Welcome Back to School!: Interactive Teaching Resources for the Classroom and Beyond

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CDE has compiled resources that students and staff can use as they return to school this Fall.

For All Grades

  • Three SEL Practices for Every Day: Explore 3 SEL practices that can be used everyday. The article includes includes cue questions for reflection and suggestions for looking forward/goal setting. 
  • Calm Schools Initiative: Calm.com is offering its mindfulness training tools to every teacher for free. Simply sign up and any teacher will get free access to Calm’s paid subscription service content. 
  • Worry Jar: Try using the Worry Jar as an activity to helps students mindfully identify their worries and give themselves permission to shift their focus away from them for a while. 
  • SMART Goals: Learn new strategies in the article, How to do Goal Setting with your Students This School Year. The article relates goal-setting to literature and includes worksheets and a guide to SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and trackable) goal-setting. 

For Elementary

  • Talking in Class: This article from Edutopia provides strategies for developing confident speakers who can share their thoughts and learning while feeling respected and important. 
  • Inclusive Get-to-Know-You Questions: To help you get to know your students, Panorama Education curated 101 asset-based, inclusive questions. Most are open-ended questions, but can also be adapted into a multiple-choice format. 
  • Building Community with Friendly Fridays: This article from Edutopia provides a variety of activities designed to build strong relationships, strengthen emotion regulation, and have fun. 

For Middle & High School

  • Thirteen Powerful SEL Activities: This article from Edutopia provides thirteen different activities that can be done in the middle and high school classroom. Examples include meditation activities and an activity entitled, “appreciation, apology, aha”. 
  • Virtual Wellness Center: Visit the Grange Middle School’s website for an example of a Virtual Wellness Center. 
  • Anti-Bullying Pledge: Get students to pledge to help create a world without bullying through kindness, acceptance, and inclusion. The Pacer website has numerous activities to accompany the pledge.
  • Inclusiveness Lesson — Identity Circles: This resource supports students’ understanding of personal identity and how that can support connections to others. 
  • Mix it Up Lunchtime: Mix It Up at Lunch Day presents a great, low-stakes opportunity for students to engage with one another and cross some common social boundaries. With options for all grade levels, these activities will build empathy, encourage acceptance and teamwork, address the value of differences and help students break down cliques and eliminate intolerance. 
  • Promoting positive relationships: This resource on promoting positive relationships includes a lesson plan template and teaching resources. The Promoting Positive Relationships lesson allows students to explore the quality of a relationship with another person and factors which can affect relationships. 

For Staff