Content Area: Career Education and Consumer, Family, and Life Skills

 

Index: 9.2C Grade 8 CPI 5

 

Standard: 9.2 - Consumer, Family, and Life Skills

 

Strand: C - Interpersonal Communication

 

Cumulative Progress Indicator: 5 -  The student will practice the skills necessary to avoid physical and verbal confrontation in individual and group settings.

 

Grade: 8

 

Sample Activities:

 

·       See World Language Framework activities under the indicated heading:
·       Hey, AESOP, What’s Up?
·       Say It with a Card

 

·       Comparison of Three Types of Milk in a Recipe

 

·       Students will complete a self evaluation of interpersonal skills. They should assess themselves in the area of orderly behavior, positive attitude, self-esteem, initiative, assertiveness, empathy, self-control, honesty, integrity, personal ethics, ethics, and courtesy and tact. For each of these personal traits they should evaluate themselves as above average, average, or below average. When they have completed this self-evaluation, they should them answer the questions – which traits need to be improved, how will they improve these traits, and how will they benefit personally, in the workplace and as members of the community as a result of the improvements.

 

·       Students will be given human relations case situations and role-play situations in which they may demonstrate the use of proper interpersonal skills. Suggested situations may involve dealing with fellow employees, communication with management, handling difficult or complaining customers, conflicts with friends, teachers, siblings, etc. Students will discuss their handling of the situations and receive feedback from members of the class. This activity may be done individually or in teams.  Case situations might include: consumer complaint about food (not getting what was ordered), a friend wanting free food, student not working with a particular person, etc.

 

·       FBLA, offers middle school students the opportunity to apply this indicator in all of the chapter competitive events. Students need to develop a program of work which all of the members of the group agree will benefit the chapter and all of its members, e.g. Outstanding Chapter Award of Merit. Guidelines for these can be found at its Web site, www.fbla-pbl.org.

 

·       Ask a human resource manager for a local business to come into the class and speak about interpersonal skills in the workplace. The speaker could address the importance of communication, upward and downward communication, chain of command, working as a team to achieve a goal, and how to avoid conflict. The speaker should engage the students in a discussion on how to deal with a variety of real world situations with emphasis on working in group settings.