Friendship Issue

Pirate, Viking & Scientist by J. Chapman is a perfect book for a small friendship group in grades 2-5 or a classroom lesson. The book deals with a very common problem of a child who has 2 friends but the friends do not get along with each other. I am sure every elementary counselor has a discussion about this issue multiple times each year. The book also reviews the scientific method and has great vocabulary which makes it useful to reinforce academics as well as social emotional learning. I highly recommend purchasing a copy for your program but if you do not have a budget it is read aloud on YouTube.

Set an Individual Goal

In some small groups it is good practice to have students set an individual goal.  This is different than the goal for the group. Often members of a group will have different needs. In an emotion regulation group one student may have terrible anxiety about coming to school in the morning but another student may be terrified the fire alarm will go off. They can both be served by the same group because they need similar skills and strategies but to determine growth it is a good idea for them to formulate a goal specific for their unique need(s).  I generally have members set their individual goal and rate it the second session since the first session they are really just understanding the general purpose of the group, taking the pre-group survey, and learning procedures. I then like them to rate themselves half way through the group to see if they feel they are making progress and what else they might need to meet their goal. Finally, they rate their goal the final session after completing the post-group survey. If they are still not making good progress that might indicate the need for follow-up.

Small Group Counseling Tips

I am getting ready to present at the KSCA Conference on my favorite topic, small group counseling, so I thought I'd share a few of the slides from my presentation and explain what is included on each. My part-time counselor and I decided last Spring to really get our groups organized, clearly delineate the competencies we want to cover on each of our main topics (social skills, self regulation, emotion regulation, and flexible thinking). Once we agreed on the competencies we reviewed all the evidence based materials and practices for each. In the area of social skills we pulled from a number of good resources (many of which I have reviewed in previous posts) and then also tried to incorporate a picture book for each session in our K-3 groups. We are fortunate to own literally thousands pf children's books. We wanted to assign a book to a specific session and not reuse them in any other group. It is common to address the same competencies from year to year like how to give a compliment but we wanted to use a different book at each grade level and build on the student response required. We have also discovered that just telling students a number (this group will be 8 sessions) is not a strong enough organizer, we like an overview "session map" that the students can see where they are in the sequence so they no there are x number of sessions remaining and what is covered in each session.  For all our small groups we have an activity or response sheet for each session and on these sheets we put a small image of the book at the top. We include a brief description of what was read and taught in the session. St the end of the group these booklets go home and parents know exactly what we covered in the group. Many parents get the books from the library and reread them with their child to remind them of skills that they still need to practice. We have gotten excellent feedback on these booklets from families. Some students will save them and tell us the next year, "I still have the book I made with you." On the slides above I have provided the name of each book we use by session and one of the same pages from our booklets for that grade level. We run so many social skills for kindergarten we have two curriculum - learning how to make and be a friend is a critical life lesson for our young learners. I know some counselors send home the sheets the same day a group meets, but we found that many never made it home but when the booklets get sent home they do make it.

Sequencing Groups

As you plan your school year it is important to figure out a schedule that maps the number of rounds of groups that will be offered. The diagram above reflects what my part-time counselor and I did last year.  We started groups at the end of September over 9 weeks (8 sessions with one week for make-ups) then started round 2, and a smaller number of groups the final round. Looking at the numbers of participants, perception data, and outcome data can drive your plan for this school year. We always have the highest demand for groups in kindergarten through grade 3. We rarely offer special groups like Children of Divorce, Adoption, or Allergies because our schedule requires us to do groups within a single grade. Completing a simple table like the one above makes it easier to complete the ASCA Small Group Action Plan.

Happiness is a Choice

"Happiness is a choice. Be happy." That's the essential message of Yabuki's picture book.  To illustrate life's struggles and the actions that can help them seem less daunting, she presents a series of photographs featuring a small, whitish rock named Ishi, with dot eyes and a mouth that changes to reflect its mood.This book encourages others to choose and share happiness. This book can be used in a variety of groups such as emotion regulation or social skills. After reading and discussing mindfulness the story, group members can make their our own rock friends that could remind them to be happy and spread kindness. 

What Ifs

The hallmark of anxious thoughts is imagining al the "what ifs" that could possibly go wrong. The Key message of this children's book is "Remember to not believe all that you think, and slowly those fears will begin to shrink." Anxiety can confuse kids because it is a false prediction. Their brain is tricking them to believe something (that is dangerous) is present when it is not. It is hard to retrain a child who has chronic worrisome thoughts. This book encourages focusing on what is good and talking to a trusted adult. The books uses the metaphor of an umbrella to keep the stormy thoughts away. This book can be used in individual counseling, in an emotion management group, or sent home as a resource to families.

Hunter New and Improved

Some of the signs of self-regulation difficulties in children include ongoing struggles with concentration (e.g., being unable to listen in a group lesson), looking sad and bored in daily activities (e.g., playing with others), or becoming easily upset and anxious so they are unable to move on. My second graders in self-regulation groups love "Hunter and His Amazing Remote Control". The story book has been around awhile but it has been redone and now includes a complete self-regulation program with a CD to reproduce all pages, as well as a kit and poster.

Hunter's Amazing Remote Control buttons include:

Channel Changer - Filtering out distractions

Pause - Stopping to think relax and create a plan

Fast Forward - Thinking before acting

Rewind - Shifting focus from past failure to future change

Slow Motion - Slowing down and managing stress

Coach - Problem solving

Zapper - Recognizing and rejecting negative thinking

Way to Go! - Using positive self-talk 

The guide has discussion questions to go along with the book and creative activities to introduce, teach and practice the strategies. The guide has 10 units, it begins with "Our Amazing Differences, then has a unit for each button, and ends with "Self-control." The Remote Control can be adapted (I only introduce 6 in grade 2) and children can add their own based on their individual needs. I highly recommend this set of materials for self-regulation youthlight.com

Resources to Teach Children about Feelings

Aaron Wiemeier and youthlight have again teamed up to provide counselors a resource to teach children important concepts regarding emotions. The new curriculum guide Building Emotional Intelligence focuses on 8 concepts regarding feelings. The curriculum is designed for schools with each of the 46 skill-based lessons taking 20-30 minutes. The curriculum develops self-awareness, motivation, empathy, self-regulation, and social skills. I love the use of the wind metaphor in lesson one (can't see it but we know it is there) taught using a pinwheel. My other favorite is lesson 14 - Coping Tool Versus Coping Skill. We introduce tools to children a lot in counseling but do not practice them enough so they become skills. This guide has many great lessons to teach healthy coping skills. I think this curriculum could be used in small groups and in classroom lessons. Some of the lessons could also be led by teachers in morning meetings if those are done in your school. This is best curriculum guide I have seen this year, I highly recommend it!

My Feelings Workbook, Wiemeier's earlier book, can be used for additional extension activities.  This resource can be especially useful when working with children who are experiencing intense emotions such as after a traumatic event.

Let's Talk About...Your Fears and Worries

I see lots of students who struggle with stress and various types of anxiety. I recently purchased this inexpensive card game to use in individual sessions. The cards and spinner (wheel) can also be used in emotional regulation groups.  The deck is 101 cards to hep kids and teens change their irrational automatic thoughts to thoughts that are realistic and helpful. This is a skill that needs practice which is what this game is designed to do. The Wheel of Relaxation is used to help players practice relaxation and self-calming techniques so that they can more easily face their fears. The spinner can also be used as a stand alone tool. If you don't have a similar game in your office already, this is one you might want to purchase.

Boy Friendship Story

This sweet book is just what I have been searching for the past few years. This is the first book by this author translated from French to English. It is very hard to find good books about friendships between boys. Since I typically use a book in each friendship small group session this is a treasure.  In the story the parents are uncomfortable by how the boys seem to love one another. This can be discussed or just serve as exposure to the idea that people do love others of the same gender. Children need to be able to connect to the characters in the story and for young students I have found it can be hard for some kids to make a text to self connection if the child is not their gender. 

In the fall I typically run mixed gender groups but the second and third rounds of groups I frequently split boys and girls and keep the groups smaller. I focus each session on a specific ASCA Mindset and Behavior and a competency that gets at the skill that session is designed to teach because our groups are psycho-educational. This book would work for a number of skills such as Identify characteristics of friendship or List behaviors that keep friends. This book could be used with kindergarten through grade 2. 

Mindfulness It's Elementary

The American Psychological Association defines mindfulness as a moment-to-moment awareness of one's experience without judgment apa.org. In this sense, mindfulness is a state and not a trait.  The APA tracks the research that indicates mindfulness has many benefits including stress reduction, boost to working memory, less emotional reactivity, relationship satisfaction, and enhanced empathy and compassion. So how can teachers and counselors incorporate mindfulness education into an already overcrowded school day?

Joree Rose wrote a curriculum to teach mindfulness to students comprised of 12 activity-based  lessons that cover the foundations of a mindfulness practice. Each 10-15 minute lesson walks the student through how to cultivate that tool, with the activity sheets offered as a way to deepen the understanding and integration of the practice. The lessons begin with a short breathing practice that sets the tone, mood, and mindset to enter into each lesson. Then the leader guides students through each practice (example: Body Awareness). The lessons have discussion questions to lead a verbal conversation about what was just taught. Each lesson has an exercise sheet that becomes like a journal of their mindfulness journey. These activities were designed to be a fun, more interactive and personal way to connecting to the topic, in a way to integrate the tools. This curriculum will help you provide students with valuable coping skills that work on slowing down, being more intentional (doing things on purpose rather than doing them through habit) and increasing awareness and attention to what is happening in each moment. The curriculum is available here youthlight.com I plan to share this resource with my teachers that are interested in incorporating more mindfulness into their classrooms.

This author also wrote "Squirmy Learns to be Mindful".  The book could be used in conjunction with
several of the lessons (i.e., breathing, gratitude, compassion, mindfulness of thoughts, and mindfulness of emotions).  I know many school counselors will use this curriculum in small groups and they might wish to also purchase "Squirmy" from youthlight.com

Coping Skills

If you run groups for kids with emotion regulation difficulties this might be a good workbook for your collection. Janine Halloran, a mental health counselor, has organized coping skills in to 4 categories: calming, distraction, physical, and processing. For each category she offers close to 20 techniques to explore. Kids need a variety of coping skills because different types of coping skills will work at different times, in different places, and for different stressors. For example, the goal of the calming exercises is to get from "flight, fight or freeze mode" back to the "rest and digest" mode. She offers many fun types of breathing and grounding activities.  The sills in this workbook are very familiar but they are well organized and explained in a clear manner.T he book concludes with a suggestion for writing coping skills cards. I have pulled several exercises from this book for my groups and a few to send home to families to practice.

Life-Changing Lessons for Girls

Our school division is looking for evidence-based resources for our school counseling program. The Peace Center's Bullying Prevention Resource Center in Pennsylvania has put together a program "Girls Unlimited" and published the curriculum through youthlight.com Every girl in grades 6 and 7 could benefit from participation in these 6 forty five minute sessions. Topics include:

• How to recognize their own emotions and treat themselves and others with kindness and respect.
•Practical ways to manage their anger or upset
•How to intervene when witnessing relational aggression
•The meaning of self-respect and self-care
•The value of trust

•The importance of women bonding togetherWhile the curriculum is self-explanatory 

My favorite part of the curriculum is Power Play which allows participants to discover that they have the ability to trust their own instincts and not hand over their power to others. I like that the evaluation is built in to the curriculum and that the developers are continuing to track the effectiveness of the program. 

Although the curriculum is self-explanatory Karin Kasdin, Founding Director of Girls Unlimited does offer one-day facilitator training through thepeacecenter.org I encourage you to check out this evidence-based resource to address relational aggression.

Great resources from Magination Press

One of my favorite publishers is Magination Press (American Psychological Association)  http://www.apa.org/pubs/magination These are two of the books I got this year. I love Move Your Mood to emphasize how moving can help you self-regulate and improve your mood. Bye Bye Pesky Fly is perfect for an emotion regulation group or a class lesson on dealing with frustration. Check their site frequently because they publish new books often and most of them are great additions to the school counselors bookshelf.

Mindful Mantras Series

 

 

This is a terrific series on self-regulation, mindfulness, self-esteem, and problem solving.  I use these books in my self-regulation  and emotion management small groups. Teachers like to borrow them to share with the whole class and we include some of them in out Family Resource Packs we send home for parents to borrow. The books come with a link to go to a web site for a free lesson for each book that also has suggestions for parents. The author, Laurie Wright, is a former teacher and one of my new favorite authors!

Teaching Children About Empathy

You, Me and Empathy by Jayneen Sanders teaches children about empathy, feelings, kindness, compassion, tolerance, respect and recognizing bullying behaviors. For other books by this author go to e2epublishing.info/books/ I love the illustrations and that they discuss the four basic groups of emotions that we use in our school counseling program. Empathy is a learned skill so as counselors it is something we need to teach. We also need to help parents find resources to teach empathy at home. This book includes discussion questions that can be used in school or at home. I highly recommend you pick up a copy and figure out the best place to include it in your program next year. I use it in a third grade emotion management group, but it could work in first and definitely in second grade.

Emotion Management Group Grade 1

A high need in my school is support for students with anxiety, unfortunately even as young as first grade. Research has shown the sooner children with anxiety begin to learn tools to self regulate the better. Research continues to indicate that Cognitive Behavioral approaches and Mindfulness are effective in reducing anxiety. Using children's literature to teach strategies and normalize the fact that many children have anxiety in the primary grades is also effective. I have developed an Emotion Management group curriculum for grades 1-5. Many of the same skills are taught at each level but with increased complexity.  I think it is critical that the focus be on skill development and that parents and teachers know what skills are taught in group. Before each group I put together a packet for the 8 sessions. Each handout has the image of the book we shared and a simple explanation of the skill and activity. It really helps students see that the group is structured and how far along they are each session. If group gets cancelled one week for a special activity or schedule change, they know we will keep meeting until we complete the 8 sessions. I communicate with parents at least 3 times during a group (beginning, middle, and end). Parents give very positive feedback about the packet of work coming home at the end and being able to reinforce the skills taught in group.

My goal is to serve as many students as possible and avoid a large number of students being referred for individual counseling. Most children like the group and support one another; however, there are some children with social anxiety that can't yet speak in a group so I may see them individually one year with the hope of them doing a group at the next grade level. I always collect perception data for these groups with a simple pre-post survey. I do NOT send these home rather I use them to evaluate the effectiveness of the groups and what needs to be revised.

Resources for Self-Control, Self-Regulation, and Mindfulness

I think the work of Lauren Brukner, occupational therapist, is extremely useful to elementary counselors and parents of children who struggle to self-regulate. The 3 books pictured above are the ones I use to pull ideas from for my small groups on self-regulation. The 6 exercises shown above are the ones I have pulled from the 3 books to use as the warm-ups in my third grade group. I also posted my overview of my third grade group. Small tier 2 groups are growth-promoting environments that provide children with “scaffolding” and opportunities to practice necessary skills before they must perform them alone. As counselors, we know that different tools work for different kids so I teach different ones in each group because some of these same students would have been in self-regulation groups in Kindergarten and grades 1 and 2.  Actually many of the tools presented in these books would be great for classroom lessons, particularly in grade 3 where the level of toxic stress seems to peak because of letter grades and standardized testing in our state.

She has another book Awesome and In Control that I recommend to parents. We have a copy in the Self-Regulation Family Resource Pack we loan to parents. I agree with Brukner that we want our children to gain "control, direction and ownership of their own states of self-regulation. Children are not born knowing how to self-regulate and for some children it takes special instruction to master these critical life skills.

The Fruit Salad Friend

I use several books by Maria Dismondy so I was happy to get her latest release. A girl who always loved school noticed peers were no longer being kind. After struggling for a few days trying her usual strategies, she decides to look at relationships differently. This is a great book for girls in grade 2 and 3 struggling with "tricky" peers who are sometimes friends and sometimes mean. It points out that a smile can win over people. The book includes 10 tips for parents to help promote prosocial skills written by Dr. Michele Borba the author of Unselfie: Why Empathetic Kinds Succeed. I have already used this in a small friendship group in grade 3 and know this will become a favorite on my bookshelf.

Dr. Seuss Book

In honor of his birthday I wanted to share about my favorite of his many books, My Many Colored Days. It also lends itself beautifully to a Bulletin Board or Decorate Your Door for Read Across America Day. I have used this book in so many ways from K through grade 5. If you want a lesson plan for some solid extension activities check out csefel.vanderbilt.edu or theteacherscorner We do Second Step for classroom lessons so I usually use this book in one of my emotion regulation small groups.