Self-Affirmation- Fourth Grade Girl’s Group

I love elementary school girl’s groups. They are
always such a challenge. Girls are dynamic, you have to tread lightly with them.
They are hard on each other, on themselves and they feel everything so deeply. Validation
from their friends is so important at this age. Most of them do not validate
themselves and cheer themselves on in positive ways. I love changing their
mindsets and self-images. It is awesome to be the one that gets to help them become
open to the possibility of loving themselves.

This was my goal with my fourth grade girl’s
group; to help them build their confidence and learn how to love themselves.  In six short weeks, we did just that.

Self-Affirmation Activity Pack 


Week One:

We spent some time getting to
know each other. We introduced ourselves, told three fun facts and chit chatted
as a group. We established norms and took the time for everyone to become comfortable
with one another. It was the perfect time for me to decide if the members were
all a good fit for the group and each other. Luckily, they all clicked
instantly. Once everyone was introduced and comfortable, we played with our
Self Affirmation Conversation Cube.

Each girl took a turn rolling
the cube and answering the question they landed on. Examples of the questions are: “What is a compliment? Can you give us an example?”.

“How often do you compliment
others? Can you give us an example?”

“What do you like about
yourself?”

It was the perfect icebreaker
to get the girls thinking about themselves and how they treat other girls. We
ended with all of the girls stating their favorite part about our time
together.

Week Two:

We started by reviewing our group norms. It is
super important to me that the members of my groups show each other respect and
feel comfortable opening up. I like to remind all members that this is supposed
to be a safe place, but that it can only be as safe as we all make it. We then
talked about our high and low for the week. It was awesome watching the girls congratulate
each other on their highs and cheer each other up and offer advice for the lows.
Even just being in this group seems to be changing their mindset.

I wanted to dive deeper into our conversation
about loving ourselves and treating other girls with respect. We utilized some
conversation cards and had some really interesting discussions about the
questions. The cards include statements such as, “What about yourself
makes you most proud” and “What are you best at when it comes to
school?”

I learned a lot about each girl based on which
questions they could answer quickly and which gave them some trouble.

Discussion Cards

I store the cards on a keyring just to keep
better track of them. When the girls came, I took them off the ring, put them
face down in a messy pile on the table and let them choose a card one by one.
The girl whose turn it is picked a card, read it out loud, answered the
question, and then we talked about it as a group and each group member was able
to answer the question (unless they chose not to or did not feel comfortable
for some reason).

At the end of our time together, each girl said
their favorite part about our time together and something that will stick with
them when they leave.

Week Three:

After going over group norms
and our highs and lows of the week, we started talking about self-affirmations.
I bound a bunch of self-affirmation posters together to create a “Throw
Compliments around like Confetti” book.

We looked at each page and
talked about if it was something that we currently say to ourselves, something
we should say to ourselves or if it was something that personally we wouldn’t say
to ourselves.

If it was something they
would say to themselves, they wrote them down on the worksheet I provided so
that they could refer back to them to practice pumping themselves up.

To close out the session, we
talked about what we learned and I had them each pick their favorite self-affirmation
statement. Once they left, I printed those in poster form and hung them in my
office so they would see them the next time they came in.


Week Four:

They just about have the group norms memorized
and can repeat them to me without even looking at them. They started telling
their highs and lows to the group without prompting. They’ve bonded quite well
together.

This session we build upon last week’s lesson
and made our very own mini self-affirmation booklets. I gave them the printed
sheets. They cut apart the individual statements and decided to order them in
their booklets based on how important the statement was to them. It was so fun
listening to them talk about and think about how each statement applies to them
and their life. “Do I need to tell myself I’m awesome more often? Yeah, that
one’s definitely going in the front.” I was pleased they were taking it so
seriously.

We bound the books with keyrings (next time I would
use ribbon) and they decided to keep the books nearby for days they are feeling
down. They said they can flip through the book and repeat the statements to
themselves when they need a little boost.

As always, we ended the session by discussing
what we learned and our biggest takeaway from the lesson.


Week Five:
After norms and high/lows, we dove into our foldable activity. I love this
thing. You print the pages double sided but must set your printer to flip on
the SHORT side. If you don’t, it will print all wacky and won’t fold correctly.
To save time, I premade the foldables for them and watched in amusement as they
tried to figure out what was so special about it.

Affirmation Foldable

They were mystified when I showed them the secret compartment. If you push
the foldable into a W shape, slide your finger in between the two center flaps
and pull so it lays flat, it reveals a secret compartment.  They loved that they could fold, hide and
manipulate which of their personal answers were showing.

We only got about 2/3 done with the foldable when we ran out of
time. We talked about what we learned and what will stick with us the most and
then they all happily went back to class.

Week Six:

We closed out our group by reviewing all we have learned and
discussing the impact this group had on us. I was thrilled that they all felt
like they had learned so much. I could feel it, the girls had changed. They were
loving and respecting themselves much more than they had. I’d call this a
successful small group and time very well spent.

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