I often use movies or movie clips s to reinforce my counseling lessons. Here are some of my favorites:
Natural High: Natural High is a nonprofit organization that spreads a message that it's cooler to say yes to a natural high and no to drugs. Natural High captures the stories of role models-word renowned athletes, celebrities, artists and musicians who believe in a drug-free lifestyle-and create captivating videos and research based curricula for educators and parents, completely free of charge.
Auto B Good: I use these videos with my 2nd graders. Auto-B-Good is a character development series featuring animated vehicles, each with his or her own personality.
Berenstain Bears DVD's: I use these videos with k-1 students. Each DVD has several episodes and each one teaches a lesson/moral/value of some sort.
Veggie Tales: These are great videos to use with k-2 students. These are the educational series and are not religious. Each tale teaches a valuable lesson. Larry Boy and the Fib From Outer Space is my favorite of the bunch and teaches about honesty and lying. Are You My Neighbor? is about respecting each other even though we all have our differences. The Story of Flibber-o-loo is about empathy and compassion. Each of these videos has a downloadable discussion guide and coloring sheet as well.
The Wumblers is another series that I use. I use these videos in small group or individual sessions.
The Wumblers devote each lesson to making the world a better place.
Other Movies that I have used during counseling sessions:
Inside Out: Check out the Helpful Counselor's post:
20+ counseling themes found in Inside Out
The Lorax: Citizenship/Perseverance
Monster University: Career and College Readiness. Check out
http://monstersuniversity.com/edu/ as well. It is made to look like an actual college webpage and there are a few activities.
Mean Girls: Relational Aggression (I only use clips from this video as there are parts of the video that are not age appropriate)
Odd Girl Out: Relational Aggression (I only use clips from this video as well)
X-Men: First Class-Self-Esteem (I only use clips from this video. You can find a lesson from Elementary School Counseling using X-Men: First Class
HERE.)
Buddy Learns to Listen: Listening grades k-2
Buddy Learns to Play Fair: Sportsmanship/Fairness grades k-2
Buddy Learns from his Mistakes: Consequences of a Poor Attitude grades k-2
You can also visit
Elementary School Counseling's Amazon Store for some great movies! Make sure you check out
her blog as well!
The
Helpful Counselor also posted about
counseling themes found in Star Wars: The Force Awakens
If you are a high school counselor make sure you check out this
list of lifetime movies. There are discussion guides and resources that go along with them!
The Pioneer Woman blogged about
must see movies for counselors when her own daughter was pursuing a counseling degree. There are some great recommendations in
this list!
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