Peer Relationships

What’s in this Issue?

• The Importance of Peer Relationships and Classroom Community
• Strategies for Enhancing Peer Relationships
• Creating Connections in the Classroom
• Resources
• Download and Print this Article HERE

Peer Relationships & Classroom Community

Children in the early elementary grades sometimes need extra help learning to be tolerant, socially-accepting, and inclusive to classmates who are different from them. Children may perceive a classmate as “different” for a variety of reasons (e.g., the student has difficulty learning, demonstrates disruptive or off-putting behaviors, is anxious or nervous, is a member of a racial minority group, wears unusual clothing, has a physical impairment, or comes from a low socio-economic class).

Research demonstrates that children’s social and academic worlds are intertwined within the classroom. Negative peer experiences can leave children feeling hurt and lonely. In addition, the results of negative peer experiences extend into the academic domain. Children who are rejected by their peers are more likely to dislike school, become less motivated and engaged in academic work, and withdraw from class participation.

In this handout, we describe strategies for enhancing peer relationships and facilitating a positive and inclusive classroom community. Several of these strategies were developed in the context of the MOSAIC (Making Socially Accepting Inclusive Classrooms) Program (developed by Drs. Amori Mikami and Julie Owens)

Strategies

Below are strategies you can use in your classroom to teach students to be respectful and inclusive of their peers.

• Include a classroom rule about respect and inclusiveness.
  • For example: “Take Care of Others”
    • Respect your classmates; try to understand your classmates even when they are different from you; tell others “good idea” or “nice job” be patient and help classmates who need your help: listen when others are talking; include others in activities; wait your turn; raise your hand before speaking when asked.
• Create cooperative learning activities.
  • Create learning activities (building a structure) where everyone has a job/role, behavioral expectations are set, and reinforce inclusive behavior, so children are encouraged to collaborate successfully. This give children practive with learning how to work and play well with others.
• Teach children how to give and receive compliments beyond physical attributes.
  • Create a time and space (e.g., bulletin board, bucket) when children can offer shout-outs. Encourage the students to become more specific and meaningful with their compliments over time.
    • Help children identify positive personal qualities by pointing them out to students.
    • Start a compliment ritual where everyone draws the name of someone else out of a hat. The person then says something nice about the person whose name is on the paper they drew.

Creating Connections

Helping children learn personal things about one another, and see commonalities between one another, can help them view other students as
individuals. This can reduce peers’ exclusionary behaviors and social devaluation of others because they now see other students as individuals and it also discourages stereotyping. Some ways to create connections among students are:

1. Implement Circle Time with greetings and sharing between children (e.g., what they did over the weekend, or how they are feeling).
2. Start a ritual: When one child shares their answer and another child agree/can relate to what the speaker said, then the child listening will make a hand gesture with their thumb and pinky extended and move their hand back and forth between the speaker and themselves. Students listening to the speaker could also snap their fingers to indicate that they agree and/or to show support.
3. Point out commonalities between children throughout the day to reinforce social bonds between peers (e.g., “Hey, Ryan and Robert, did you know that both of you swim?”).
4. Try t get the Conversation started between children and then, once it is started, leave to let the children continue it on their own.

TIP:
When trying to make connections among peers, it’s most useful when the teacher can point out commonalities between children so that they are heard by all the children involved. This provides the greatest chance that the children will build upon what the teacher said (e.g., talk to a new peer with whom they may have a connection).

Resources

PBS – Kindness in the Classroom

Video – Positive Discipline Class Meeting: Compliments & Appreciations, Problem Solving

Video – Morning Meetings: Creating a Safe Space for Learning

Download and Print this Article HERE