Proud To Be ME!

If there is one thing that I hope that I can accomplish as a school counselor, it is to have students embrace themselves and be proud of who they are and what makes them unique and special. I can remember back to elementary school when I wanted to have all the coolest clothes and be a part of the popular fads. Being different was scary. I never want my kids to feel like they should be scared to be different or to be interested in unique hobbies and activities. Addressing the importance of being unique is something that I try to do across the grade levels in one way or another.

In third grade, we recently completed an adapted version of the "The Crayon Box That Talked" lesson that I blogged about earlier this year in my "Bibliotherapy...What is THAT?!" post here. For this lesson, I take two versions of the same picture (I chose to draw a spring like scene with flowers and sunshine and green grass since we officially have Spring FEVER here in the Northeast). One version of the picture is drawn in black and white and the other version of the picture is all different colors. This segues into a discussion about which picture is more exciting. Typically, all students choose the colored picture. We talk about how boring life would be if we were all exactly the same, just like the black and white picture was boring. Next, I read the story, which is a really a poem that was expanded into a short children's book. After discussing the message, how each crayon brings something special to the completed picture, we talk about that in terms of the classroom. Each student represents a crayon, and without each and every one of them, the classroom picture wouldn't be complete.

The final part of this activity is to create your own unique hand print. Each student traces their hand, and on each finger writes an interest, something that they like, or something that they feel makes them unique. Then, they can decorate it however they choose to show their individuality. Once all of the hands are decorated and cut out, students are invited to share. At the end, I collect each of the hands and glue them onto a ribbon to be hung up somewhere in the school.