Whether you’re teaching or , there are simple ways to weave social-emotional learning activities into your routine. The activities below are broken down by age group, with a focus on five core competencies: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making.

Practical Social-Emotional Learning Activities

Kindergarten – 2nd Grade

At this age, it is essential to present information clearly and straightforwardly for students to understand. So, this might mean instead of using terms like “” and “self-awareness,” children may look at pictures of feelings, use hands-on activities, or, through examples they can see, touch, or relate to. Visuals, repetition, and modeling within social-emotional learning activities will help students understand what those feelings mean. Here are a few simple ways to start.

Feelings Check-In

Start your morning with a . Use a fun emoji chart where students can point to how they are feeling, or make a bulletin board where students can move their clothespin to the emoji or face they are feeling at that moment.

Mindful Breathing

A fun way to introduce young kiddos to mindful breathing – a great way to regulate emotions is to give each child a stuffed animal (or bring in their favorite). Have them lie on the floor and place their stuffed animal on their belly, and show them how the animal goes up and down as they breathe calmly.

Kindness Jar

Catch kindness in action by adding marbles to a kindness jar anytime you catch someone helping a friend or using kind words. When the jar is full, the class gets a reward. This helps kids see the impact of their actions on others.

Mirror Talk

Have students practice positive self-talk in the mirror. Use simple phrases like “I am a good friend” or “I can keep trying.” They’ll giggle at first, but over time, it helps build confidence.

Grades 3-5

Upper elementary students are at the age where you can build on their understanding because they are now able to think a little deeper. This is the age when kids begin to look at situations from someone else’s point of view and are open to talking about their choices and the consequences that come from those choices.

Daily Problem Solvers

Each day, present a simple scenario and talk through it as a class. “You and your friend want the same swing at recess. What can you do?”  or “You and your friend each want to play something different. What do you do?” Let students brainstorm solutions and discuss what’s fair and respectful.

Emotion Charades

Write different feelings on slips of paper and have students act them out while the rest of the class guesses. It’s a fun way to practice recognizing emotions and talking about what those emotions might look or feel like.

Circle

End the day or week with a gratitude circle. Go around and have each student say one thing they’re thankful for. For example, kids may say, “I am thankful for my friends” or “I am thankful for not having homework yesterday”. It’s quick, calming, and a great way to focus on the positive, even if it’s something silly like being grateful for not having homework.

Goal-Setting Journals

Have students write one personal goal each week, along with a simple plan to reach it. For example, kids might say, “My goal for the week is to read five picture books, and my plan to reach it is to read one book each night before bed.” They can reflect on how it went at the end of the week. This supports both self-awareness and responsible decision-making.

Middle School

Middle school students are at a time in their lives where they are trying to navigate friendships, dealing with peer pressure, and those ever-changing emotions. They crave connection even though it may be hard to see that. They want to be understood and need a safe space to talk about their feelings. That’s why it’s so important to keep your open-ended and respectful. Here are a few activities that can make a big difference.

What Would You Do Scenarios

Create discussion cards with realistic social scenarios. Then talk through the options and consequences without judgment. Here are a few examples:

• Your friend is talking badly about another classmate behind their back and wants you to join in. What do you do?
• A friend texts you something mean about another friend. What do you do?
• You notice a classmate getting bullied in the hallway. Other students are watching, but no one is stepping in. What do you do?

Mindful Minute

Middle schoolers get stressed, just like we do. Give them a chance to reset with a mindful minute. Turn off the lights, play calming music, and ask them to close their eyes and focus on their breathing. This is something you can do in each class because it only takes one minute.

Identity Collages

Have students create a collage about who they are. Include things they value, like the people they care about, or any goals they have. This encourages reflection and helps students celebrate their individuality.

Group Challenges

Try quick group challenges that require collaboration, like building a tower with straws or solving a riddle together. Debrief afterward to discuss how they communicated and worked as a team.

High School

While this is the age when students are still figuring out who they are and where they fit into the world, it’s also a great age to talk about the big stuff like responsibility and the choices they make, and how they affect them.

Life Skills

Have open conversations about stress, relationships, and conflict. Keep it real and use prompts like “How do you handle a disagreement with a friend?” or “What helps you when you’re feeling overwhelmed?” Give students the space and time to talk and share.

Journaling

Give weekly prompts like “What does respect mean to you?” or “Describe a time you stood up for something you believed in.” The goal is to help them process their thoughts.

Peer Shout-Outs

Let students recognize each other for positive actions. Set up a space where they can write anonymous shout-outs like “Thanks to Brady for helping me study” or “I noticed Reece included someone who was sitting alone.” This is a great way to build community.

Future You Letters

Ask students to write a letter to their future self. Where do they want to be in five years? What do they hope they’ve learned? It’s a powerful way to tie SEL to goal setting and self-awareness.

You can see that all you need to teach social-emotional learning is just a few minutes a day to help your students feel seen, heard, and supported.

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What is Social-Emotional Learning?

(SEL) focuses on developing interpersonal skills necessary for building relationships in and outside of school. It begins with a focus on self-awareness and knowing one’s own emotional cues. Once students understand their own emotions, they can learn to recognize others’ feelings and develop empathy. In an attempt to enhance these skills, schools are realizing the need to embed social and emotional skills within the curriculum.

The Importance of Teaching Empathy and Kindness

While the vision and mission of schools may differ, the goal of educating students is to prepare them for life, including becoming productive citizens in the global workforce. For this reason, it is vital that students begin at an early age to develop the skills necessary for building relationships and resolving conflicts. This starts by teaching children to understand emotions, how they drive their actions, and ways the students can self-regulate to be more productive. Once students grasp their own feelings, they are able to apply that knowledge to others.

Empathy is the ability to understand the emotions of another person. Because it is human nature to be self-centered, students must be taught to empathize. According to Stephen Young, a research scientist at the Center for Creative Leadership, there are three types of empathy.

• Affective empathy: Allows people to experience similar emotions as others are experiencing. An example would be feeling sad when another person experiences a sad event in their life, such as loss of a loved one.
• Behavioral empathy: Reacting with verbal and nonverbal behaviors that demonstrate an understanding for others’ thoughts and feelings. An example would be spontaneously clapping when a classmate accomplished a difficult task.
• Cognitive empathy: Enables people to understand others’ thoughts and feelings. An example would be knowing that a friend feels pain when she drops a heavy book on her foot.

Once students begin to develop empathy, they can learn ways to express kindness to build relationships with peers and adults. Kindness is doing something to make someone happy or to help them and expecting nothing in return. Students will soon discover that kind acts and empathy will help them to work cooperatively and make responsible decisions which leads to productive problem solving.

How to Teach Kindness and Empathy through Social-Emotional Learning

It is probably easy to understand why schools are adding SEL to their curriculum, but the strategies for teaching students empathy and kindness can be more difficult. Because each stage of development comes with its own sense of personal awareness and connections, teachers will want to address SEL for each age group strategically.

Pre-school and Early Elementary School

At this age, students will need to focus on self-awareness. Before they are able to relate to others, students need to be able to identify their own emotions and understand what generates those feelings. Teachers will want to acknowledge acts of kindness specifically by stating, “That was kind of you to share your crayons.” Likewise, teachers can label what caused the feeling by making statements such as, “I am sure you were frustrated when you lost your shoe, but didn’t you feel happy when you found it in the cubby?”

As students begin to develop a language for their emotions, the teacher can emphasize empathy by acknowledging and modeling empathetic gestures. Thinking aloud, a teacher might model this by saying, “I am sure you will be happy if I share my cookie with you. I know we both like these.” Soon, students will be using these strategies with their peers in an effort to develop friendships and strengthen relationships.

Upper Elementary and Middle School

As students grow in understanding their own emotions and triggers, social emotional learning standards can be taught through a classroom culture that focuses on kindness. When students see respect, empathy, and kindness modeled, they are more likely to respond in similar ways; but it is not enough to just model social and emotional skills, these must be strategically and continually taught. This can be done through collaboration, where students are coached and guided through working with others in small groups.

Activities that allow students to actively listen and respond to a peer can further develop SEL skills. It is also important that the social emotional learning activities allow students to discuss how their emotions affect others, both positively and negatively. Participation in feeling surveys may be an effective tool to prompt discussion on the impact of one’s actions. Knowing how one person influences another’s feelings is a very important leadership trait. Likewise, it will enhance students’ abilities to communicate effectively.

High School

As students begin to mold their true personalities and look toward developing future goals, it is time SEL focuses on building healthy relationships and resolving conflicts successfully. One way this can be done is by studying book characters who make good and bad choices and discussing the results of those decisions.

Another way to teach social and emotional skills at this age is through peer interactions. As students become involved in clubs and extra-curricular activities, these are great opportunities for sponsors to further develop SEL. These more intimate group settings provide occasions for adults to teach strategies for self-regulation and managing behaviors as they affect others’ ability to maintain composure.

Social-Emotional Learning prepares students to navigate through a stressful and fast-paced society.

By continually spiraling SEL for students throughout their educational years, teachers are able to help students see the correlation between better behaviors and success. Through these lessons, students will develop empathy and be able to express kindness through strategies that will allow them to flourish throughout school and in .

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