Elementary (Grades 3-5)

Middle School (Grades 6-8)

• Have chart paper and markers.

CASEL Core Competencies

• Self-awareness

• Self-management

• Social Awareness

• Relationship Skills

• Responsible Decision-Making

Common Core ELA-Literacy Standards

• Speaking and Listening

NCSS Social Studies Themes

• Culture

• Groups and Organizations

• Civic Ideals and Practices

• Define harassment, intimidate, ally, and bystander

• Identify examples of what being an ally looks like, sounds like and feels like

• Identify examples of people being targeted for their religious or non-religious beliefs

• Explain why they think being an ally is an important role to take when they see someone being targeted for her or his religious or non-religious beliefs

• Ally

• Upstander

• Bystander

• Harassment

• Discriminate

• Intimidate

Ask students, based on their knowledge about bullying behavior, to define what an ally is. Chart responses. Ask for a definition of what a bystander is. Chart responses.

Print the word upstander next to ally and say that it is another word for ally: someone who stands up for a person facing bullying, prejudice or discrimination because of who they are or what they believe.

Post the definitions of harassment, prejudice and discrimination. Work with them to put a definition on chart paper similar to the following: Harassment is attacking, hostile behavior, or intimidation (frightening someone, especially to make them do what the intimidator wants them to do).

Post charts labeled “What being an Ally Looks Like,” “What being an Ally Sounds Like,” and “What Being an Ally Feels Like” at the front of the room.

Ask students to give examples of what being an ally looks like and sounds like. Put responses on the applicable chart. Examples may include: not participating in the harassing behavior, not giving in to negative peer pressure, telling the person who is the aggressor to stop, getting an adult you trust to help, saying that it’s important to know people before you judge them, telling a trusted adult what happened so that it doesn’t happen again, and standing next to the target of the behavior to show you are the person’s ally.

When students have finished brainstorming, distribute an index card or small paper to each student.

Ask them to look over the examples they suggested and ask them to take a moment to think about feeling words that would describe how they would feel if they were being an ally. Tell students their cards are confidential so they should be honest about how they would feel. Tell them they have two or three minutes to write down their feeling words on their cards. Ask them to raise their hands when they are finished writing.

Tell the students to raise their hands when they are done so you can collect their cards. As soon as you have at least seven or eight cards, start charting words on the “What Being an Ally Feels Like” chart paper. Purposely mix up the cards when they are given to you so that students cannot make assumptions about who put down what word.

If students’ cards do not contain words like nervous, scared, worried, upset, tense, afraid, uncertain, and so on, then include them in the list as you chart the students’ responses. Chart a long list of feeling words.

Ask which words make students realize that some ally behaviors are more difficult to do. Ask: Which behaviors are more difficult? Why? Which behaviors are easier? Why?

Ask: What could someone else who sees the prejudice and
discrimination do to make being an ally less difficult? Why would that
help you?

Ask students to imagine for a minute how they would feel if someone was being prejudiced or discriminating against them because of their religious or non-religious beliefs. Think about some of the examples they learned about from history and current events.

Ask: What words would you use to describe how a person in that
situation would feel? Chart responses.

Why do you think the person would feel that way?