Duration: 10 – 15 minutes
SPIRIT Skills:
- Emotional awareness/communication
- Empathy
Brief Description:
Students brainstorm what they truly appreciate, use a word bank to choose feeling words, and draft a gratitude message that is kind, specific, and respectful.
How does this develop particular SPIRIT skills:
- Strengthens empathy by focusing on the receiver’s feelings and needs
- Develops emotional awareness and communication by choosing emotion words and expressing gratitude clearly and respectfully
- Supports connectedness through idea-sharing and gentle peer feedback (without forcing public performance)
What do we want to achieve regarding SPIRIT skill development (student understanding and/or behaviour)?
As a result of this activity, students (will be able to/understand/do …):
- Emotional awareness/communication: write or dictate a gratitude message using at least one feeling word (e.g., “I feel grateful…”).
- Empathy: include one specific reason that shows they truly noticed the person (“Thank you for helping me when…”).
- Connectedness: offer one supportive comment to a peer (“That sounds kind,” “That will make her happy”).
Academic/Curriculum Objective connection
Purposeful writing: drafting, vocabulary selection, audience awareness, and tone.
Materials and tools needed for implementation
Writing templates, word banks, sentence stems, sample card.
Preparation notes
Differentiate: older students can write independently; younger can draw + dictate.
Guided Questions
- “What do you want your mother/guardian to feel when reading this?”
- “Which words show real care?”
- “What is one moment you remember that you can thank them for?”
Stage Debriefing Questions (Optional)
- “Which line feels the most true and meaningful?”
Tips and Tricks for dealing with stage challenges
- Challenge: Students write generic messages (“You’re the best”).
Tip: Prompt specificity: “What did they do that helped you?” - Challenge: Younger students struggle to write.
Tip: Allow drawing + one sentence; older buddy can scribe.