Technology Enhanced Social Emotional Learning Activities

Identifying Emotions Apps

The following is a list of apps that can help learners identify feelings.  

Moody Monster Manor

Moody Monster Manor features twenty cartoon monsters that represent emotions that children commonly experience. Some of the Moody Monsters that children will meet in the manor include Ecstatic Ed, Worried Wanda, Sad Sal, and Sorry Simon. Children can also create their own Moody Monsters to represent how they’re feeling.

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Emotions from I Can Do Apps

The Emotions from I Can Do app focuses on helping individuals identify different facial expressions using real faces and test their understanding of emotions.

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The Feelings Book App

The Feelings App is based upon the Feelings Book (Rubin & Laurent, 2000). It is designed to provide an easy to use format for fostering the "Three "E's"

• Emotional Identification
• Emotional Understanding
• Emotional Regulation

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Moody Me - Mood Diary and Tracker

Track your mood with the Moody Me mood tracker app to find out what makes you feel good. Log your mood and note what affects it.. Take pictures of what makes you happy and play them back for an instant lift. Or see what makes you sad so you can better manage your mood.

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emotionary

Emotionary is a dictionary of emotions and funny feelings. No fuss, no random unrelated meanings. Just a quick and easy way to expand your emotional vocabulary and express yourself better in social media. With over 70 expressive full-sized emoticons, and hundreds of feelings to choose from, now’s the time to get the emotionary app and start sharing.

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Positive Penguins

The four Positive Penguins take you on an interactive journey to help you understand that feelings arise from your thinking and if you challenge your negative thoughts successfully you may be able to see things in a more realistic and even optimistic way.

Try these apps as an additional delivery mode for implementing SEL into your district, school, and/or personal SEL curriculum with classrooms, small groups, and/or individuals!

#SELforallstudents #SELcounselor #schoolcounselor #SELconsultant

Kristine Kilgour, M.Ed., LPSC, LPCC                                                                                                                       School Counselor, Mediator, SEL Consultant                                                                                                       selcounselor@gmail.com                                                                                                                                         970-775-2441

Helping Students Build Self Respect

If you have students who have difficulty in recognizing the good in themselves, the worksheet below might be just what you need! 

This worksheet is, quite simply, a list of 58 positive traits to use during individual, small group, or large group counseling sessions. 

Try getting creative with this one...have students make a collage, art piece, poem, or anything else you, or your students, can think of.  You can also simply encourage your students to circle their own positive traits to begin building self-esteem. 

Ask the students to share a story about some times they have displayed these traits; or, you can just let them take the list home to keep as a reminder of their own positive qualities. 

Kristine Kilgour, M.Ed., LPSC
School Counselor & Mediator
rfhscounselor@gmail.com

FLOW: A Brain Break By GoNoodle

I was thrilled to learn about a great brain break website called Go Noodle.  This site offers a variety of awesome, free brain breaks to use with children.  Included is their newest brain break, FLOW, which focuses on student mindfulness and stress release.  After creating my free account and checking out Flow, I was excited as I thought of the great ways to use this tool in my school counseling program.

End-of-Year Testing time is a great opportunity to use FLOW.  Many students, especially third graders who are testing for the first time, experience some anxiety about doing well on their tests.  FLOW includes meaning activities to assist students with managing stress and maintaining the confidence they need to be successful.  It can also be an excellent tool to use with individual students who come to your office feeling angry or worried.  The activities in FLOW can be used for whole class lessons, small group sessions or individual counseling.

Here’s how you can get started:

Create an account. (It’s FREE!)  You will be asked to enter the following information:

Once you complete this step, you will have access to the free brain breaks.  You will need to create a class or you may use the demo class.  Simply click on the purple “+New Class” button, name your class and add the number of people in the class.

 Once your class is added to the list, you may click your class link and select a classroom champ avatar.  The longer you and your students use GoNoodle, the bigger your class champ will become.

Click the green PLAY button to enter the brain break menu.  Click on the FLOW link, and you are ready to begin!

Once you have entered FLOW, you may select a grade level.  I tried it using both Kindergarten and 5th grade, and I did not see a difference in the videos.  You will select one of the two categories (Attitude or Stress) to begin.

The background sounds in all of the activities are very relaxing.  Students have the option of closing their eyes or keeping them open and watching the screen.  The screen gives visuals of everything being described throughout the activity.

The ATTITUDE option includes two activities:  Chin Up and Weather the Storm.

Chin Up talks students through shifting their moods.  This is an excellent activity for students needing to calm down whether they are angry or worried.  It is a very relaxing activity which includes head tilting and raising and lowering of the chin.

Weather the Storm is a great visual for students who are going through a difficult time.  During the activity, the students watch as a small tree weathers a storm but remains strong and standing when the storm passes. (Love it!)

The STRESS option also includes two activities:  Bring it Down and On & Off.

Bring it Down is great for helping students to bring down stress.  Students imagine a balloon high in the sky.  They imagine slowly pulling the string on the balloon until they can hold the balloon between their hands.  Finally, they imagine letting it go as they watch it fly away in the air.

On & Off involves managing stress by making parts of the body tense and then letting go to relax.  Students will turn on the energy in their toes, legs, hands, arms and whole body.  When the energy is ON, the screen brightens up almost like the sun is in the center.  When students turn their energy off, the screen becomes dark.

I am so excited to learn about this great tool to use in school counseling.  There are other great games you can try like “To the Maximo” where students perform stretches and poses to help with relaxation as well.

If you’d like to TRY OUT FLOW, you may follow any of the links in this post to get started or click on "TRY OUT FLOW" above.

What Is Mindfulness?

Instilling Integrity In Children

Instilling Integrity in Children

As a school counselor, a lot of my time is spent teaching character education throughout the school year.  I believe it is important for children to understand what it means to show the different character traits, and how doing so will help them become the best they can be.  One important trait for children to understand and learn to demonstrate is integrity.   This one can sometimes be tricky.  Looking back, my son has always had a sweet tooth.  This sweet tooth has caused her to put integrity to the side many a day!  I won’t even go into the story of when he took one bite out of each of the cupcakes from the Whole Foods Gluten Free Cupcakes box, and said he didn’t.  Our family consists of him, Dad, and me; so I knew I had a little problem on my hands.  Instilling integrity in him became, and still is, one of my top priorities.

Integrity: Defined

Integrity is defined as the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles.  If you were to ask my students what integrity means, they would most likely say, “Doing what’s right even if no one is looking.”  Instilling this trait in children at a young age is so important.  So what can you do?  Here are three simple ways to start:

Be an Example - Children are always watching what we do as parents and as educators.  The old adage “lead by example” couldn’t be more relevant in this day and time.  It is important to show children that being truthful and honest is the way to go.  When you say you are going to do something, follow through with it.  When you make a misstep, acknowledge it and make the necessary changes.  The children in your life will take notice.

Use Literature to Help Children Understand - I love to use literature in my classroom and small group counseling lessons.  There are several books you can refer to when teaching your children or students about integrity:

Jamaica’s Find - This is a great book about a little girl who finds a stuffed dog in the park and takes it home without finding its owner.

The Emperor’s New Clothes - This is an old favorite!  The emperor’s ministers pretend to see his “invisible” clothing because they are afraid of losing their jobs.

The Empty Pot - Many wanted to be the Emperor’s successor, but only Ping shows integrity.

Horton Hatches the Egg - He meant what he said, and he said what he meant.  This elephant is faithful…100%.

Give Positive Reinforcement - When you witness examples of integrity, make a big deal about it.  It’s so easy for adults to point out what children are doing wrong.  It takes a little more effort to pull out those things they are doing right.  When children take responsibility for their actions and tell you what they’ve done before you “accidentally” find out, they are demonstrating integrity.

Thank them for being honest and use it as a teachable moment instead of a punishable moment. Although you may be disappointed in what they’ve done, let them know how proud you are that they told the truth and showed integrity.  Then, discuss how to make better choices in the future.

Instilling integrity is going to be a work in progress and will not happen overnight.  Modeling integrity, sharing literature about integrity, and giving positive reinforcement when children show integrity can make a difference.  When it’s all said and done, we want our children and students to grow up and become adults with strong moral principles.  For now, they are still children and need the opportunity to learn from their mistakes.   Make the most of those teachable moments now, then sit back and wait for the results.  You won’t be disappointed.

Kristine Kilgour, M.Ed., LPSC
School Counselor & Mediator
6636 West William Cannon Drive, Suite 1627
Austin, TX 78735
512-704-5265
gracecoachingandmediation@gmail.com