Suggested Grade/Age Range: Grades 1-3 (ages 6-9)

Activity Objective: The goal of this activity is to have children think of the different factors that make a good friend and/or lead to a healthy friendship. The process whereby each child illustrates a piece of the puzzle and then put these together to form a friendship poster is symbolic of the individual effort and teamwork needed to maintain good friendships. The children will present their posters in their respective groups afterwards.

Friendship Learning Goals
Big Messages to Kids

Link to Ontario Curriculum

Materials Required:

• Bristol board (one piece for each small group of 4-5 children)
• Markers, pencil crayons, crayons
• Pencils, erasers
• Scissors

Prep Time: 15 minutes

• Gather all needed materials
• For the younger grades, should pre-cut Bristol board into the puzzle pieces for each group

Task Time: 40-50 minutes

• Introduce the activity
• Time for children to work on their puzzle pieces
• Presentation time for each small group

Activity Description:

Opening Discussion:

1.       Start with a class discussion about friendship. Ask the children to brainstorm different characteristics that make a good friend. You may choose to write some of their comments down on the board or on chart paper so that they can reference them when making the posters

Activity:

2.       Explain that they class will be working on friendship posters in small groups of 4-5 individuals. Each individual in the small group is responsible for completing one ‘puzzle piece’ of the poster by drawing and/or writing a description for the question, “What Makes a Good Friend?”. Once all the puzzle pieces are done, they will be put together to form one complete poster

3.       Divide children into small groups and distribute materials for them to complete the posters

4.       Tell the children that before they start, they should plan as a group how they want to complete the posters. Encourage each child to come up with a unique idea for what makes a good friend so that each poster will have four or five different items

5.       Circulate as the children work in their small groups on their individual puzzle pieces and provide suggestions and/or feedback as needed

Wrap-up Discussion/Presentations:

6.       Once children are finished, give them five minutes or so to rehearse presenting their posters before gathering back into a whole class. Have each small group take turns presenting each puzzle piece in their poster

Activity Extensions:

Children can choose to take on a larger-scale project of completing puzzle pieces as a whole  class on the theme of ‘What Makes a Good Friend’ and this can be displayed as a mosaic in the hallway

As developmentally appropriate, children can write an entry in their journals or writer’s notebooks on ‘What Makes a Good Friend’ and give a personal example from their own experiences

Additional Comments:

Be sure during the discussion to cover the ‘Big Messages to Kids’ of: friends should make you feel good about yourself; respect yourself, respect others; treat others the way you want to be treated. These may be spontaneously mentioned by the class during the discussion. Take the time to emphasize their importance in good friendships and perhaps give children an opportunity to offer any specific examples demonstrating these messages

Additional Resources:

You may also choose to review the Friendship and Social Support Literature Review before implementing this activity. It can be found here.