Books are one of my top resources I use to bring character education to life for my students. Also, as an avid reader, I feel like it also helps pass along a love of reading onto my students. One of my favorite phrases to hear is when a student asks if we are going to read a book in counseling today.
But if you are also like me, some days you look through your classroom library and come up empty with a book that delivers the exact message you are needing to teach on that day. Whether it be a social skill, a tough lesson, or just something different from your regular go-to's, I feel like I have found a great tool to assist you with these sort of days: Storybird. Storybird is a quick, interactive website where you can build your own story books with any message you need! I stumbled across this website a few years back, and I have been in love with it every since. Check out some of my favorite features below: Perks 1. Educator-friendly. The website is set up to cater to educators; you can build classrooms where students can write their own stories, put in their own illustrations. 2. Quick and simple. As a counselor, these are my two magic words that get me, besides free (see #3). I have created a story in less than thirty minutes, but you can also take your time and create some masterpieces. 3. Free! Once again, one of my favorite words as an educator! 4. Different layouts. You can choose from three different layouts: picture books, chapter books, or poems. If you teach many different age groups, this may come in handy for you. So, how can you use this? Oh the possibilities! I generally use it to create my own stories and share with the students. They love it! However, there are times after I have introduced a concept, we use the skills we have learned to write a story together as a class to re-teach the skills. For example, we wrote a story about a third grade student who was nervous about the state test and went through all the different test-taking skills he could use to prepare for the test. We have also written stories about how to solve conflicts. Drawbacks 1. Illustrations. I have personally not had good luck finding illustrations that really speak to the different stories I have written. They may be a personal drawback, but one I thought I would list. 2. Creation page. Sometimes it is difficult to place the images and your text boxes precisely where you want them on the page. Maybe I just need more practice with this finesse, but it was an issue when I first started using it. Practice does make perfect though! 3. Searching for published works. There are many published works on the website, it is just very hard to search to narrow down the certain topic you may be looking for. However, there may just not be many school counseling-related stories either! Good luck writing stories with your students! I hope you are able to build more connections through this valuable tool. How do you use Storybird?? I would love to know! Please comment below.
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