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Create a ‘Natural’ Friend-o-meter

Healthy Relationships
Lesson Plan Glossary

Glossary of Terms

At URSTRONG, we believe it’s important to use kids’ language for kids’ problems. That’s why we have our very own, unique language of friendship. Here are some important terms that children, parents, and teachers learn in our program.

Friendship Fire®: Any situation between you and a friend that results in negative feelings.

Mean-on-Purpose: When someone is intentionally unkind to someone else.

Quick Comeback: A very short word or phrase that is used when someone is Mean-on-Purpose. Quick Comebacks are designed to let the other person know that you heard/saw what they did and you’re not okay with it.

Friend-o-meter: A visual tool that assesses the health of friendships, ranging from the healthy zone to the unhealthy zone.

Friend-o-cycle: The normal cycle in a friendship that brings the friendship back to the healthy zone after experiencing a Friendship Fire. The phases of the Friend-o-cycle are: Healthy Friendship – Fire – Confront the issue – Talk-it-Out – Forgive & Forget – Closer & Stronger – Healthy Friendship…

4 Friendship Facts: A set of four facts that help us have realistic expectations in our friendships so we understand what is normal.

  1. No friendship (relationship) is perfect.
  2. Every friendship is different.
  3. Trust & Respect are the two most important qualities of a friendship.
  4. Friendships change…and that’s okay.

Red Shirt Girl and Striped Shirt Boy: Two characters that remind us about the importance of body language.

Friendship Ninja: A Friendship Ninja is someone who surrounds themselves with friends in the healthy zone of the Friend-o-meter. A Friendship Ninja is kind and friendly to everyone. A Friendship Ninja understands the 4 Friendship Facts and puts out their Friendship Fires when they ignite. A Friendship Ninja stands up for themselves and their friends. A Friendship Ninja makes new friends and understands that friendships change…and that’s okay. Above all else, a Friendship Ninja is someone you want to be friends with because they’re true to who they are!

Fresh air? Yes, please! Get outside with this fun activity and teach your students there are Friend-o-meters all around them!

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Objective

The Friend-o-meter is a visual tool that we use to help us assess the health of our friendships. It is a bit like a thermometer that indicates whether a friendship is in the healthy or unhealthy zone.

If things are going well in our friendships, they are generally in the healthy zone and we feel good. However, we know that a number of things (like Friendship Fires®!) can make us feel like a friendship is slipping into the unhealthy zone. When our friendships are creeping towards the unhealthy zone, it doesn’t feel very good at all! If the Friend-o-meter indicates that we have a friendship that is in the unhealthy zone, what can we do? (Hint: We can put out our Friendship Fire® and get our friendship back into the healthy zone or spend less time in that friendship).

This lesson is designed to help students to reflect on their current friendship network, assessing the quality of their friendships using the Friend-o-meter.

Key Outcome

Your students will learn how to describe the difference between healthy & unhealthy friendships by using the Friend-o-meter & apply it to their own friendships.

 

Materials

  • A collection of items sourced from nature that have a variety of textures, colours and forms (e.g. leaves, sticks, rocks, pebbles, flower petals, dirt, sand, flowers, shells, seed pods and grasses)
  • Camera to document your ‘Natural Friend-o-meter’

Instructions

  1. Review Friendology 101 – Session 3, particularly focusing on the Friend-o-meter and how it works in helping to assess the health of friendships.
  2. Ask your students to head outside into the garden or a natural environment and collect a range of different things like sticks, rocks, pebbles, feathers, flower petals, leaves, sand, dirt, grass, seed pods & shells. Encourage to them collect as many different coloured and textured things as they can.
  3. Instruct students to use their collection of natural objects to create their own version of the Friend-o-meter. Say to your students “Be as creative as you’d like and be ready to explain to a friend how your Friend-o-meter works!”
  4. Get students to document their creation by taking a photograph of it or videoing themselves and a friend talking about their Friend-o-meter, explaining what it is, how it works, and when they would use it to support them in their friendships.

Next Steps

Get your students to turn their ‘Natural Friend-o-meters’ into a stop-motion animation. Get them to take a photo each time they include a new piece of nature (eg. a stick, pebble, flower). Then, animate the still photographs using a stop-motion animation app!