ELEMENTARY SCHOOL COUNSELORS: encourageME is a free program for elementary students focused on how to build positive friendship skills to replace bullying and toxic friendships. Four lessons with materials provided can be found at https://encouragemeprogram.wordpress.com
The below was sent from a teenager in Atlanta, Georgia. Inspiring…check out her program.
My name is Avery Bradley and I am a current high school senior from Atlanta, Georgia. I am also a proud Girl Scout who has earned her Gold Award, the highest achievement for a Girl Scout. The Girl Scout Gold Award is earned by taking initiative and leadership to solve an issue in the community. The issues that I felt passionate about addressing were bullying and toxic friendships among young students, but rather than focus on those issues directly, I wanted to help solve these problems by building positive friendship skills instead. I believed this was a need in my community because students are often taught not to bully others, but are rarely shown how to do the opposite and be a good friend.
To teach these positive friendship skills, I developed my own school program called encourageME. encourageME is designed to reach older elementary school students, specifically fourth and fifth graders. The program consists of four sections: communication, support, trust, and conflict. Within each section, I lead two lessons and discussions, as well as three activities and games to help reinforce the topics discussed during the lesson. The program was reviewed by an elementary school counselor, a sixth grade counselor, and a school psychologist, and has been successfully implemented at four elementary schools to date. I have additionally presented my program at the 2018 annual GSCA conference to professional counselors from across Georgia.
complete with lesson videos, discussion questions, activities, and printable lesson plans, available at https://encouragemeprogram.wordpress.com. I wanted to send the website to you for your own use, to help students develop these positive skills that will assist them for the rest of their lives.
