2 What’s good in me – Affirmations
Learning for Peace by West Midlands Peacemakers explains that part of developing inner peace (peace with myself) is to ‘learn to affirm others and accept affirmation for themselves’ (Zammit & Hagel, 2016, p. 44). Affirmations help people see what’s good in themselves, something that is important for every member of the school community. In this session you will concentrate on children and young people, but you will return to wellbeing for educators in Session 6.
Learning to give and receive affirmations is most effective if it is a regular classroom activity as it takes time and practice to develop these skills.
Activity 2 Affirming myself
Here you’ll use the activity It’s good to be me from West Midlands Peacemakers as a starting point for working on affirmations. Read the activity and then think about how you might adapt it for the context in which you work, remembering that it may take time and patience to build up to the point where you and your class can participate confidently in giving and receiving affirmations.
Note that the activity is intended to be carried out with the group seated in a circle and a ‘talking piece’ is an item that a participant holds that indicates it is their time to speak. You can use the response box below to note down your ideas. If you have signed into OpenLearn, your ideas will be saved for returning to later.
Activity:
It’s good to be me
Aim: For children to be able to affirm themselves
Skills: Listening, affirming, communicating, self awareness, looking
Age: 5-11 and beyond
Model this by going first. Holding the ‘talking piece’ say ‘it’s good to be me because… ’ and finish the sentence with something you are proud of, or something you have achieved. For example:
‘It’s good to be me because I’m learning how to bake cakes.’
You then pass the ball to a child next to you. The child then repeats what the adult has said:
‘It’s good to be you because you are learning how to bake cakes.’
And adds their own affirmation statement:
‘And it’s good to be me because I’m good at literacy.’
The ball is then passed all around the circle with people repeating what the person said before them and adding their own sentence.
Discussion
Peacemakers suggest starting this activity with a small group working with an adult rather than the whole class. Once children are beginning to develop confidence in talking positively about themselves and others, these small groups could join other groups until the whole class feels comfortable talking together. In a multilingual classroom, you might encourage children to express their ideas in different languages, offering a translation for the next child or group.
You might also consider giving children cards with a sentence starter that will help them articulate their thoughts. For example you could use ‘It’s good to be me’ as a sentence starter or work on an alternative with the group to find something that everyone is comfortable with using.
Whatever adaptation you make, it’s important to keep sight of the learning and to support children in developing their capability to give and receive affirmations, as well as seeing the good in themselves.