It was a sunny September day, years ago, and I had just kicked off the second week of my second year of teaching. I was riding the high of those days when everything just seems to go right—everything in its place, no nagging agenda notes or panicked phone calls, and I had even remembered to take attendance without any reminders. As I gathered my students at the bell, like Fraulein Maria would the Von Trapp family, a teacher approached me with one of my students, whose head couldn’t have hung lower if he tried.
"We had a little issue at recess. J tried to punch someone," she said.
After settling the students in, I had to mechanically smooth the furrow in my brow. I got down to J's teeny-tiny level and asked, "Can you tell me what happened outside?"
"Someone was being mean to my friend. We learned in class that hands are for helping, so I helped my friend, and I gave that guy a punch."
It took everything in me not to laugh in disbelief—that my teaching had led this sweet, sweet child to genuinely believe he was doing the right thing in the name of justice and friendship.
This event was pivotal in helping me assess how I was teaching friendship skills in my classroom. It's not enough to just co-create rules and have students sign them, and it's not enough to host one lesson and crown them the epitome of congeniality.
Primary students need to be explicitly and consistently taught how to be good friends, with numerous hands-on opportunities to showcase and practice what they know in action.
That's why I've created a hands-on and creative friendship skills unit to support positive relationship-building in your primary setting.
