Dear Families/Caregivers, 

In order to develop social awareness, students must understand that all actions have consequences, and their actions and consequences can, and often do, affect others. In this lesson students learned to identify constructive choices for himself/herself. Students were taught to identify good and poor choices and how to make the right choices for himself/herself. Some examples of choices that were discussed included:  

 - Practicing to get better at something  

 - Staying up late playing video games instead of studying for a test   

- Posting a rumor or something negative about a peer on social media   

- Asking an adult for help  

- Making someone a birthday cake 

- Asking nicely for an adult to give you a ride somewhere 

Learning to make good choices for ourselves is a critical piece of becoming independent and making safe decisions in life. It helps with peer pressure and gives students the skills to weigh the consequences of actions prior to engaging in them. 

You can help your child make good choices at home by discussing different choices that he/she has each day and asking him/her to tell you poor and good choices and to identify the possible consequences of these choices and how/she might feel about the choice that he/she makes.  

Dear Family/Caregivers, 

Sometimes life does not go as planned and sometimes things happen that are  challenging or difficult. Our ability to bounce back and cope with these hard times is  called resilience. Resilience helps us to move on and learn from our mistakes. Having  resilience improves our coping and problem solving skills. Resilience isn’t just about  recovering from a setback but learning from it so that we can do better in the  future. Resilience builds self-advocacy and self-awareness as well as confidence  and motivation. Teaching children and teens about resilience prepares them for  challenges and allows them to learn from natural consequences. 

In this lesson, children are learning to identify challenges in everyday life and ways to overcome these challenges. Students were taught general strategies for overcoming challenges and then identified challenges in his/her own life and strategies to help him/her overcome these specific challenges. 

 Help your child identify a challenge that he/she is having home: 

(e.g. plays too much video games, has trouble getting homework done, has trouble with   organization, etc.). Then, help your child come up with specific strategies   that he/she can do to overcome this challenge. Write down the strategies   and post them and work with your child daily to help 

Dear Families/Caregivers,

Healthy boundaries are important to protect our safety and take care of ourselves.  We all have different boundaries. Boundaries are guidelines and limits we set for  ourselves and our relationships. However, everyone’s boundaries are different.  What is okay for one person may not be okay for another. Students learn the  importance of healthy boundaries, how to identify one’s own boundaries, and how to  know when a boundary has been crossed. Students learn strategies for speaking  up for themselves when a boundary has been crossed. Students were taught to  identify and set safe limits for himself/herself and to understand those of other  people. 

At home, you can help your child identify his/her safety limits and to understand  those of other people at home and in the community. To help your child remember,  you can have him/her write down a set of safe limits for the home and for common  places that he/she goes in the community. 

Knowing our own set of safety limits and standing by those helps to build our  independence while keeping us safe. It also improves decision-making and  problem-solving skills.

Dear Families/Caregivers,                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       Conflict resolution is a process of seeking a solution to a disagreement that satisfies  everyone involved. When students build their conflict resolution skills, they are better  prepared to embrace healthy conflict as an opportunity for growth. 

We learned about the benefits of healthy conflict and strategies for healthy  communication. Healthy conflict introduces new perspectives, helps us practice communication skills, and improves relationships. Some strategies for healthy  communication are: 

• Use the I-Message 

• THINK Before You Speak 

• Listen to Understand 

• Seek Common Ground 

Here are some things you can do to help your teen build their conflict resolution skills: 

• When a conflict arises, invite your teen to first reflect on what caused the conflict and identify the emotions they are feeling. Encourage them to use the I-Message to express how they feel and what they need. 

• Invite your teen to consider how to respond respectfully by asking, Is it True, Helpful, Inspiring, Necessary, or Kind? 

• Encourage your teen to ask clarifying questions to try to understand the other person’s perspective and discover solutions that work for everyone. 

              • Talk about conflicts you have resolved in your own life and strategies you use for resolving conflicts effectively. 

Dear Families/Caregivers, 

This week, we will be talking about anxiety, a common mental health concern among teens. Anxiety is the  body’s natural response to stress or danger, but it become a mental health concern when it interferes with a  person’s ability or desire to complete everyday activities. During the lesson, we will discuss how anxiety can be  experienced physically, mentally, and behaviorally. Students will learn strategies to manage anxiety, such as: 

- identifying and accepting their emotions, 

- developing stress management tools, 

- practicing mindfulness, 

                - nurturing empathy and compassion for oneself and others, and 

- seeking help from a support system.  

Please feel free to communicate with me or other staff members about any information that may be helpful when teaching about this topic with your teen. 

Suggestions for Helping Your Teen to Manage Their Anxiety 

• Create an open environment to discuss emotions with your teen. Help them name their emotions and accept them as a natural response to what is happening around them. 

• Model stress management strategies and self-care practices for your teen, demonstrating healthy ways to address your own anxiety. 

• Help your teen to challenge anxious negative thinking by asking them if the thoughts are true and helping them to focus on the facts. For example, if your teen is anxious about a test, remind them that they prepared for the test and/or that it’s just one test. Although students encounter many important tests, the fact is that no one test can determine their future.  

• Support your teen in changing their thoughts and behaviors by offering alternative suggestions or distractions from their anxious thoughts. 

• Be patient. Allow your teen time to process their feelings. Rushing the process can lead them to feel like there is something wrong with them, which may lead to confusion or hiding their feelings to make others more comfortable.  

• If you have concerns about the intensity or duration of your teen’s anxious feelings, seek the help of a mental health professional.  

Thank you for the opportunity to partner with you to promote your teen’s safety and mental wellness.

Dear Families/Caregivers, 

Students who develop self-control are better able to reach their goals and live healthy,  productive, and successful lives. Research suggests that self-control supports teens  in managing their stress to respond to unexpected events in healthy ways. 

We learned strategies to delay gratification, or put off getting a reward now to get a greater  reward later:  

Out of Sight, Out of Mind 

Put your temptations out of sight.  

Press Pause 

Stop and think. 

Positive Distraction 

Do something else.  

Self-Talk 

I can do this!  

If, Then 

Make a plan for delaying gratification.  

Reward Review  

Remind yourself of the reward.  

Pros and Cons List 

Make a list of the pros and cons.  

At home, encourage your teen to track their goals in a journal or calendar so that  they can note their progress. Support your teen in practicing the delayed gratification  strategies to meet their long-term goals.

Dear Families/Caregivers, 

Values are a person’s principles and standards of behavior. They are what a person believes to be important. Studies indicate that people are happier when they act according to their values. As students become more independent, they begin to shape their values based on new information gathered from peers, the media, and their own experiences. 

Students have been identifying their own values and learning about the values of others at school. They learned strategies for understanding others with different values including: 

• Accept that different people have different values. 

• Look for similar values. 

• Ask questions and listen. 

• Give others the same respect for their values as you would like given to yours. 

Here are a few discussion questions to engage your teen in a conversation about values in other people: 

• Discuss how your family has some shared values and some values that are different from one another. 

• Discuss the values of other people that you know and how they are the same and different from your family. 

Our values are influenced by our culture, religion, environment, experience, and the values of our extended family. It is important that your teen have a clear sense of your family’s values while having some freedom to begin to evaluate and own or reject values based on his or her own wants and needs. Your teen should be able to respect and try to understand the values of other people to improve relationships and cooperation.

Dear Families/Caregivers, 

Students are often bombarded with decisions that need to be made, which hinge on a specific career path. How can they know what courses to take in high school for a future educational goal, if they haven’t explored career options available to them? Gives young people broader exposure to the working world they will one day enter

Benefits of Middle School Career Exploration: 

• Improves academic performance

• Improves the attitudes of young people about their career possibilities

• Increases students’ knowledge of career options

• Allows students to more easily envision how they fit successfully into the working world

• Encourages students to plan their high school courses of study carefully to gain the skills they will need