Creativity

The Book Arts as a Counseling Tool
Description of the Lesson

The Book Arts as a Counseling tool is a series of classroom elementary guidance lessons developed by Karen Krause at Waterville Elementary School to enable children to express themselves in a creative way. The Accordion, Step, Flag, Meandering, and Jelly Bean Book styles allow for a variety of topics to be explored, including but not limited to: divorce, grief, self-esteem, friendship, anger, career exploration, feelings, and personality type. The supplies used are simple and inexpensive, requiring only a small amount of preparation. This lesson will focus on the Step Book. Topic: self-esteem. It is suitable for students K-3. The title of this book is I am Special.

Objectives: 1) to develop self-awareness and positive attitude toward self and others. 2) To help students identify characteristics about themselves that they like, and 3) to encourage student expression of their feelings about the people and things in their world through drawing/illustrations.

Activities: Depending on the age of the students involved, the step books can be pre-folded and stapled, or if students are capable, they can fold and staple their own. Possible themes for each page: first page- name, second page-a picture of me, third page-my family, fourth page- my friends, fifth page-things I like, sixth page-best thing about me. This lesson will take two-three classroom developmental guidance times depending on the age of students you are working with.

Begin the first session reading a book such as “I Am Special” by Mercer Mayer. Have students discuss what makes them similar/different from other students in their class, and ask if they like or dislike the fact that everyone is different in some way. Return to table or desks and have them write their name on the first page of the book, draw a picture of themselves and color on the second, draw and color a picture of themselves on the third page. On the second lesson, review what was covered in the previous session. Form a circle and have each student tell one thing they like. (i.e., food, color, activity, sport) Move to work area and have them draw a picture of a friend(s) on page four, things I like on page five, and the best thing about me on page six.

Ask for volunteers to share what they think the best thing about them is. Have them share their books with their family. Directions for the Step Book: Each book requires three sheets of paper. (Legal size works well). Lay the sheets on top of each other with a 1 ½” gap between sheets at the top. Fold the top of the papers in half to make 6 pages. Staple on the top fold. The top page will be the smallest and each page a little bit bigger.