November: Wellness
My November Bulletin Board:

November Bulletin Board/Full View

November's monthly counseling theme was wellness.  During November, I partnered with our school's 2nd grade music teacher to conduct anger management lessons. Each of us were able to utilize our areas of expertise to co-teach the lesson.  The instruction began with a review of anger.  I described anger as a secondary emotion because people become angry as a result of experiencing such feelings as frustration, anxiety, fear, or jealousy.  Anger is important to understand because students are at risk of getting hurt, hurting another student, or getting into trouble when they lose control of their thoughts and actions.

November Bulletin Board: Wellness

The key to controlling anger is stopping the emotion before it escalates.  Students were taught to recognize their body's anger clues, such as becoming hot, clenching their fists, or getting a belly ache, so that they will know when to start using calm down techniques. Many calm down techniques were discussed, including counting to ten, imagining relaxing place, or taking a deep breath.  At this point our music teacher started to discuss the role music can have in the calm down process.  The 2nd grade students were taught the Mr. Rogers' song, "What Do You Do With The Mad That You Feel?" The song not only has a calming rhythm, it also includes helpful cool down strategies within the song's words.

At the end of the lesson students also discovered how movement and music can help relieve stress and anger with the help of boom whackers.  The release of anger can be made by safely hitting the boom whackers to make music.  Music can therapeutically release anger in multiple ways; by thinking and paying attention to music lyrics, auditorily by listening to music's sound and rhythm, or kinesthetically by dancing or making music with instruments.

Song Lyrics

2nd Grade Anger Management Music Lesson PowerPoint