Skillful Communication in Action
Learning to use words that help and heal
Teacher Experience
A contemplative invitation for educators to reflect on before teaching.How can we find the courage to openly tackle the questions that matter most to our students? Being consistently honest, kind, and timely in our speech can be quite challenging for educators who are constantly communicating with their students. How do we model patience when interrupted? How can we give students time to talk in class and practice deeply listening to what really matters to them? Reflect on those teachers and friends who you feel really encouraged you to use your voice.
Student Experience
A contemplative invitation for students to connect with this learning goal.Notice how your body feels when someone speaks kindly to you, and how it feels when someone uses mean words. Pay attention to how others react when you use different types of words.
Understanding
Students will understand...Our words have the power to help or hurt others. When we choose kind words, we help our friends and family feel loved and safe.
Action
Students are able to...Practice kind and helpful words through daily classroom interactions. Demonstrate the difference between words that help and words that hurt using role-play with stuffed animals or puppets. Create simple agreements about how to use words to make friends feel good.
Content Knowledge
Students will know...Kind words help people feel happy and safe, while unkind words can hurt people’s feelings and make them sad. The Buddha taught that we can choose to use our words to help or harm others. When we speak with kindness, we help make our classroom and home peaceful places to be.
Simple questions can guide us in choosing our words wisely: “Will this make someone feel better?” and “Is this true?” Using helpful words requires practice, similar to learning to read or tie your shoes.
Guiding Questions
Implementation Possibilities
Practice daily greetings and comfort words through routine classroom interactions with gentle teacher guidance and positive reinforcement. Use puppet shows and stuffed animal scenarios to demonstrate the difference between kind and unkind words, allowing children to practice helpful responses in safe, playful contexts. Create simple classroom agreements about “happy words” and “hurtful words” using pictures and symbols, supplemented by morning circle sharing where children practice listening and offering kind responses to classmates’ experiences.
Assessment Ideas
Observational checklists tracking daily use of kind words during natural classroom interactions, playground time, and transitions. Puppet show demonstrations where children show understanding by choosing kind responses over unkind ones in simple scenarios. Circle time participation assessments measure the ability to listen to others and offer appropriate comfort or encouragement. Picture-based reflection activities where children identify helpful versus hurtful words through images and simple yes/no questions. Behavioral documentation shows an increase in the use of polite words, comfort language, and conflict resolution through teacher help-seeking, rather than aggressive responses.
