See Positive Start Program
Walk around the room and freeze when you hear the teacher say 'stop'. Make a sad statue.
Look around at the sad statues and brainstorm similarities in the expressions and gestures. Brainstorm what makes people sad.
Repeat this with different emotions.
Show examples of the different hand art works. Students to brainstorm different patterns.
Students to create their own hand artwork.
Choose an emotion. Brainstorm different experiences that would cause someone to feel that emotion, repeat with various emotions.
Draw a picture of a time you have felt a certain emotion, and write the emotion above it. You might also like to write a sentence explaining your picture.
"I felt happy when I went to the beach with my family."
Choose Mindful Monkey exercises to practise with your class:
Mindful Breathing - Balloon breathing, elephant breathing, snake breathing, mountain breathing
Mindfulness colouring
Mindful eating during brainfood
Brainbreaks
Read 'The Box Cars'. Before reading, explain that students will be identifying different emotions in the story.
Students to draw a picture of a character from the story and identify how they were feeling. Students to write a sentence describing why the character was feeling that way.
Collect these for assessment
The class will be playing a game that focuses on partnership and teamwork. Model balancing a pen on the palm of your hand with a partner, and moving around the room. Practise making the game more difficult by using opposite hand/index fingers etc.
Students to pair up and play the connections game. This game can also be played by balancing a balloon between tummies.
Circle Time questions:
How did you help each other to succeed in the game?
What did you do to improve your skills in the game?
When do you use these same skills in the classroom or playground?
Explain how to play the Traffic Lights game. The call ‘Green’ means they should walk up and down on the spot. ‘Red’ means they should freeze and put their hand up in a ‘stop signal’. ‘Orange’ means they are to turn around on the spot.
Play the game a few times, and increase the speed of your commands towards the end of the game.
Ask students to sit and think back on the game. Ask:
• What were the skills they used to play this game?
• What did they have to do to make the right move? (Students may suggest skills such as listening, concentrating, remembering, controlling themselves, reacting quickly)
Highlight that being a good listener was important in this game. Ask: Can you think of some more times when the skill of listening is very important?