With Halloween around the corner, traditional trick-or-treat has been identified as a high-risk activity by the CDC. Below, you’ll find a list they provided as lower risk activities.

These lower risk activities can be safe alternatives:

• Carving or decorating pumpkins with members of your household and displaying them
• Carving or decorating pumpkins outside, at a safe distance, with neighbors or friends
• Decorating your house, apartment, or living space
• Doing a Halloween scavenger hunt where children are given lists of Halloween-themed things to look for while they walk outdoors from house to house admiring Halloween decorations at a distance
• Having a virtual Halloween costume contest
• Having a Halloween movie night with people you live with
• Having a scavenger hunt-style trick-or-treat search with your household members in or around your home rather than going house to house

Virtual learning can be very challenging or frustrating at times for our children. Having the right exercises in place will help ease unwanted feelings.

• Underwater Guided Imagery
• Breath Meditation for Kids
• Chakra Meditation for Kids
• Guided Meditation: Your Secret Treehouse

Below you’ll find some useful links to activities and games you can do as a family at home.

• Do Nothing for 2 Minutes
• Weave Silk Drawing
• Tangrams
• Word Clouds
• Jigsaw Puzzles
• Flipbook Maker
• PBS Kids Clifford Adventure Stories
• Build a Treehouse
• Make a Robot
• Pixel Art
• Disney Coloring Pages

PDFs by Core Competency

According to the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL), there are five core competencies that enhance students’ capacity to integrate skills, attitudes, and behaviors to deal effectively and ethically with daily tasks and challenges:

• Self-awareness
• Self-management
• Social awareness
• Relationship skills
• Responsible decision-making

Dear McUnis Families

Welcome back to the new school year! This year is a special year, and we’ll be embarking on this journey together. There are many adjustments for us to make as the year progresses, and it will be a learning process for everyone. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me via email: sabbagl@dearbornschools.org

Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference, that is, the capacity to place oneself in another’s position.

During these trying times, exercising empathy is extremely important. Below you’ll find a free printable Empathy Journal from GoZen that you can use as a tool to teach your child or loved one about the true meaning of Empathy.

Grab your FREE Empathy Journal here. Be sure to download the PDF before printing.

Less stress, more impulse control
Less anxiety, more emotional awareness
Less distraction, greater motivation

The list of research-based benefits from practicing mindfulness goes on. In times like these, it’s easy for kids to feel they have no power to change the world around them. While some things are out of our control, how we navigate and transform our emotions remains in our power. Mindfulness is a pathway to transformation; it’s also something we can teach to kids and tweens alike.

So, how do we get tweens to engage in mindfulness?

If your tweens are into fantasy, anime, manga, or comic books, try this week’s free printable called Galaxy Breathing. Every exercise includes beautiful original art as well as a simple, mindful breathing technique.

1) Grab your FREE Galaxy Breathing Exercise Booklet Here. Be sure to download the PDF before printing.

Got challenging feelings?

If you’ve been on a feelings roller-coaster over the last couple of months, you’re certainly not alone. This week, GoZen has dedicate their printable to helping kids and grownups alike navigate through tough feelings with their new mini-journal!

1) Grab your FREE Feelings Mini-Journal Here. It’s 21 pages of feeling goodness! Be sure to download the PDF before printing.

Highlights At Home

The beloved classic kids’ magazine, Highlights, is posting twice-weekly online roundups of stories, puzzles, craft ideas and more to help children cope with being cooped up and help parents make the most of this time with their kids. Each installment has a different theme:

• Celebrate reading — Reading can transport us somewhere else for a while, even when we’re stuck at home.
• Pajama day — Showing your children affection with a hug, snuggling on the couch to watch a movie, or reading together in a cozy blanket tent are all ways you can be fully present with your child.
• A never-ending pile of fun — Sequestering at home may actually provide you with the time to teach kids tasks like matching socks, folding clothes, and putting away clean laundry. Kids usually like to help, and when we make the chores fun, they’re often eager to pitch in.
• We are (all) family — Whatever your family configuration, this week’s issue has ideas for strengthening your family bond.
• Staying connected — Children are likely feeling the loss of connection with friends and extended family. This guide is full of ways you can help your kids feel more connected to people they love but can’t safely see right now.
• Just keep dancing — What raises our spirits more or gives us a burst of energy like music and dance? These activities will help  your kids move their bodies, use their creativity, and improve their mood.
• Shoot for the stars — Young or old, we’re all fascinated by space. What’s known is often mind-boggling, and what’s unknown leaves so much to the imagination.
• Thank you teachers — Thanking teachers is not only a nice thing to do, but showing appreciation is a simple but important practice of gratitude.
• Hooray for helpers — National Nurses Week presents an opportunity to expand your kids’ understanding of what it means to be heroic.