The Teaching of Wellness – SECONDARY Instructional Strategies and Activities #1

This post starts a new series of secondary instructional strategies and activities that can be integrated into units of study and class cultures.

• Character Day – Find ways to participate and elaborate on the activities offered for this annual event.

• Game Cards – There are multiple pathways to follow in creating your cards to employ them in various activities. A starter set could be your definition cards. The Institute of Positive Education provides cards with activities that students can try.

• Sketchnoting to Paint the Strength Picture – Guide your students to make visible their self-understanding of how they currently engage with each strength. A secondary activity is to have your students sketch out new ways they can exercise each strength. We know that going from thinking about ideas to then make them visible often leads to taking action with the ideas. The first step to this strategy is to teach your students about sketchnoting. You will find applications of this tool across all areas of your curriculum. 🙂 Students can take pictures of their sketches to upload them to SeeSaw to then explain their thinking.

• Strength Chart – Teachers have lots of ways to bring the strengths into the language and culture of their classrooms. Patrick connects to the SSIS core values by having the names of students on small sticky labels that he places on the core values poster. He sticks the student name by the value on the chart in the following ways that are adapted here for the strengths. One technique is for students who want the class to support his/her effort to grow a strength to have his/her name placed beside the designated strength(s). A second strategy is for teachers to verbally highlight students who are applying the strength at the moment in class. The teacher then puts the student’s name by the strength on the chart.

Image Sources: Character Day | Game Cards | Sketchnoting | Strength Chart