December Social Skills Lesson

Managing Anxiety and Worrying

Teaching Coping Skills and Strategies

We will be going into the classrooms this month to talk about Anxiety and what to do when you worry. Students will be learning different coping skills and strategies to help manage anxiety. 

Grades K, 1, 2 and 3

Students will be learning the language and skills represented in the book "What to do when you worry too much?"

We will be talking about what do do when you worry too much. Students will brainstorm worries that they experience every day. We will also explain how worries tend to grow and what strategies you can use to help stop worrying.

One of the strategies that we will discuss is "talking back to your worries". Students will learn how to talk back to the "Worry Bully" on their shoulders.

 

 

We will also introduce our Worry Monsters so that they can eat any remaining worries that students have. Students will write worries on a piece of paper and feed it to the worry monster. The worry monster is very hungry and holds onto the worries so the students don't have to.

Grades 4 and 5

4th and 5th grade students will be listening to the story "What to do with a Problem?"

After reading the story, we will talk about anxiety and how it can effect you. We will talk about how anxiety isn't always a bad thing and how it can be an opportunity. We will then brainstorm different strategies as a group on how to help manage anxiety.

 

  

Each classroom will get a cup of "Coping Strategies" to keep in their classroom to use when they become anxious or are worrying about something. 

We will finish our lesson with a role playing activity and students will have a chance to practice different strategies to help them feel more comfortable and will be able to carry them over. 

Memorial School Giving Tree

    

Memorial is participating in a charity program known as the “Giving Tree”. This program supports students and families who are in need during the holiday season. Gift items are purchased by Memorial staff members (no cash gifts). All referrals and families participating in the Giving Tree are ANONYMOUS.

If you are a family in need or know of a Memorial family in need of assistance during this holiday season, please contact one of the Memorial’s Guidance Counselors.

Danielle Flaccavento          Jamie Martin

    (781) 238-6825            (781) 273 7031   

Flaccavento@bpsk12.org     jmartin@bpsk12.org

A little help goes a long way.

Your support is greatly appreciated!

Holiday Donation to the Burlington Food Pantry

Help make a difference and donate to the

Burlington Food Pantry

Memorial School is partnering with the Burlington Food Pantry again this year to help support Burlington residents in need during the holiday season. We are looking for people to donate the following items:

cake mix

quick bread mix

cookie mix

frosting

coffee

hot cocoa mix

toothpaste

shampoo

dish detergent

individually-wrapped toilet paper

Memorial 5th Grade Student Council will be organizing the collection and collecting the items to donate to the Food Pantry. You can send items to school with your child to be put in a donation box in their classroom.

Please send in items no later than Friday, December 9, 2016.

November Social Skills Lesson

Mindfulness

What do you think it means to be mindful?

Your brain is a powerful part of YOU!

Amygdala: Security Guard (Guard Dog)
Helps protect us
Flight, fight, freeze
Hippocampus: Memory Saver
Helps us learn and remember
Chronic stress can shrink it
Prefrontal Cortex (PFC): Wise Owl
Helps us make good decisions
Observes, analyzes and remembers
Thinking, planning, reasoning, impulse control

Has a teacher ever said to you...

• You need to calm down
• Time to focus
• You need to pay attention

Did you know?

You are going to learn the skills of calming down BEFORE you get upset. Mindfulness helps you before you feel sad or mad.

Mindful Listening - Learning to Be Mindful

30 seconds of mindful listening:

• Sit quietly with eyes closed and just listen to

       the sounds around them.  

Just Breathe

by Julie Bayer Salzman & Josh Salzman

Click here to watch "Just Breathe"

Core Practice

Combining Listening and Breathing

using resonant sound.

Step 1:

Raise your hand when

you no longer hear the sound

Step 2: Practice for 30-60 seconds

Where Do You Feel The Breath?

• Put hand on stomach and breath

• Put hand on chest and breath

• Put hand over nose and breath

Practice

• Mindfulness is best practiced “daily.”
• 3 minutes/day is better than 20 minutes/once a week.
• By giving attention to positive experiences, we rewire the brain toward healthy habits of thinking and feeling and away from fight, flight and freeze.

What does Mindfulness mean to you?

October Social Skills Lesson

Spreading Kindness

Kindergarten:

 Each kindergarten class will be reading the story "Have You Filled a Bucket Today?". They will discuss what it means to be kind and what kindness looks like. 

1st and 2nd Grade:

 Each 1st and 2nd grade classroom will be reading the story "What Does it mean to be kind?"

 We will be discussing what it means to be kind and what kindness looks like. Then the students will be designing a flower and writing an act of kindness on their flower. Their flowers will be added to our kindness garden. 

  

3rd, 4th and 5th Grade:

 Each student in 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade will be reading the story "The Invisible Boy".

 After we read and discuss the story with the students, we will be talk about what it means to be kind and how important it is to treat others the way that you want to be treated. 

BEFORE YOU SPEAK

THINK AND BE SMART

IT'S HARD TO FIX

A WRINKLED HEART

 The students will then do an activity where they sketch a picture of themselves inside a heart. We will discuss examples that people may say or do to hurt someone. Each time the students give an example,they will wrinkle their paper a little bit. Once their paper is all wrinkled, we will then talk about acts of kindness. For each example given, the students will try to flatten out their paper. 

 At the end of the lesson, the students will notice that no matter how many acts of kindness are done, the wrinkles remain in their heart. So it is important to think before you speak or act because you don't know what your actions or words will do to someone else.