Breakups are a tough part of adolescence. For many high school students, navigating the emotional rollercoaster of a breakup can be overwhelming. As educators, you play a critical role in helping students build resilience, manage their emotions, and learn how to handle difficult social situations. To support this, Everyday Speech has developed an engaging interactive sorting activity for helping high schoolers cope with a breakup.
In this blog, we’ll discuss how the activity works, why it’s essential for high schoolers, and how you can incorporate it into your lessons to promote emotional wellness.
Why Teaching Breakup Skills is Important for Teens
Breakups can have a profound emotional impact on teenagers. At a time when they are learning how to manage their emotions, relationships, and social interactions, breakups can feel devastating. These experiences can affect their emotional health, social relationships, and even academic performance. Teaching students how to handle breakups constructively is critical for several reasons:
- Promoting Emotional Regulation: Teenagers often struggle with controlling intense emotions like sadness, anger, and frustration after a breakup. Teaching them coping strategies helps them manage these emotions in healthy ways.
- Encouraging Positive Behavior: Often, breakups lead to impulsive actions—whether it’s spreading rumors or engaging in hurtful behavior. By learning the dos and don’ts of breakups, students can prevent escalating conflicts and foster respectful behavior.
- Building Resilience: Understanding that breakups are a normal part of life and learning to cope with disappointment can build emotional resilience in students, preparing them for future challenges.
The Helping High Schoolers Cope with a Breakup activity from Everyday Speech provides a guided framework for students to explore the best and worst ways to handle the aftermath of a breakup.
How the Interactive Sorting Activity Works
The Breakup Dos and Don’ts interactive sorting activity is a hands-on digital tool that helps students differentiate between positive and negative responses to a breakup. In this activity, students are presented with various scenarios or statements, which they then categorize as either a “Do” or a “Don’t.”
Key Elements of the Activity:
Reflection and Review: After sorting the statements, students can review their choices and receive feedback. This reflection helps reinforce healthy behaviors and discourages harmful actions.
Engaging Scenarios: Students are given real-world scenarios that could arise after a breakup. Examples include emotional responses like “Take time to consider your feelings” or actions such as “Spread rumors about your ex.”
Sorting into Categories: The goal is for students to sort each statement into the correct category—either as something they should do (e.g., “talk to a trusted friend”) or something they should avoid (e.g., “send angry texts”).
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Conclusion: Empowering Students to Cope with Breakups
Breakups are a challenging part of adolescent life, but with the right guidance, students can learn to handle them in healthy and constructive ways. The Helping High Schoolers Cope with a Breakup interactive sorting activity from Everyday Speech is an excellent tool to help students navigate this emotionally charged experience.
By incorporating this activity, you’re equipping your students with the emotional intelligence they need to manage breakups positively. With guidance on the dos and don’ts of breakups, students will leave with tools to handle difficult situations with maturity.
Sample Video
Students learn best by watching others their same-age model the behavior! Check out a sample video modeling lesson below. We offer our entire Social-Emotional Learning platform free for 14 days here!
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Navigating Middle School: Enhancing Social Skills Through Videos
Teaching Middle School Students to Stay Calm and Solve Problems
Promoting Mental Well-being: SEL Lessons for Middle School Students
