Activities to Support Social Emotional Learning

Social Emotional Learning

Socially Distant Classroom Games

SEL Practices and Strategies

Build Classroom Community

1. Daily Classroom Meetings

A Daily meeting creates an opportunity for frequent check-ins with students. This can be a chance for you to get to know your kids, have them bond with each other, have them share school & life concerns with the class, and solve problems as a class.

Before beginning these discussions, set ground rules for how info is shared and what is expected out of students to encourage respectful, thoughtful, productive discussions. See Suggestions for Classroom Meetings Here

Issue Box: Designate a box for students to anonymously (or not) report class, community, or life issues to the class which can be discussed during class meetings.

2. Weekly Virtual Whole-Class Meetings

Have all students meet virtually on Wednesdays to build connections between students in both A and B groups.

A Thorn and a Rose; Challenge and a Cheer (or whatever you want to call it!) - Try having students share both 1 difficult/unhappy/stressful thing and 1 good/happy/exciting thing.

The above sign means "Same" and can be done to show you relate to what someone is saying.

I-Messages: Teach students how to use I-Messages when talking about problems and their feelings. See this Exit-Ticket Template

"I feel _______ When _______ Because _______. I Want _______."

Make sure you also share YOUR experiences, feelings, and struggles to help start the discussion, model appropriate discussion, and normalize talking about feelings.

3. A-B Penpals

Foster connections between students in both A and B groups by finding ways to pair A students with B students.

4. Establish Expectations Early

Give students more time to adjust to the new school year than you have in past years. Spend plenty of time talking about expectations.

5. Stillness Challenge

Start small and set a timer for two minutes. Turn off the lights, play calm music, and ask students to sit comfortably in a cozy spot. Each day, see how long your class can go each day, tracking progress on a poster. Objective is to keep your eyes closed, sit in stillness and to focus on breathing slowly. Encourage students to avoid talking and fidgeting. They should attempt to sit as still as possible and if their thoughts wander, instruct them to kindly bring them back to the breath. The timer will go off when two minutes are up. Take a nice stretch and debrief how it went.

Other Option: Have your student sit where they can place their fingertips on the desk or their knees. Starting with the thumbs, tap each finger on the table to count in the breath—inhale 1-2-3-4-5 and then to count out the breath—exhale 1-2-3-4-5. This can also be done by raising arms or lifting feet off the ground with each breath.

6. Mindful Eating

Choose something to eat (candy, raisins, crackers, etc.). Have students take time to focus on all 5 senses as they observe and appreciate the qualities of the food. Spend about 1-2 minutes on each sense.

7. Breathing Buddy Meditation

Supplies: timer, calming music, stuffed animals or tennis ball

Have students lie down. Each student should get a stuffed animal or tennis ball to rest on their stomach. Set a timer, and for your determined length of time, students should close their eyes, taking slow deep breaths while balancing their stuffed animal or ball on their stomach. If the object falls off, they can simply put it back and keep breathing. The object is to keep the focus on the breath and to balance the object for the given time.

8. Sensory Challenge

Ask students to sit comfortably and close their eyes. Take a few deep breaths together and then offer the following prompts.

For 30 seconds, focus deeply on what you can hear. Even the smallest noises.

For 30 seconds, focus deeply on what you can smell.

For 30 seconds, focus deeply on what you can feel.

Open your eyes and look up. For 30 seconds, focus deeply on what you can see

Grounding Worksheet

9. Sound Focus

Supplies: timer, bell, singing bowl, singing bowl app

Ask students to sit comfortably and close their eyes. Using a bell, a Tibetan singing bowl, or tuning fork (or a video/app of any one of these), play a robust, reverberating tone. Ask students to breathe quietly, and listen intently to the sound as it fades. When they can no longer hear it, they should put their head down. You can repeat this a few times.

10. Body Scan

A body scan is a guided meditation that takes students through a head-to-toe scan of the body. Students should sit or lie down comfortably. Listening to the audio, students should follow the cues to breath and relax the body muscle by muscle. This practice can help students learn to assess tension and use their breath to release it and its especially helpful for students with sleep problems.

11. Feelings Circle

Coming together to talk about our feelings helps us learn about emotions and build our feelings vocabulary. Talking about feelings helps us to better understand ourselves and build stronger relationships. See Lesson Plan Here

12. Pleasant Events Calendar

Students learn to care for themselves by planning enjoyable activities to combat stress and anxiety. See Lesson Plan Here

13. Dear Abby

Imagine situations, brainstorm what the options are, and identify what we like or don’t like about them. Talk about these choices to help with decision making and problem solving. See Lesson Plan Here

14. Drawing to Manage Emotions

Students take a few minutes to draw anything they like, learning an emotion regulation strategy that can help shift unpleasant emotions to calmer, more pleasant ones. See Lesson Plan Here

15. Time Capsule

Students and Teachers record their thoughts, feelings, memories, and important events in a time capsule to reflect on their experience during a pandemic. Return to this at a later date. See Time Capsule Template Here.

16. Vision Board

Have kids create a vision board of things they want to do in the future. You could suggest they think about tomorrow, next week, or over the summer, or even next school year! This activity is included in the free SEL activity pack for distance learning below!

17. Circle Meetings

Self-Care Circle: Ask students to reflect on self-care practices in a sharing circle.
See Self-Care Circle Lesson Plan Here

Responsive Circles: Ask students to reflect on their experiences with Covid-19.
See Responsive Circles for Covid-19

18. Puzzle Community

Create a community puzzle by having each student decorate a puzzle piece. Post the puzzle pieces on a bulletin board in your classroom. Use this activity to foster a discussion about class community. See Puzzle Piece Worksheet Here.