This start-up guide for instructors and helpers provides written information and a video tutorial that overviews session structure and accompanying documents. It provides tips for teaching these plug-and-play lessons (sessions) with ease while creating meaningful, positive culture-building experiences. 

Overviews the many types of relationships people have and their importance. Explains how to recognize healthy and supportive relationships (communication, balanced social engagement, perspective-taking, empathy, trust, and respect), as well as unhealthy ones (pressure to do what someone thinks is wrong or to exclude others including diverse people, manipulation, drama, violence, and threats) that don’t help but can harm us. Includes specific elements of healthy versus unhealthy friendships.  

Clarifies the qualities of people who are good friends to have and how to be a good friend such as empathy, good listening, and respecting opinions as well as personal space. Reviews healthy expectations for friendships before adulthood. Unravels unhealthy aspects of friendships such as drama, pressure, put-downs, manipulation, danger, and one-sidedness. Covers practical aspects of healthy friendships including the details of good listening as well as things to avoid that can make it harder to form or maintain friendships.

Presents friendship-making as a learned life skill that includes finding people who are good friends to have in good places and at good times. Explains the Importance of participating in group activities and being open to different people who aren’t into popularity or drama, and how to approach kids for initial brief positive interactions, have full conversations, do things that indicate being a good friend to have, and connect while avoiding clinginess and unrealistic expectations. Offers healthy perspectives about rejection along with reassurance that making and keeping friends gets easier with age and experience.

Explores the common nature of social media use today, how it is a choice with good and harmful consequences, what those consequences can be including for games, and how youth can choose to limit uses to beneficial and responsible ones and control their amount of use and with whom for best results. Explains how to recognize when messages are cyberbullying or creating drama and gives healthy ways to react including using empathy and kindness. Promotes social media safety and protective adult input. 

Defines conflict between people and explains conflict-solving skills, the many benefits they provide, and how to use them. Spells out why violence never resolves conflict, fear, anger, or disappointment. Teaches how to prepare for conflict-solving discussions by setting goals and regulating emotions, and then effectively communicating with I-statements, perspective taking, empathy, a chocolate-cookie method, and assertiveness as well as how to find compromises. Compares assertiveness to aggressiveness.

Explains the difference between friendship and dating relationships, myths that teens often believe about dating, and common peer and media pressure to date and engage in sexual behavior early. Presents a simple definition of sexual activity (two people touching each other’s private areas with permission) and some general risks. Good reasons to delay dating and sexual activity are given.