Guide members of the educational community in understanding and supporting autistic learners. A kit from Autism Speaks includes an array of tools designed for parents, teachers, and community members. 

Emotions come in all shapes and sizes, and can be difficult for young learners or students with special needs to identify. Support them in gaining the valuable social skill of recognizing emotions and understanding empathy with this...

Fridays can be a challenge with learners already dreaming about their weekends. Here's a routine that will bring their minds back to the classroom. Read aloud the beginning of a story, sure to engage your listeners.

Teach middle schoolers how to develop healthy relationships with activities and lessons designed to create a kind and inclusive classroom. Pupils create guidelines to develop a safe and civil learning environment. They learn how to...

It's possible to promote inclusion and empathy on the Internet—it just takes effort! Scholars read and discuss a short story about being a friend online. Then, pupils role-play appropriate ways to respond to hate within a digital...

Say no to hate speech! Pupils discover the importance of practicing empathy and inclusivity in digital communities and discuss strategies for responding to online hate speech. Then, small groups develop and present class guidelines for...

Planning activities for Autism Awareness Month? Check out the ideas in a packet designed to raise awareness of autism. Suggestions include plans for an assembly to launch a school-wide focus, lesson plans for classroom activities,...

Putting yourself in someone else's shoes is a common phrase we hear from time to time, but do children really understand? Explore empathy with elementary schoolers using these activities. Focusing on feelings and emotions,...

What does empathy look like? Encourage your pupils to put themselves in another person's shoes with several writing and discussion activities that relate to a featured short film. Over the course of the activity, individuals collaborate...

Students identify missing characters from a text, particularly a school text. They increase critical thinking by supplying missing perspectives in a text an build empathy through surveying different points of view. They reflect on the...

Students recognize the value of multiple perspectives and differences of opinion. They build empathy and open-mindedness for other points of view. They study the complexity of social and cultural issues such as violence in media.

Second graders interact with the story of Alexander's horrible day by connecting it to their lives. They practice predicting, writing paragraphs, reading aloud, discussing his problems, making a card to cheer him up, and designing a pair...

Young scholars discover the inequality of food distribution.  In the hunger lesson, students discuss how some places and people do not get the food they need to survive. Young scholars role play distributing pretend meals to people...

In this personal health empathy worksheet, students read 3 scenarios and examine what is happening in each of them. Students role play the situations using strategies that show empathy toward one another.

Students develop critical thinking skills about personal situations depicted in a video about cliques. Issues about identity, self-esteem, and stereotypes are explored.

Students investigate the emotion and social practice of empathy. They role play being in various situations in order to understand the feelings of others. Students pick an adult to interview who has overcome great difficulty.

Young scholars list traits that make them unique. They participate in a Bingo-like game, where they try to identify people by their traits.

This blog explains how reading and empathy are related.

This article discusses the importance of social intelligence and how to encourage it in others.