in a special backpack with a bag of microwave popcorn.
- Compile an ABC book about feelings using drawings or photos.
- Design a SECOND STEP or STEPS TO RESPECT bulletin board or mural for the hallway.
- Compose a song or rap that incorporates program concepts or teaches a new skill.
- Team up with another class to create a public service announcement about SECOND STEP or STEPS TO RESEPCT concepts for a local radio station.
- Write an article for the school newsletter describing the program and what the class has learned.
- Shoot a video showing how a problem is solved using SECOND STEP skills.
- Shoot a video showing a bullying scenario and how it should be resolved using STEPS TO RESPECT skills.
- Write a brochure about program skills and concepts for new students.
- Create photo lesson cards using program lessons as a model.
Students who are already part of a group activity can use strategies to help new participants join.
- Hold a classroom discussion about the ways students can encourage and accept others who wish to join group activities. Have students brainstorm a list of ideas about how to encourage someone else to join a group activity.
- Next, have students work in small groups. Ask each group to choose an art form—such as visual arts, music, drama, or dance—to communicate their ideas and feelings about how to help others join a group activity. Groups may create a poster, make a voice recording of suggestions, videotape a skit, make up a song, perform a live skit, and so on.
- Schedule a time later in the week for students to perform or exhibit their work, and build in discussion time to reflect on each piece. You may also consider having students perform or exhibit their work outside of the classroom, for example, during a school assembly.