Inside: Use these Social Emotional Learning 180 Daily Questions to start conversations about kindness, empathy, compassion, and being a good friend.
When I taught third grade, we were focused on multiplication, cursive, the solar system, Native American and Indigenous studies, and of course reading and math.
But one day, someone passing by our class dropped a stack of books and my kids laughed.
That’s when I knew we had to focus on something else: kindness, empathy, being helpful, and social emotional skills.
I would not have been a successful educator if my third graders left me being able to read and write cursive if they didn’t stop to help someone who needed it. They needed to memorize their multiplication tables but they also needed to learn how to be a positive addition to our community.
So we started intentionally focusing on kindness, empathy, compassion, being a good friend, and being helpful. One simple way to do that is to talk about kindness often.
But it can be hard to think of what to talk about with students. So you can use these 180 Daily Kindness Questions to talk about kindness and social emotional learning concepts every school day.
What is Social Emotional Learning And Why it is Essential:
Social Emotional Learning Includes 5 major components:
1. Self-Awareness
Are kids in tune with their bodies and emotions so they keep getting better at handling setbacks and new challenges?
This includes things like knowing what you need and want, labeling your emotions, recognizing your strengths and areas of improvement, increasing self-confidence, and building a growth mindset.
2. Self Management
Can kids manage or handle themselves without adult intervention?
This includes managing and controlling your emotions without losing control (teaching kids to be mad without being mean), controlling impulses, dealing with stress, creating the internal motivation to set and reach big and small goals, and creating organizational skills to reach those goals.
3. Social Awareness
Do kids know how to interact with peers around them in socially acceptable and positive ways?
This includes celebrating and appreciating diversity and differences, respecting other people’s thoughts/beliefs/values, belongings, and personal space, showing empathy and compassion towards others, and seeing things from different perspectives.
4. Relationship Skills
Can kids interact with, work with, and deal with other people in positive ways?
This includes communicating with others effectively, dealing with conflicts or issues in appropriate ways, learning how to be a good friend and a good teammate, standing up to bullying behaviors, and cooperating and using teamwork.
5. Decision-Making Skills
Do kids understand the consequences of their actions and make decisions accordingly?
This includes understanding cause and effect when making big and small decisions and understanding that their decisions will have a positive or negative outcome/consequence, problem-solving, and reflecting on their decisions to evaluate their behavior/decisions.
Research has shown that social emotional learning curriculum and concepts:
- help reduce bullying behaviors in schools
- create a safe learning environment for all students
- improves academic success and even test scores
- increases students’ emotional intelligence which decreases outbursts, meltdowns/tantrums, etc.
- improves school attendance
- reduces behavior issues
- builds a positive classroom environment and school culture
- encourages kindness, empathy, compassion and helpfulness
We can use these Social Emotional Learning 180 Daily Questions to start conversations with kids about all of these.
More Social Emotional Learning Resources for Teachers:
Social Emotional Learning and kindness can not be taught in a week.
Related: Why Kindness Week Doesn’t Work and What to Do Instead.
But it can be taught if we focus on it every day, in small ways: conversations, activities, lessons, and positive reinforcement.
You can use these Social Emotional Learning Resources to make kindness a habit for your students in an easier way:
Acts of Kindness Linkshttps://coffeeandcarpool.com/acts-of-kindness-links-paper-chain-to-celebrate-kindness/
Emergent Reader Kindness Bundle
Monthly Social Emotional Learning Curriculum
Kindness Games for your Classroom
Year of Kind or Unkind Sorts- Games for Centers
How to Use the Social Emotional Learning 180 Daily Questions:
To use these SEL Questions at School:
1. Purchase and download the 180 questions.
2. Print out the version you wish to use on colorful paper: the sheet of questions, square cards to hole punch or strips for a jar.
3. Cut apart the cards, hole punch them and put them on a ring; or cut apart the strips and put them in a jar and pull one a day.
4. Ask your students these questions during your Morning Meeting, or when you have a few extra minutes in your day.
Related: How to Teach SEL During Morning Meetings
5. Write the question on your white board or bulletin board as a passive “Just ponder about it” kind of question.
6. Use these questions as journal entries for writing practice.
To use these Kindness Questions at Home:
1. Purchase and download the 180 questions.
2. Print out the version you wish to use on colorful paper: the sheet of questions, square cards to hole punch or strips for a jar.
3. Cut apart the cards, hole punch them and put them on a ring; or cut apart the strips and put them in a jar and pull one a day.
4. Ask your kids these questions at a family meal or chatting in the car or when you tuck them in.
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