Title: Belonging in our School

Grade Level: 3
Length of Lesson: 45 minutes
Lesson Number 1/3
Domain: Social Emotional
Standard: Create positive and supportive relationships with other students.
Common Core:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.3.1.B
Follow agreed-upon rules for discussions (e.g., gaining the floor in respectful ways, listening to others
with care, speaking one at a time about the topics and texts under discussion).

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.3.1.D
Explain their own ideas and understanding in light of the discussion.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.3.2
Determine the main ideas and supporting details of a text read aloud or information presented in diverse
media and formats, including visually, quantitatively, and orally.

Learning Objective: Students will be able to identify positive ways in which they belong in their school
and ways in which they can help their classmates feel like they belong.
Materials: foil stars, parent take home letter
Introduction (8min):
Say: What does it mean to belong? [Response] What are some groups or places you belong to?
[Response] (make a list) How do you know you belong to these places? [Response]

Say: So, we said that feeling like you belong means feeling included and found so many different places
and groups the different students in our classroom belong to. Now, let’s think about how it feels when
you don’t belong somewhere. How do you feel when you don’t belong or how do you think you would
feel if you didn’t belong somewhere? [Response]

Say: Right, a lot of these feelings that we just shared are not comfortable feelings and don’t make us feel
good. We want everyone to feel included and don’t want anyone to feel [example of response from
previous question].

Activity (20min):
Explain rules of activity to students: Each student will close their eyes and have a foil star put on their
forehead by the SC or teacher. Students may not peak or tell other students what color they have.
Students need to group themselves according to color of star without talking. You can help someone else
find where they belong my using body movements. When you find where you belong, sit down with
your group and assist others in locating their groups.

(2 students will get a blue star and one student will get a red star, consult with teacher first about who to
give those stars too- students who are more likely to participate and reflect)

Say: Now that everyone has a star on their forehead, it is time to find other people with the same color
stars as you. Remember, you may not talk, but you may use your body to help your classmates find their
colors. So, before we start, let’s all catch a bubble so we can’t talk!

After everyone is seated on the carpet with their group,

Say:
Gold stars: How hard was it to find where you belonged?
Green stars: How did you know you belonged in this group?
Silver stars: How did it feel to find other students with silver stars?
Blue stars: What it hard to find where you belonged? How did it feel to have 1 other person with you?
Red star: How did it feel to be the only student in the red star group? How could you tell you did not
belong in the other groups?

Ask the whole group: How do you think it would feel to be treated like the red star student? What are
some ways to include our classmates at our school so that they do not feel excluded, like the red star
student?

Conclusion (7min): Today we have discussed what is means to belong, how we belong to our school,
and how to include others in our school. What are some places you belong to outside of school?
[Response] (examples: church, soccer team, gymnastics club, camp) What are some of the groups we
belong to inside of our school? [Response] (examples: classroom, grade, running club, band, art club)
What are some ways that you can make other students feel like they belong at recess? [Response] During
circle time? [Response] On the bus? [Response]

Assessment (10min): To finish off our lesson we are going to pass this ball of yarn from student to
student. I want everyone to say one think that they learned today about including others. You can give an
example, say what it means to include others, or anything else that you learned. Students will throw the
ball of yarn across circle until it gets back to me.

Say: Great job everyone. Now we can all see with our web that we all belong in this classroom. We are
all connected. When you see someone being excluded, think of the ways you can make them feel like
they belong, because as you can see, we all belong.

Follow up:
Next time we meet, we will discuss similarities and differences we have with our classmates.