Growing Book By Book and two other bloggers have been putting on "Family Dinner Book Club" for the past few years (you can find more information about it HERE). When I saw that this year's theme was highlighting different 'character strengths' each month, I decided to use their monthly ideas as a jumping off point to further encourage speech and language development, social-emotional intelligence, increase world knowledge, and develop critical thinking skills in therapy. Bonus: ideas for family carryover are already done!
Our focus character strength for June was HONESTY.
We tell lies when we are afraid...afraid of what we don't know, afraid of what others will think, afraid of what will be found out about us. But every time we tell a lie, the thing that we fear grows stronger. ~Tad Williams
I found an interactive PowerPoint from Eve Coates on Teachers Pay Teachers about Trustworthiness (also part of her Character Education PowerPoint Bundle #1). This was a good introduction to the topic of honesty for my elementary-middle school clients, and provided a good jumping off point for a discussion about the various aspects of honesty (more than just not telling lies), including:
- being honest in your actions
- not hiding the truth
- speaking honestly
- doing the right thing, even when no one is watching
- keeping promises/doing what you say you are going to do
- asking before you do something
- being honest with yourself
Honesty is the fastest way to prevent a mistake from turning into a failure. ~James Altucher
In therapy sessions throughout June we also:
- read the book The Empty Pot by Demi and discussed and completed worksheets
- read the book The Berenstain Bears and The Truth by Stan & Jan Berenstain and discussed
- read the book Apples for the Princess by K. Sean Buvala and discussed
- watched the movie The Boy Who Cried Wolf (iTunes; also available on YouTube as a reading of the book by B.G. Hennessy)
- and, finally, we wrapped up our learning by completing a worksheet to summarize what we had learned about honesty
Using our focus book, The Empty Pot, as inspiration, my clients decorated "empty pots" every session and then we wrote a statement about honesty on them. This helped us brainstorm different ideas/information about honesty and then formulate a sentence to express one thought (so challenging for my kids - and a good cognitive-language workout!). We used these decorated pots to make our Honesty poster.
Every lie is two lies - the lie we tell others and the lie we tell ourselves to justify it. ~Robert Brault
With my high school clients, every week we read and discussed quotes about honesty, followed by them writing a short statement about what the quote means to them / how they can apply the meaning to their lives.
Head on over to this blog post on Growing Book By Book for free materials if you would like to highlight the concept of honesty at home. There is a list of suggested books, discussion questions, and links to suggested activities and accompanying dinner menu for the June Family Dinner Book Club on Honesty.
For more pictures of what we did in therapy, check out the HONESTY album on the Vlinder Facebook page. I also shared several quotes related to honesty throughout the month.
Who lies for you will lie against you. ~Bosnian Proverb
Related Resources
The Empty Pot Book Study by Joy in the Journey (Teachers Pay Teachers)
Honesty (Values) by Kimberley Jane Pryor
Our July focus word is CREATIVITY! Stay tuned...
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