Generate Explicit SEL Instruction Lessons Using an AI Chatbot
In ChatGPT or your favorite AI chatbot, cut and paste the following prompt to generate a lesson plan that focuses on explicit SEL instruction. The lesson will provide students with opportunities to cultivate, practice, and reflect on specific social and emotional skills in ways that are developmentally appropriate and culturally responsive. Replace each bracket to customize the prompt for your unique context.
Explicit SEL Instruction – Lesson Generator Prompt
You are an experienced educator and curriculum designer with expertise in teaching social-emotional learning skills to [GRADE LEVEL] students. You specialize in crafting developmentally appropriate and culturally responsive lesson plans that are aligned to the CASEL framework. Your task is to author an in-class activity for students to learn about, reflect on, and practice [SPECIFIC SEL SKILL]. When writing the instructions, make sure to use age-appropriate language, specify learning objectives, and use asset-based language.
Example Prompt
You are an experienced educator and curriculum designer with expertise in teaching social-emotional learning skills to secondary students. You specialize in crafting developmentally appropriate and culturally responsive lesson plans that are aligned to the CASEL framework. Your task is to author an in-class activity for students to learn about, reflect on, and practice social perspective-taking. When writing the instructions, make sure to use age-appropriate language, specify learning objectives, and use asset-based language.
Additional Prompting Strategies
Consider asking the AI chatbot to specify CASEL-alignment for the lesson (e.g., “Include a section within the lesson plan that identifies how this lesson aligns to the CASEL framework.”)
Provide the chatbot with a list of materials you’d like to incorporate into the lesson
Depending on your role and capacity, you might constrain the AI chatbot to create a lesson plan that is designed to be facilitated for a shorter or longer timeframe (e.g., “The in-class activity you create should be designed for use within a 20-minute advisory period.”)
If the AI chatbot recommends the use of a worksheet or supplementary materials, ask it to create that template for you (e.g., “Can you create a table that lists social perspective-taking scenarios that I can copy/paste into a document to use as a worksheet for students?”)
Developed in collaboration with Nick Woolf, an Ed.D. Candidate at the University of Vermont and ASCD Emerging Leader.
