LES Life Skills Virtual Lesson 1: Expressing Anxiety and Learning to Cope
One part of the South Carolina Comprehensive School Counseling and Career Guidance Model is School Counseling Core Curriculum – This curriculum consists of structured lessons designed to help students attain the desired competencies and to provide all students with the knowledge, attitudes, and skills appropriate for their developmental level. The ASCA Mindsets & Behaviors for Student Success: K-12 College- and Career Readiness for every student describe the knowledge, skills and attitudes students need to achieve academic success, college and career readiness and social/emotional development.
The LES Counselors provide these lessons throughout the school year. Even though we are not currently in our school buildings, we want to continue providing these lessons. Our first lesson will help students identify the things that cause them to feel anxious or worried and offers some coping strategies to help deal with unpleasant feelings in an ok way! The idea is to keep our unpleasant thoughts and feelings from turning into bigger worries or fears that become overwhelming to the point of feeling out of control. Parents, you can follow these step-by-step lesson instructions and activities.
Lesson 1: Expressing Anxiety and Learning to Cope (provided by Centervention.com)
Mindset Standard 1. Belief in development of whole self, including a healthy balance of mental, social/emotional and physical well-being
Behavior Standard-Self Management Skill 5. Demonstrate perseverance to achieve long- and short-term goals
Behavior Standard-Self Management Skill 6. Demonstrate ability to overcome barriers to learning
Behavior Standard-Self Management Skill 7. Demonstrate effective coping skills when faced with a problem
Prep: Print both worksheets for your child and hand out the first one titled "Fill Up Your Worry Cup"
Prompt: Start a conversation with your child about worry. Explain how we all have things we worry about, they may be big or small, and they may make us feel uneasy. Let them know those feelings of worry can creep up on us, and it helps to talk about them. Let's take a few minutes today to think about things we worry about. *Give your child some writing time* After they have written down a few examples, you can discuss the examples.
Next: Hand out the square breathing worksheet. Explain to your child this is like a tool in our toolbox that we can take out when we feel anxious or worried. Review the instructions with your child and do the exercise together.
Give your child some other examples of calming/coping skills: * imagine your favorite place * picture the people you care about * take a break (a walk around)
