A collaborative learning lesson at Lynwood Avenue Elementary School in Sheryl Amallobieta’s fourth grade class spread smiles and cheer during the holiday season as students participated in a social-emotional learning activity exploring positive ways to address negativity.

As part of the class’s daily lesson on social-emotional learning, students were joined by the remote learning students via Google Meet to participate in the collaborative activity. The class was visited by a bad elf who shared negative thoughts and feelings with the class, and the students shared ideas on how to change these feelings in a positive way. During the lesson, students heard the story of “The Giving Tree” and identified the important message found within the story.

Concluding the activity, students named a large cutout tree that was placed in their classroom and wrote special messages of kindness and encouragement to spread kindness within their classroom and beyond.