Lesson Plans on Self Esteem:
How to Help Your Students Build Self Esteem
In our years of working with elementary and middle schools through Boost Kids educators have often discussed the great need they see in developing a healthy self-esteem in their students. They see students struggling to develop the social and character “know-how” to build self-esteem and they are searching for tangible solutions to this problem. For many of them the difficulty they have encountered in addressing this question is found in two areas. First, the increased academic 
pressure placed on schools due to the growing emphasis on standardized testing rendered these types of programs to the peripheral of importance. Areas such as reading and math have taken on the highest priorities leaving little room or time for specific programs on self-esteem development. Secondly, they have struggled in locating a simple and effective set of lessons plans on self-esteem development. Educators are highly interested in lesson plans on self-esteem but finding a curriculum that would fit into their busy classroom agendas and requirements is not easy.
The struggles educators go through to make self-esteem development a part of the school experience for students is one of the foundational motivations for the development of Boost Kids. We heard the cries of parents concerned about their child’s self-esteem development as well as the educators searching for an effective answer to this same issue in their students. Through these experiences Boost Kids was developed to provide parents and especially educators with a simple set of lesson plans on self-esteem.
What Does Boost Kids Teach?
The focus of Boost Kids is based around preparation and skill development in boosting self-esteem. Throughout life students will face many challenges and obstacles as well as accomplishments and successes. It is vitally important they are equipped with the understanding to productively deal with these situations. When a student can independently handle a situation, overcome a challenge facing them, and successfully remove an obstacle in the way their self-esteem will grow. For most students entering their adolescent year’s new and unfamiliar social and character responsibilities pose one of life’s initial challenges and specifically preparing them for these challenges will help them build their self-esteem. When a student feels prepared and understands how to handle them selves socially, their anxieties and
inadequacies are more easily overcome. They have been given the skills they need and know what to do. This then allows them to independently handle the social situation in a productive and positive way. For this reason Boost Kids designates half of the lessons to specifically addressing people skills such as greeting people, eye contact, speaking clearly, smiling, telephone manners, and many others to prepare students for this new phase in life.
Boost Kids also focuses on the character development side of things to prepare students for the challenges they will face. Providing students with a strategy to fall back on as they encounter these issues is a crucial aid in supporting their self-esteem development. If they have already discussed these issues and productive ways to handle them they will be more likely to positively handle the situation helping to boost their self-esteem. In the Boost Kids lessons we discuss various character topics such as resisting peer pressure, being honest, respecting others, apologizing, saying “thank you”, handling being teased, and many more. This is done in an effort to make issues of character a self-esteem building opportunity for students.
How does Boost Kids Work?
In developing Boost Kids we strived to make the program as effective and fun as possible. Here are the various components used in the program.
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Boost Kids CD-ROM
The main component is an interactive CD-ROM containing video of various real life situations. The video first depicts the wrong way to handle a situation and then the right way. This video helps the students visually see the difference between the two approaches and how they might look in this situation. This real world reinforcement gives them a reference to draw from when they face a similar situation. The CD-ROM also contains a pre and post test to monitor the progress of the students. |
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Boost Activity Book
The second component of the program is the Activity Book. It contains a brief reading on each of the 28 topics in Boost Kids and fill-in-the-blank exercises to review what they have learned. All the skills and techniques are specifically laid out for the students to read from and refer back to when they face a related situation. |
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Boost Flash Cards
A third component is the Boost Flash Cards. Each topic has a flash card a student can review from to reinforce what they have learned through the other components. |
For educators the lesson plans on self-esteem provided by Boost Kids are very flexible. The materials can be used in many different ways depending on the needs of the teacher and the students. Boost Kids can be used on an individual basis. A teacher can assign a student certain lessons and have the student work at the computer and review lessons at their own pace. They can then read those assigned lessons in the Activity Book and do the fill-in exercises for the teacher to review and correct. This can be done at a time determined by the teacher. For example, each student could have a specific time once a week to work on it or a student who finishes an academic lesson early could also work on it at that time.
The Boost Flash Cards can also be an individual tool a teacher can use with a student. When a teacher sees a student struggling with one of the topics in Boost Kids the teacher can hand the student a flash card that pertains to their behavior and ask them to review it. For example, if a student forgot to say “thank you” to a classmate who gave them a piece of candy the teacher could hand the student the Say “Thank You” card and ask them to read over it.
The Boost Kids lesson plans are also designed for a group setting. The Boost Instructor Book is the resource a teacher would use to facilitate the group. The Instructor Book contains a very structured format from which a teacher could conduct the sessions. Each session is designed to cover one lesson and last for around forty-five minutes. There are a total of eight lessons so the program can be done once a week, twice a week, once a month, or whatever is best for the teacher. The instructor book can also be used in a less structured format. For example, a teacher could pick one topic instead of a whole lesson to cover in a day or week if they do not have the time allotted for a forty-five minute session and only had ten or fifteen minutes. The other materials needed for the facilitation of the group format would be the CD-ROM and Activity Books for students to read from.
In an effort to help educators address the issue of building self-esteem in their students Boost Kids developed a set of lesson plans on self-esteem specifically designed to address the needs of educators today. The lessons plans are simple, specific, flexible, interactive, and fun. They can be used in a traditional format where a teacher instructs the whole classroom for an allotted time or they can be used individually and injected at different times during the day with different students. Whatever the case may be Boost Kids is currently helping teachers across the country instill in their students the social and character skills they need to boost their self-esteem and I hope it can do the same for you.
How BoostKids Can Help:
BoostKids is a program that can help increase a child’s confidence by teaching social skills to children and building their character. BoostKids has been and is currently being taught in schools, non-profit organizations, and after-school programs. The program is now available as an at-home training program for children and their parents. The key training tool of the BoostKids program is an interactive CD-ROM that shows kids the right-way and the wrong-way to handle social situations. They learn from real kid actors in real-life scenerios!
For more information about what’s included in BoostKids, click here.
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By Charlie Copp - Executive Director of Boost Kids
About the author: Charlie Copp is the executive director for BOOST KIDS, an interactive CD ROM-based program for kids ages six and up, that teaching children social skills and strong character across the nation. His work with BOOST KIDS confirms what Copp has always believed: that kids and teens are hungry for character-building life skills, and with them gain the confidence needed to succeed in the classroom, on the playing field, in their interpersonal relationships, and on the job.
