This giveaway is now closed. Congratulations to our winner, Nancy! This month we’re thrilled to give away a complete set of the five books in the Zach Rules series, including the newest title, Zach Stands Up. One lucky reader will win:
To Enter: Leave a comment below telling us how you help children learn important life skills. This giveaway is now closed.
For additional entries, leave a separate comment below for each of the following tasks you complete:
Each comment counts as a separate entry—that’s four chances to win! Entries must be received by midnight, June 22, 2018.
The winner will be contacted via email on or around June 25, 2018, and will need to respond within 72 hours to claim his or her prize or another winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way affiliated with, administered, or endorsed by Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest. Winner must be a US resident, 18 years of age or older.
We welcome your comments and suggestions. Share your comments, stories, and ideas below, or contact us. All comments will be approved before posting, and are subject to our comment and privacy policies.
© 2018 by Free Spirit Publishing. All rights reserved.
I believe in modeling, then talking simply about relationship skills.
Our students could use these books independently to think about making wiser choices with interacting with classmates.
I’m an elementary school counselor & love these books for helping support children! The visuals and ideas are fantastic! Great add to anyone’s library!
I’m a therapist working with children and families teaching social skills, coping skills, emotion regulation, effective communication, etc. I work with a variety of issues related to mental health and run a group with 3-5 year olds on teaching social-emotional skills.
I work at a public library where we help foster a love of reading.
I work at a library and we are having a summer program with different activities each week.. think this would come in so handy
These books are a great visual for students and a fun and easy way to connect to tricky things in life, socially. I have read these great books before with students and they love them! I am a general education teacher, but love incorporating literature that has a social connection as well…double bang for my buck!
One way that I help children develop life skills such as cooking and cleaning is by giving them opportunities to help with this roles at home and in the community. Helping with a donation drive teaches compassion, giving, and teamwork.
I’m a mentor in a once-a-week after school program for elementary students. We help with homework and reading, life skills, etc., plus the kids get a hearty snack and playtime. Read more about us at PathToShine.org
The kids in our group will enjoy these books.
I am a “steps” person, so anytime I can teach a complicated skill and break it into (ideally) 3 steps I do. The Zach books (I have Zach Gets Frustrated & Zach Makes Mistakes so I would give these to a school counseling colleague) do this really well. My students easily remember the steps in these two books so I find them incredibly helpful in individual counseling.
I teach the Step Ahead program once a week in grades 1 -6
I’m a restorative practices facilitator, I love how the books are easy to understand and have a character that is identifiable to young children
Working with students with disabilities, we are using situations throughout the day to promote life skills and reflection. Our students can struggle with change and so we use visual, verbal, gestural and physical prompting to assist them. We use AAC devices for those who struggle with speech. We model work for students to follow. We have Circle Time, where our students discuss strategies to use in everyday situations, based on our school values of Be Safe, Be Responsible, Be Respectful. We work closely with families to support them too.
I’m a Speech/Language Pathologist who works with kids K-12. I have so many students that these books would help. I do social skill groups and individual training as well both in school and at my outpatient pediatric job as well.
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As a school counselor myself I would love to use get these books for my daughters small preschool!
I help the children in my daycare learn life skills by example. Throughout the day we talk and read books on life skills.
I hold parent/child events to show parents how to use books to teach life lessons and enjoy reading at the same time!
One way that I help children learn these life lessons, is to model them. I play with the children, and if I make a mistake, I stop, say I made a mistake, and I apologize. I do this while talking about the steps, and how an apology is more than words it is trying to make something right. I also prompt and support children as they work through these steps.
Our students are all deaf/ hard of hearing and often miss social clues that would help solve a challenging problem or relieve anxiety through self-advocacy. Books help us directly teach these skills and help our students expand their world as they learn they are not alone.
We use Conscious Discipline which would work well with the Zack books
Sometimes, educators forget that students have a lot more to deal with outside of school in addition to being held accountable for their own learning. This series would allow me to implement mini-lessons centered around hot, critical topics such as bullying and/or peer pressure.
Students can also independently read the series and take Accelerated Reader quizzes to assess their understanding.
At least once per week, my students and I hold discussions that are not content related, but focus on being well rounded outside of school. In addition, each morning students are reminded what good citizens are through inspirational-life quotes.
As a school counselor, I work with grades K-2 on developing social skills in individual, small-group and classroom counseling lessons. I try to use engaging books and then do an activity to reenforce what was taught. 🙂
I use social skills and bibliotherapy, but most recently I have been incorporating a lot of mindfulness activities into my work with my students.
As a childcare provider, teaching young children social skills is a necessity to provide them with resources and knowledge of how to navigate the world around them.
We often learn life lessons through books we read together in kindergarten. I love leading class discussions with one or two deep questions that get the children talking about how they could change what happened in the book, or how we could do the same as the model character did in the book.
These are exactly the materials I like to use best to teach important life lessons because Zach is so relatable.
I am a therapist in an outpatient clinic. I use bibliotherapy, play therapy and music therapy to help kids problem solve and learn new skills.
This is always needed in my classroom, helping students learn social skills will help them for years to come.
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I serve toddlers at a ministry daycare as their social emotional coach, I model the behaviors and I name emotions as I see opportunities to show them what the feeling looks like.
This series is honestly the best group of books I use to teach the core resiliency and character skills at the early elementary level. Thanks for publishing it!
I teach 3K-8th grade. We all make mistakes and do things we shouldn’t do. Zach looks like a great series to help all of us navigate life.
I support children in learning important life skills by modeling appropriate behavior and recognizing it in them.
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Reading books help get the topic of character education and important life lessons started. Reading a story gets students thinking of a time when these situations happened to them. We can then discuss how they felt, how they handled it, and how they can handle these situations differently.
I teach Kindergarten and teach important life skills through a daily morning meeting, using Boy’s Town and PBIS lessons. After learning new skills, I encourage students to use them when opportunities present themselves, during the day. I also support them as they problem solve.
I teach life skills to my preschool class by reading quality books such as those published by Free Spirit and then having the children play act the situations discussed in the book for reinforcement.
I like to use picture books to teach students essential SEL skills.
I guide children ages 4 – 6 in my Montessori Children’s House classroom. Many of the children face challenges related to trauma. I would like to offer them stories that can help them identify their feelings and how to develop positive prosocial behaviour. These books will help me offer them important lessons that they can use throughout their lives.
The Zack Rules series will appeal to many children and teach them life lessons.
Our school participates in the Positivity Project. Each week we focus on different character traits that help us to problem solve and develop our character.
As the school Counselor, I teach social skills
Lessons to the students. This year a big
Focus I plan to teach the students is friendship/conflict skills so I can’t wait to use the book Zach Apologizes.
I help children learn social skills through specific social skills training/curriculum and then following up in everyday life.
Get down at their level and have the child observe the expression of the other and talk about feelings ie look at Zach’s Face. He looks sad because you took the toy he was playing with….
I am the special ed coordinator and school social worker in my district. I hope that what I do everyday improves the lives of children!
I help students in the classroom, small groups, and individually by playing games and discussing books. I help my own little ones by talking about feelings and reading lots of good books!
The way I teach important life skills to my children is to role play. Playing in dramatic play center with children is the best way to get them to fully understand and learn life skills. You can model behaviors and give examples on how to deal with different situations.
I teach PreK, and social emotional learning is part of our curriculum, I use purchased the book, Zach Gets Frustrated, and I’ve used it several times during my lessons.
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Through individual and group sessions I work with students on a variety os social and emotional areas. I often try to use books as part of my approach and have used some of these borrowed by colleagues. Would love to have my own!
I give my preschoolers the proper words to use, and practice LOTS of patience as they learn appropriate social skills.
I also follow on Twitter. @optimusgal
I follow on FB.
I facilitate a club for children which emphasizes life skills as part of the curriculum.
I teach PreK which is an important time for young children to develop socio-emotional skills. In our class, we have lessons to rehearse skills to manage our emotions appropriately and to practice problem solving with our peers. Additionally, we use a Concious Discipline approach when problems arise to support children as they practice these skills in everyday settings.
My library classes learn to recognize behaviors that need modifying best through books like these. When they see a character like Zach doing something they recognize the right and the wrong. It is so much easier to talk about how to change someone else’s behavior. Children love Zach and identify with his life experiences without experiencing “quilt”. Even my three year old students identify with these books.
I continue teaching important life skills to the School aged children at my center, Growing Green. Even though they are older, I feel it’s needed more. Kids have lost manners, morals, and values over the years and I am here to continue instilling these important characteristics into them.
I teach students with low IQs, some behaviors and sensory needs. We work on social skills each day. My students need many visuals. This book series would benefit their learning and be a great addition to my other items.
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We have a therapeutic child care that emphasizes social emotional development.
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As a teacher, I hold community circle meetings where I share books that start conversations on topics such anger and frustration. These books look like they would be great additions to my collection.
I work with families and child care providers. I help to mentor and coach them on various topics in early childhood education and development. I often times will meet with parents individually to help with specialized situations. These books would help me so much in my work with families and also child care providers in that we could use these stories to relate them to everyday life and talk about ways to work through conflicts/issues/troubles.
I work with kids with special needs as an occupational therapist and focus on social emotional learning. I teach mindfulness classes to students preschool through 5th grade and I think this book series would be a great addition to what I am teaching!
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I teach life skills through discussion, role play, and social games.
As a librarian and ensure that my community has access to programming and materials and support proper social-emotional growth! That Zach series would be a welcome addition to the other Free Spirit titles our library circulates.
Liked on Facebook and following too:)
My students spend time learning the important skills in life by practice through roll playing and by stories that I share with them.
Thank you for the opportunity to receive these. I train per-service teachers and I’m always looking for resources that they can see first hand and know where to go to for quality resources!
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I am a Family Child Care Provider with limited resources. This book series would really be a great addition to my program library. Reading this series to my PreK children would help them tremendously in their social & emotional development.
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These would be perfect for our center.
I teach students important life lessons in the classroom by reading books, doing role plays, and with group projects. Last year our 5th graders worked in groups to make and present posters based on the Zach Rules books. Zach Makes Mistakes and Zach Apologizes are favorites of mine for 4th and 2nd grades.
For many situations in life, we read books to help my child understand the situation. Once we are facing the situation, I discuss with him how he’s feeling about it, and try to respond to his feelings best I can.
I work on a referral basis as a Child and Youth Worker with our school board’s Learning Support Services. The students I work with are struggling with self regulation skills, anger management skills, anxiety and communication skills. I work with our students with highest needs. I assist their educators to better understand what their lagging skills are and assist in empowering these students to practice socially expected behaviours to help them cope with their upset emotions. These books would be very helpful in my career.
As a school counselor, I am constantly looking for new resources. These books would be great to add to my library. I help students with social emotional learning, conflict management, social and friendship skills, and much more.
By reading books that have real life situations, it helps the children realize that it is okay to feel a certain way but there might be better ways to handle difficult situations.
We help Infants and Toddlers learn their important life skills early to help them be successful in life when older. Those early years are so important.
I work for a non profit, partnering with elementary schools to bring SEL skills to students using teacher coaching, modeling, small group direct service and community building sessions.
I love helping children learn life skills and build relationships. I believe this is a very, very important part of education! It is so important to take time daily to do this and to get to know your kiddos, this then allows learning and academics to take place and be more successful!
I work as a school psychologist at the elementary school level and spend time with students in classrooms, small groups, and also 1:1 teaching friendship skills, self-regulation, problem solving, etc. Books are a great jumping off point to teach these skills.
I work with children and I know the importance of life skills and reading is very important.
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I work with students from Kindergarten to fifth grade and a constant way for them to develop life skills is reading about the daily life of other kids just like them, who have the same problems or face the same situations, it makes them become more independent, develop his self-esteem, and socialization. Also make them think about how to manage different situations.
That’s why I think that winning this collection will be FANTASTIC!
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I teach students who struggle in reading, and I make sure to create an environment that is safe from any kind of ridicule, sarcasm or other emotionally stressful comments so they can thrive and learn without fear of making mistakes in front of others.
I am an early childhood/ school-age consultant- always looking for new resources to help the classroom teachers!
My organization, HumaneEducator.com was founded to partner with teachers and homeschool parents to bring humane education principals such as compassion, empathy and respect. We do that by i tegrating these principals into the existing academic curriculum for literature and mathematics and social studies.
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Awesome idea for a series of books these would be great for my classroom guidance lessons.
As a school social worker, materials like books, art activities and problem solving scenarios and games are creative ways that I work with my students to help them master important life skills. As a parent, modeling is everything! Taking the time to model, teach and assist with practical life skills is important for the littlest members of our families.
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I orchestrate a weekly Toddler Time at my library and we focus on things like paying attention, putting things away, taking turns, AND having wild, crazy dance parties. I try to teach them how to be able to socialize, ramp up behavior for physical activities, and ramp back down for listening and doing craft activities.
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I love helping all kids by encouraging them to live, laugh, love and learn. As that is exactly how they help me! Your books are amazing, inspiring and educational! Thank you for this opportunity to continue my community outreach!
Lisa Elam
I’m a therapist that works with children ages 4-18 with behavioral issues, struggle with appropriate social skills, have family issues, and those that have had trauma in their lives. I love using books as interventions and aids in my therapy. There’s nothing better than finding the right books to help them see that things can be different – and from their viewpoint!
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I will be moving from a district consultant role into a classroom teacher role. I look forward to helping children to learn these important life lessons – I have learned a bit from all of you that have posted here! Thanks for the help!
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I offer an interactive, experiential learning, Story Time for Early Learners!
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I teach classroom lessons and run small groups to help students learn important life skills.
I am a school social worker and love working with kids K-5 about expected behaviors. Books are a great way in helping kids work on expected behaviors!
I am a school counselor at 2 elementary schools. I help my students learn important life skills by reading books with them and discussing the themes. I also use social stories.
I like to teach my students life skills through leadership training. I like the book The 7 Habits for Happy Kids by Sean Covey. It sets a great tone of leadership and teaches us how to treat others for the year, and hopefully for life.
I am a second grade teacher in a rural school. I am always in need of great resources to reach students and support their social and emotional skills. It is one thing to have a discussion and another to involve students in the process.
The Zach rules series hits the target with a very boy friendly protagonist that solves social problems!
I work in an inclusive pre school and we are always helping/sharing ideas to give children ways to understand and cope.
As a school counselor, I continue to work with students by helping to empower themselves to grow socially, emotionally and academically. My fellow school counselor and I teach school counseling classes, meet individually with students and provide small groups. Our jobs are evolving and changing daily with the needs. We are always seeking great resources to keep ourselves up to date and current. Love this position!
One thing I started in this previous quarter was going in to the EC classroom once a week for 30 minutes to go over different life skill lessons with them. We usually read a book and do an activity. I am so excited to continue this into next year.
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Role-playing scenarios & chores around the house are easy way for kids to learn the important of key skills.
I am a School Social Worker at 2 Elementary Buildings. These books would be very helpful in sharing with my students in many small groups that I run daily. Not only would it be beneficial behaviorally for them, but they love to read along with me and take turns reading every other page to enhance their reading fluency.
Sometimes after a story time in the library, we reflect on the the behavior of the characters. What could have been done differently by the characters to be helpful, empathize or make things better for all? I try to choose answers from students who don’t usual volunteer if possible.
I teach resource and these would be perfect for my students. Also, my son is named Zach!
Reading books about tough subjects helps me teach me children important life skills in addition to trying to model them in our everyday lives
I LOVE helping children learn important life lessons! I go in to classrooms monthly/weekly for some and discuss character education. This discussion happens either through Peace Circles or a whole group traditional lesson plan….so much fun!!