Thursday, September 13, 2012

I have a book for that!

In classroom guidance and groups, I love to use picture books.  It must be the teacher in me, since I got a teaching degree in addition to my counseling degree!  :)  I thought I would share with you some of my favorite books that you might not have heard of:


Amber on the Mountain by Tony Johnston--a great book about perseverance.  I love that it has to do with perseverance in the academic domain since the main character perseveres to learn to read and write.

If Everybody Did by Jo Ann Stover--a book with funny illustrations that talks about responsibility for your actions.  The book discusses what would happen if everybody was too loud, slammed the door, made a mess, etc.  We then talk about how great things would be if everybody did the right thing!

It's Hard to Be a Verb! by Julie Cook--I love me some Julie Cook and this book is a favorite.  A great book to teach self-control for those kiddos who are wiggly.  Another favorite by this author is My Mouth is a Volcano (a great book about interrupting/blurting out in class).  Her books are great because they are rhymy and fun to read and listen to, and have interesting illustrations.

Not Everyone is Nice by Frederick Alimonti--love using this book for stranger safety.  Some of the books on this topic seem to scare the kids, and I like the way this one presents the information in a non-frightening manner.

Me Jane by Patrick McDonnell--a book about Jane Goodall.  I use this book to talk about interests and future careers.  It is so cool because the book is about a real person, and even includes pictures and drawings from when she was a little girl!

Ordinary Mary's Extraordinary Deed by Emily Pearson--a book about spreading kindness. Mary does something nice, and then it spreads from person to person till there were 6,103,515,625 kind deeds THAT ALL BEGAN WITH MARY DOING SOMETHING KIND!!  This book is good for integrating some math skills also.  I use this book with my Peace Club lessons that I shared in my first post.
 

So these are a few of my favorite counseling books.  What are some of your favorites?

And I am not done with this list.  Check back for my next post when I will share more great books!







Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Welcome to my blog!

Welcome to my blog! 


 One of my favorite things to do is search the web for new and exciting ideas to use on the job (yes, I am a little nerdy that way) :).  Some of my favorite resources are counseling blogs and Pinterest.  Since I have been doing this job for quite a while (13 years, but who's counting!), I think I have developed some pretty good ideas, practices and resources.  So I got to thinking that a blog of my own might be a great way to share.  I hope you will check back often to see my latest resources, and to share some of your own!!!


One of my favorite units  is Peace Club.  It is a conflict resolution program that was developed by a former coworker.  It's such a fun way to teach conflict resolution!  The kids love it, the teachers and parents love it, and the kids learn 12 awesome ways to solve problems with their classmates.  I hope you love it as much as I do!









Handouts and lesson plans can be found on my school webpage HERE
so check it out!