Engaging Grade 4's to explore how to build good relationships

In this post I reflect on the first lesson with the Primary School Grade 4 class. Something surprising happened right at the end that enabled significant learning.

Aim of lesson: to orient a class of primary students to a project where they lead the school in building capacity and awareness around building good relationships.

After thinking about the logistics of which class to engage with this project, the Principal, Sam, decided on working with the Grade 4’s. They come out of their Grade 3/4  and 4/5 classes each Tuesday afternoon to work with him. We decided we would team teach. We saw the first two sessions as fairly teacher-directed to help students gain an experience of the topic before opening up to their creativity and greater direction.

For the first session we had the intention of orienting the students to the project through focussing on the relationship of friendship and finding the positives about good friendships.  If we had time we intended to look at other types of relationships and the things that could go wrong with a relationship.

Setting the scene:

The combined class sat on the mat scrunched up with the grade 3’s in front of the interactive whiteboard. Sam showed 3 music videos about friends – Count on Me, You've got a friend in me from  Toy Story, and XXX – and some kids even sang along. After each video he asked students to reflect on what made a friendship. I was impressed at how articulate they were and their ability to pull out key concepts – trust, looking out for each other, it doesn’t matter what you do - your friend will be there. However,  there were some boys who were fidgeting and seemed less engaged.

Then I introduced the bigger project – "We are looking at how to build good relationships in the school and would like you to be the leaders in this and take other classes to celebrate a national day of action on the 20th March." Hands went up immediately  - “Are we going to lead the grade 6’s?” and there was a little trepidation/excitement about that.

Sam explained the next activity was to work in pairs to create a picture of two friends showing what good friendship was. Students would then write down the sort of things that help a friendship – how you might greet someone, smiling, type of conversation, what you might do. He then separated the girls and boys in two lines, put from lowest to highest height and then paired them off so that they would work outside friendship groups. What was interesting was that as soon as student pairs started drawing their characters and working out what to write they started having a real conversation with each other to find out more about each other. And then they captured this conversation on the drawing. Some also wrote more abstract ideas. Some wrote keys to explain the type of activity – movement, smiling, etc. I wonder how obvious all these things are to young kids? Do some need more practice in learning how to socialise with new people?

We then got the students to share their drawing with another pair and discuss. They could write down ideas that they got from the other pair on their drawing. Then we put the drawings in a big circle and each group moved around to another drawing for about 1 minute each. We invited students to respectfully add something to the drawing of another pair if they felt it was missing something or they could value-add it. A check-in with the students showed they were nervous about giving over control to others on writing on their work so we reinforced that it needed to be respectful. They did this about 4 times before coming into a closing circle.

Sam watched for a while and said he was really pleased with the way the students were doing this activity – it was the first time they had experienced it. Then he was called out of the room.

The surprising learning moment

I pulled the students into a group on the floor for a closing reflection and asked what they noticed as a result of doing the activity. There were a few comments, then one boy said “I notice that some people don’t think the same way to me.”

“Oh,” I said, thinking this was a great comment, and thinking about the value of an exercise that helps students to see different perspectives.

Then  another person said the same thing.

“Can you give an example?” I asked.

“Well,” said the boy, "Someone has written on my sheet,  'You’re not a nice person.' I don’t understand why they would think that would help to make a friend.”

“And someone has written something similar on mine.”

“And mine.”

“And this person has made my person vomit.”

Deep breath. “Ah,” I say,  thinking fast about what it might mean to use a restorative justice approach here, “That isn’t very nice. That is not respectful. How do you feel about having that on your work?”

A girl who is not affected starts by giving me an abstracted impression of the situation. I ask her to pause and say in another way. “What might be one word to describe your feelings now – those that are directly affected?” The first boy says “Disgusted.” Then others say – sad, disappointed, sick, angry. I notice one boy, who I suspect might have done it, shifting around.

I then say, “Perhaps who did it might like to own up, if not now, later.” And wondering if I am using the right language. Sam comes back in the room and I summarise for him and the students again. He looks at the class and reinforces this is not a good thing, it isn’t respectful behaviour,  and that he will wait after class if anyone wants to come forward. The boy who I suspect,  does come forward, and explains  to Sam that he didn’t know that the others would take his actions that way. I wonder if he really doesn’t know. What is his capacity for empathy? Did hearing the students speak about their feelings make any impact? What was the value of this for the class and how to follow up?

It is interesting that a situation like this can put you on a spot or can be turned around into a learning moment. In reflecting on the language I used, I realise that we all bring a whole lot of language and baggage to the words we use and that moving to and modelling a restorative paradigm for each interaction is something one has to practice and be vigilant about.  I build on this with the students in the following lesson by asking them to reflect from the perspective of those harmed and the one who harmed - What do you hope for?

What would you hope for as a positive outcome for these students in this circumstance?