I Am FANTASTIC

Activity Overview

When students feel confident and validated, they are more likely to take risks, give their all – even when doing something new – and recover quickly, even if things have not gone as expected. Using the format of an acrostic poem, grown ups will support students to identify positive attributes about themselves through matching each letter of their name with an adjective to describe one of their strengths. Having the constraint of using each letter of their name to select a corresponding descriptor offers a chance to explore synonyms. Students will also symbolize their best skills and elements of their character as part of a self portrait. This task combines spelling, poetry, and art to provide students with an opportunity to build self esteem and celebrate their individuality!

What You Need

• Acrostic poem template (depending on how many spaces you need, glue additional sheets together and clip off any extra lines so that there is one line for each letter of the student’s name. Write the student’s name vertically with one letter in each of the boxes on the left)

• Glue

• Scissors

• Fantastic You on Epic!

• Blank paper (large scale paper encouraged for self portrait, but not necessary)

• Art supplies of choice

Steps

1. Read Fantastic You on Epic. Use the guiding questions to think about what makes you a unique, special individual, worthy of love and acceptance.

2. Use the template to write an acrostic poem about the positive qualities about yourself. To support your student, if necessary, write just one or two lines of the poem each day.

3. Draw a self portrait. Include detail from your poem in the portrait that represents what makes you unique and celebrates your individuality.

Guiding Questions

• What are some things that are special about you? Think about what you like to spend your time doing, what you are good at, and what your strengths are consistently.

• What kinds of things do you do to show yourself love?

• What kinds of things do other people do for you that make you feel loved and encouraged? Can you do any of those things for yourself to show yourself love?

• What makes you unique and different from any other person?

Extensions

• Use multiple days to complete the writing and add detail to your self portrait based on the new qualities represented in the new lines you add each day.

• Create similar acrostic poems for family members, friends, pets, and loved ones.