FAQ

Yes! The authors used both CASEL’s five core competencies and subskills that the Easel Project used to evaluate SEL programming and embedded them into the lessons.

a. Themes/Skillsets:

There are seven themes/skillsets for each age range. These themes were derived from children’s expressions of kindness, worldwide, not a curriculum writer sitting in a cubical somewhere! The authors did not manipulate these categories, so the very basis for each lesson comes from children.

b. Lesson Format:

Each age-range has four lessons for each theme/skillset. The lessons are broken down into the time segments which helps teaching in the moment to occur:

1. Mini Kindness Boost: 5-10 minutes,
2. Kindness Boost: 10-20 minutes,
3. Super Kindness Boost: 20-30 minutes,
4. Kindness Immersions: 15 minutes a day for 1-4 weeks or a large pocket of time like 90 minutes in length.

c. Multicultural/Diverse/International Learning Examples:

Children are naturally curious about other children so engagement in these lessons is very high because each lesson includes kindness ideas from children all over the world. Exposing students to other children who are similarly aged, but different than they are, is vital in helping students expand their GLOBAL thinking about HUMANITY.

d. Leveraging Student Voice:

Because all learners are heard and participate in deciding what kindness actions the class will take, the actions and the learning of the students is therefore reflective of the diverse thoughts and cultures represented that learning community. It is very hard to do with other available curricula. And, just in case the teacher does not have time or needs a mental picture for how each lesson could go, we also developed a complete lesson for the teacher to follow or alter as needed.

e. Completely Project Based:

Every lesson is completed as an action, in the moment. This element is unlike typical SEL curricula where concepts are often taught in isolation using role-play, a mock scenario, or a worksheet. Students are actively engaged in hands-on learning and “doing” in every lesson.

f. Critical Thinking:

Each lesson concludes with robust conversations using higher order thinking questions as prompts. This is where the real learning takes place because robust conversations create strong learning connections in the brain which reinforces the new skills. Young people tend to learn in silos, so overtly connecting the kindness actions with the positive feelings they experienced being kind, is critical.

g. Participation Rubrics:

Student learning is measured based on the teachers’ observation of the students’ level of engagement, via a participation rubric. When students are fully engaged, they are not only learning, but they are fully experiencing the emotional impact of the lesson. Measuring student growth in social and emotional learning is very hard to quantify, therefore, most SEL curricula do not have authentic ways to measure student success.

These curricula are supplementary because they do not explicitly teach all the possible SEL skills. Educators using these curricula have indicated that the curriculum does cover many of the SEL skills that other, mainstream curriculum does not teach, especially since it all hands-on, project-based learning, and, because of the way these curricula are written, other subject matter skills are honed. As the lessons unfold in these curricula, students and teachers are taken on a ‘kindness journey’, that when done with fidelity helps bullies and children who struggle with emotion management to change. However, the materials do not teach explicit skills, for example, coping strategies a student may need to calm down when they are angry.

The authors of these curricula wrote these lessons to help educators, worldwide, develop kindness skills in their students and school communities. This is a research-based curriculum that has been tested in twelve countries, including the United States. Based on feedback from the test, the curriculum was refined to better meet the needs of teachers and children. The process of creating and refining these curricula is a lot like a small batch food company where all the elements are coming from two consistent voices with deep experience and expertise in research as well as educational practices. The authors offer this curriculum free of charge because it helps teaching and learning, worldwide.

Yes! We work with educational staff to provide all the skills they need in order to implement these curricula and more importantly, we facilitate learning about the research on which all of these lessons is based.

Start with reaching out to us using the email address on this website: [email protected]. Please introduce yourself, providing your name, school, and country you live. Please also indicate grade level you teach if you are a teacher, or your other position at the school, and reasons that make you feel interested in contacting us. Expect an enthusiastic response within the next 24-48 hours depending on the time of the day/year.