Alright, this could quite possibly be my favorite unit ever!  CHARACTER STRENGTHS AND VALUES.  Love it for  all the positive information it teaches kids about themselves and their families.  I mean really, you do have to love yourself before you can truly love others and this units helps the kids who may be struggling with confidence and self-esteem see all their amazing strengths they may have never known about themselves.  Here we go!!!!

Day 1:

1. Meditation or Journal topic: What are character strengths? What are some of your character strengths? (about half of the kids list strengths that aren’t character based at all… like I’m good at swimming, math, etc… some of them get it a bit, and a few actually nail it, dead on.)

 

2. Via Character Strengths Survey

Students will take the Via Character Strengths Survey to find out their top character strengths.  Once completed, have them download the document and save in their Health folder.

3.  Show Jacaranda video- compassion

Our school sends groups of high school kids every year, multiple times, to the Malawi Jacaranda school.  Great example of the value compassion and helping others plus many, many more!!!  Great for our middle school 8th graders to see what could be in their future in terms of service work.

 

Day 2 

1. Journal: Reflect on your top strengths from the VIA survey. Do you think they’re a good representation of who you are? Were there any that surprised you?

2. Have a discussion about their strengths

The students actually do a great job with this discussion. Some students got some character strengths they didn’t believe they had.  When they talked about this, other students would say comments like, “remember the time when you did this…” or “You do _____  all the time!”  Kids don’t understand that a character strength can go multiple ways when it comes to character strengths.

A couple examples:

One girl in my class had appreciation of beauty and excellence as her first character strength and didn’t understand why or how that could have happened.  This girl is a very well spoken girl who LOVES fashion.  A couple kids in the room said, “You have such style!  Of course that was your first character strength!”

One boy in my class couldn’t understand how Bravery was in his top 3 character strengths.  This is a boy who is very well liked and kind in his class, loves drama and  is a huge part of all the middle school plays.  One person called him out and said, “You are so brave for getting up on stage and performing in the plays!” Another one said, “Remember in 5th grade when you did _______???”  He finally came to realize that he did exemplify bravery in not just one way, but many different ways!

Sometimes all you need is a friend to remind you of your strengths!

3. Explain the character strengths project.  Student are now going to create a project an showing how they embody their top character strength. This project should be a true representation of them and their strength.  It could be anything to the creation a of song, to an IMoive to a “draw my character strength” depiction.

After they have created their project, they then will present themselves to the class, making sure to state how they embody their top strength, the importance of it in their life and specific ways they demonstrate and use their character strength on a regular basis.

Character Strength Rubric-F2015

 

Day 3

1. Meditation

2.  Character Strength Project Work time

Check in and conference with them about their projects

Day 4

1.  Journal: What have you learned about your self and your strengths during these last few health lessons?  Explain

2.  Character Strength Project Work time

      Before having the students complete their project, I make sure they refer back to the rubric to ensure they’ve meet the requirements. 

Day 5

1.  Meditate

2. Character Strength Project Workday

Day 6

Celebrate Strengths through PRESENTATIONS!!  (most likely will take 2 days).

 

Family Values Project

Day 1

show Kids videos on values.com