The most important part of recess club is free time on the playground. Choose a time when other students are not outside. In my school, that meant 9:00am. We started the group in September to make sure that we could finish the group before group before the mornings were too cold.
It gets a bad rep but recess is hard. So many skills are needed to navigate the playground successfully. What to do? Join recess club! Recess club is designed for small groups. When I've run this group in the past, I allow about 6-7 kids. I think it would be possible to teach a whole class in shifts with a teacher assistant or parent volunteer in the room while some kids are outside for club. I recommend this group for K-2 but it could be adapted for older kids. The most important part of recess club is free time on the playground. Choose a time when other students are not outside. In my school, that meant 9:00am. We started the group in September to make sure that we could finish the group before group before the mornings were too cold. Every school has unique rules for using the playground equipment. In the first lesson, we start off with an active icebreaker and then talk about the appropriate use of equipment. I created skill cards to include each piece of equipment. To make them fun- we play games with the cards. I like to play go fish by printing two sets of cards. To practice, we go outside and walk around the entire playground to talk about appropriate ways to use the equipment. What are the norms for waiting for your term? Are certain pieces of equipment only allowed for older/younger kids? In this lesson, we use the anchor card to learn the appropriate way to ask others to play. Each kid draws a role play card and then practices. I pull one kid aside and ask the to say "no" to a student that I know won't be upset. We then practice what to do when someone says no. For playground time, we go outside for free play. Every 5 minutes, I yell "switch" and students find a new friend to invite to play. Not as fun as playground time but a part of reality in school, indoor recess requires a whole set of skills. We play a board game to practice the skills of taking turns, waiting patiently, and game play. Any board game will work, but I created a recess game that teaches conflict resolution, procedures, and other recess skills. The best part of this lesson is that it can be done in any order so it's a great back-up plan in case it rains on a club day. Anytime kids play, there is conflict. That's a good thing! Conflict is natural and an important skill for life. I work with kids to practice creating "Bug and a Wish" sentences. We brainstorm actual playground problems and then work together to write a bug and wish sentence. I try to leave as much time as possible to for free play on the playground so that we can work on actual conflicts that arise. What does review look like for recess club? Play! Never underestimate how much kids learn in free play. Love what you see? You can easily recreate this group yourself, or you can find everything all set for you in my recess club download on TPT. Take advantage of the 2016 Back to School Sitewide sale to save 28% August 1st and 2nd!
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If you've read my post on solution focused on a clipboard, you know that I like to create tools that make my life easier. I also like things to look nice and be useful at the same time. To meet both needs, I created the Map It Out wall for your school counseling office. To explore, I am going to walk through the process with a real student we'll call Corey. My Achievement PlanCorey was a fourth grader when I began this work with him. He was a really tough kid who struggled both with his behavior and with understanding empathy. He often hurt others and seemed not to care. When reading stories about sad things, he couldn't understand why the character would act against their own best interest. I had known Corey since he was a Kindergartener and we had worked closely together all those years. However, to be honest, Corey really wasn't doing well. It seemed like all the other things I tried had failed - behavior contracts, solution focused, understanding feelings, work with his family, and many more ideas. I hadn't tried the Achievement Plan because I didn't think he cared enough to work on his behavior. In fact, I think this is why solution focused wasn't very effective for him, I couldn't get the hook he needed in order to try. The Five WantsThe MAP It Out plan is based on the work of William Glasser. In this theory, humans have 5 wants: o Survival – basic needs & safety o Belonging – fitting in, having a tribe, connecting o Power – significance, competence, ability to achieve your goals o Freedom – free choice, to do what we want o Fun – FUN I thought I knew Corey so well. I just knew he would say Power. He was a "power and control" kind of kid, or so I thought. To my utmost surprise, he chose Belonging. I was shocked! I never thought he cared enough about others to want to be connected to them. Clearly, I had already made a huge breakthrough. Now I had the hook I needed to encourage Corey to work towards change. What's Happening NowOnce Corey had a reason to try to change, we could have a really honest conversation about the choices he was making now. Without commentary, I wrote what he said (he didn't want to do the writing) on a post it and divided them between "It's Working" and "It's Not Working." This can be a challenging concept to think about. If I want to belong and I tease others because I think it's funny - is it working? It's might be working in amusing me but not in helping me to belong. This part of the process is important and should not be rushed. How Hard Are You Willing to Work?As we all know, wanting an outcome and working for an outcome are not the same thing. It was important to assess how hard Corey was willing to work. If he's not willing to do "Whatever It Takes," it might be hard to see change. Conversely, if he says he's willing to work hard but doesn't, he's accountable to himself and his actions. I used this part of the tool to explore his feelings about the process of change. Change is hard and the effort check is a great way to get a feel for where your student is. What's The PlanWorking together, Corey and I created a SMART Goal and Plan for his behavior. He was able to identify exact things that he could do to work on belonging in his classroom. In his case, he chose to stop teasing others. He thought he was funny but no one else did. Not a great way to belong. Putting It TogetherHere's where I created a great tool that I wish I had with Corey! On this page, the student (or counselor) can write down what they talk about to keep track of their plans over time. It would work great to staple the planning pages in a folder each week. The stickies can be placed on the actual page when your conversation is done.
So what happened with Corey? He got better. It's been years since I've seen him last but I imagine that his work is not done. Without a doubt, his time at our school was better because of the work that we did. His behavior referrals went down, he was involved in fewer bullying incidents, and I really do think that he began to feel like he belonged. What's your success story? How do you break through with students who are tough to reach? We can all expand our tools of the trade. You can get the entire bulletin board and planning page over on TPT. Like a lot of people I know, I have jumped on the mindfulness bandwagon. I have been surprised to see how much kids enjoy the concepts of mindfulness. I have taught classroom lessons on mindfulness and used the concepts on some of my groups but I really think that the best fit for mindfulness is in individual counseling. I thought it might be fun to create a list of mindfulness crafts for kids. String CraftsI purchased the whale string craft in the cover photo from the one spot at Target (I think it was $3) as a craft with my own kiddo. As we were working on it, I was inspired to create a similar version for cheaper to use at school. You could even use pieces of styrofoam or a shoe box. Simply draw an outline of an object and have the student place pins along the outline. Then wrap string around in random order. It's strangely soothing, even for an adult. ColoringWe can't overlook the power of coloring - it's all the rage for a reason! I love to color while talking with students. You can take it a step further and teach the idea of concentrating on what you're doing and coloring with mindfulness. I can imagine a whole group of students who are working on anxiety coloring peacefully with soft music in the background. Bonus points for beanbags and other comfy chairs. Play DohCounselors often use play doh as a tool for communication but it's also great for mindfulness. Play doh has great textures, smells, colors, and movement to focus students' attention while practicing mindfulness. Arm KnittingOK, I've never tried this one but I've heard that it's great for kids. Arm knitting uses yarn and your arms to create chunky knits that are great for scarves. This is a great tutorial for beginners.
What do you think? Ready for some mindful crafting in your individual sessions? What a wonderful skill for students to learn that will add to their toolbox of anti-stress strategies! If I had to sum up my organization philosophy, it would be to think about it once and make it easy for yourself in the future. I've been using the Solution Focused counseling technique for most of my students for many years. It's helpful to write down what they say so that I can remember where we are each time quickly and without a lot of digging. To do this, I keep a clipboard with all of my current students on it. This clipboard stays in my office and is kept in a confidential spot so their information is not shared with everyone. The "path to solutions" guide includes questions to ask in each stage of the process and guides you right through the solution focused theory. This is also really helpful for new counselors or experienced counselors who are practicing a new theory. On the back, there is a spot to keep a log of the student's scaling and a few notes about their progress. If I need to go back through the process with the student to identify other solutions, I just use a different color pen so I can keep it all straight. I have some pages that have 3-4 colors of pen written all over them! When a student is seen for a completely separate concern, I use a new paper. To help elementary students scale, I created a mood meter that uses smiley stars to correspond with the scale numbers. This helps students to pinpoint where they are on the scale. I have a bunch of these printed out and laminated in a library pocket in my office. I have even had students reach over for one without being prompted! If they are laminated, students can write on them with vis a vis pens or dry erase markers each time they come in. When they are no longer receiving individual counseling, you can easily erase the marks.
This whole set is available on my Teachers Pay Teachers store! How's it going with your kindness challenge this year? If you haven't started, it's never too late. I want to share an amazing idea that a colleague of mine, Chris Dudek, had- a kindness tree! She uses this idea around Christmas but I see it being applicable to other times of the year! Here's what she has to say: In December, we celebrate the character trait of Kindness. To instill this trait in our students, a "Kindness Tree" is in the lobby of our school the week before break. The tree is full of tags with acts of kindness on them. Students are encouraged to select a tag and do that act of kindness within the week. The tree is a huge success with 635 tags taken by students. We emphasize that acts of kindness can be and should be done each day. As well as how good it makes the recipient and the giver feel. Isn't that an amazing idea? I see so many extensions - hearts on a white tree for Valentine's Day, pencils on a tree at the beginning of the school year, and turkeys at Thanksgiving.
To create the tags, Mrs. Dudek printed acts of kindness on labels and affixed to diecut winter shapes. You could also incorporate the making of the tags into part of a lesson on kindness and have students make tags! Isn't this the coolest? I am so inspired by this idea! |
Rebecca AtkinsWelcome to my blog where I talk about all things school counselor and encourage others to Counselor Up! This website uses marketing and tracking technologies. Opting out of this will opt you out of all cookies, except for those needed to run the website. Note that some products may not work as well without tracking cookies. Opt Out of CookiesInterrupting Racism: Equity and Social Justice in School CounselingLinks may be affiliate links. If you link and purchase, I may receive compensation at no additional cost to you. Thanks for your support of Counselor Up.
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