Our two counselors, Ajarn Arabella and Ajarn Amandine, went into Grade 5 to discuss the impact of mean words on our hearts, and to foster teamwork! The students engaged in a mixture of activities, videos and play and seemed, at times, moved.

One of the activities consisted of crumpling up a piece of paper and inviting the students to stomp on it and call it names. Some students came forward and participated. One of the counselors unfolded the paper afterward and encouraged the students to try and smooth it out, trying to get it back to its original condition. She apologized to the paper and asked if any students wanted to do the same. The lesson was in realizing that, even though they said they were sorry and tried to fix the paper, there were still scars left behind which would never go away no matter how hard they tried to fix it. The students were asked to compare it to bullying and to recognize that some of their words and actions can create damage to someone else’s heart.

They then participated in Hoola Hoop activities which consisted of working as a team to bring the Hoola Hoops down to the ground. The students were asked at first to make sure other students were doing the activity correctly and to give each other feedback if they weren’t. This resulted in terrible outcomes and lots of frustration! The students were then asked to do the same activity focusing only on their hands and their part of the Hoola Hoop. The results were dramatic; the time it took for the group to be successful was much faster than the first time!

The lesson learned was that we do better in teams when we focus on our part of the work instead of policing others!
Great job Grade 5!