16 YouTube Videos for Morning Meeting
Showing short YouTube videos and songs is one of my favorite activities to use during morning meetings. Video and songs are a quick, to the point way to get a morning meeting discussion started, to enhance students’ understanding of the topic, or to continue to build on previous discussions when you don’t have time for a full morning meeting!
If you are looking for a way to spice up your morning meetings OR are ever short on time but want to impart an important community-building message to your students at the start of your day, I highly recommend the following videos for morning meetings!
My morning meeting lessons are focused on personal development, character education ideals, and social-emotional skills, and I organize my upper elementary morning meetings through theme-based units.
I LOVE using short, engaging videos because they can impart a key message in a short amount of time! A song or video helps me introduce new themes, offers students mentor songs and lyrics related to the theme, and is part of developing text-to-text connections (which I incorporate into my morning meeting units to get more bang for my buck and piggyback on my literacy instruction). Students LOVE learning from the short stories or advice in these videos.
If you are not familiar with my theme-based morning meetings, here’s a snapshot of the goals I have for morning meetings (you’ll also see some of the themes and topics in bold):
setting the foundation for how we treat one another through topics like belonging, friendship, kindness, and compassion
helping students develop empathy and understanding of classmates that they may not be friends or “friendly” with
creating a space and forum for resolving conflict, providing students with the skills to solve conflicts appropriately, and for understanding the benefits of compromise
encouraging students to develop perseverance, growth mindsets, and provide opportunities for goal setting and reflection
encouraging the development of positive character traits like courage, integrity, and responsibility
helping students develop their emotional intelligence and intrinsic motivation abilities to respond to life’s challenges
LET’S GET ON TO THE VIDEO SUGGESTIONS! (Note: I’ve included Amazon affiliate links so that you can easily find any books I mention! As a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, I may earn advertising fees at no cost to you by linking to amazon.com. Read my full disclosure here. )
16+ VIDEOS TO USE DURING YOUR MORNING MEETINGS
(NOTE: All of these videos are hosted on YouTube. You should preview ANY video for appropriateness before you choose to show it to your students.)
Why 16 videos you may ask? Well, I have identified 16 themes that I use during morning meeting lessons. I teach students about each theme for 2-3 weeks. (Yes, many other themes could be included in this list, but the topics I've focused on have a lot of utility with upper elementary students!) I’ve listed one of my favorite videos for each of the morning meeting themes that I teach in my classroom.
1) A SENSE OF BELONGING
A sense of belonging is the very first theme that I introduce to my students. I use this theme to set the expectation that we create an environment where everyone feels welcome and that they belong. I enlist my students to consider ways that we can help others feel that they fit in. I ABSOLUTELY LOVE how “zfrank1” describes feeling like an outsider, different, and as if something was wrong with him when he was younger in his video called “Fitting In Cardboard.” I think a lot of students can relate to this video! You can read about my first Belonging lesson at this blog post, Setting a Foundation for a Strong Classroom Community through Belonging Themed Lessons.
2) KINDNESS
Kindness is one of the most obvious morning meeting topics to bring into your discussions. While I am a proponent of teaching lessons in kindness, I typically introduce kindness as a precursor to my compassion-themed morning meeting unit. I really like to get right on to my compassion lessons and I’ll share why in the next section.
“Kindness Boomerang—One Day” is my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE video to use during morning meetings—like, it gives me chills and reminds me of why I became a teacher! The lyrics of the song are so inspiring—”One Day”—you just have to listen for yourself! The great thing about this video is that it can be viewed through many lenses—kindness and compassion would be the main ways I’d have my students think about this video, but it also mentions elements of conflict resolution, peace, courage, etc.
3) COMPASSION
Compassion is an important morning meeting topic to introduce to 4th grade and 5th grade students. While acts of kindness often come from a place of making ourselves “feel good,” acting on compassion means that we have “recognized the suffering of another human being,” have empathy for what they are going through, and are compelled to act because of that empathy and recognition. It is important to bring the vocabulary of compassion into our classroom so that students have a deeper version and understanding of kindness; it is compassion that guides us in the actions that we can take to most support and help those around us.
Compassion is about being “in-tune” and conscious of the needs of others. I want my students to learn so much more than the importance of a kind deed or a “random act” of kindness—I want my students to think outside of themselves and to be able to relate to the needs and feelings of others on a deeper level. I’ve shared lessons and ideas from my Compassion Themed Morning Meeting unit in this blog post.
4) PERSEVERANCE
Finish Strong featuring “Eye of the Tiger” Long before growth mindset became an educational phenomenon (and an amazing one at that!), I realized that my students needed to be encouraged to persevere through the “hard parts” of so many aspects of their education. I was constantly talking about “being perseverant” and not giving up during math lessons and trying to develop my students’ awareness of how things that presented themselves as difficult at first became things that they soon mastered.
This video shows many examples of famous people who overcame adversity and persevered to accomplish great feats and accomplish their dreams. It is super inspiring and perfect for a short morning meeting discussion!
GOT CONFLICT?! Ha, do we ever?! Conflict seems to pop up out of no-where in our classrooms! This short Tim and Moby video explains that conflict is unavoidable and natural but that there are ways to disagree with one another in a respectful and productive way. Tim gives a lot of great suggestions for how to find solutions to common conflicts that students encounter.
During our RESOLVING CONFLICT morning meeting unit, we brainstorm classroom routines and strategies for dealing with common conflicts. I teach students 6 Steps for Resolving Conflict based on a list I found online, but students and myself take the list of steps and make them our own to work for our classroom.
6) INTEGRITY
If you haven’t hear of the “Because I Said I Would” movement, this is an excellent video to share with your students. I often use this video to launch/introduce the topic to help students develop an understanding of what integrity is, which is important because it’s a term that many students may not have heard or developed a deep understanding of in the past.
If you’re looking for ways to teach your students about integrity, I’ve shared more ideas for Integrity lessons in this blog post.
Who couldn’t use a little more HAPPINESS in our classrooms and every day lives?! In “A Very Happy Brain” , we hear the story of “Broody” an unhappy brain that learned how to become very happy. He learns to defeat fear and self-doubt, strategies for becoming more grateful and compassionate (keys to deeper happiness), and learned that “brains that feel safe and worthy become happier.” To be honest, this video is #GOALS for me personally, and I love how teaching my students important life skills during morning meetings also benefit me as a person. Seriously, watch this video a few times! You won’t regret it!
To extend the lesson, you could allow students to share what questions they have and extend their learning through research or teaching them more about how the brain and our emotions work! Dr. Sood also has an 18 minute Tedx Talk that you may find valuable! Want more resources? Check out my Happiness/Joy Morning Meeting Unit!
Wanting to be appreciated as an individual and the desire to fit in are at constant odds with one another for our upper elementary students. This video titled “Identity,” is one that I find perfect for the theme of “belonging” and “individualism.” It is obvious that the main character does not feel that she fits in with everyone else as she walks the halls and notices various groups in her school. Students are seen wearing different masks, staring at a poster of a woman wearing a mask that represents “This is what beautiful looks like,” and changing their masks to fit into new groups.
On a basic level, you can discuss whether or not the main character feels that she fits in and what she means by “Today, I found the truth.” If you have more time, you can help your students analyze some of the symbols and metaphors used in the video—Plato’s allegory of a slave being enlightened, the mission of freeing those still trapped in the metaphorical cave, and a game of chess with pawns to be used by others. Want more resources for this topic? Check out my Individualism Morning Meeting Unit here.
9) COMPROMISE
The ability to compromise is deeply connected to how possible it is for students to solve their conflicts. This quick video provides two simplistic examples of what it means to compromise. In the first scene, two boys are arguing over the rules of a game. A voice-over explains the problem and points out that compromising might be necessary to solve their problem and offers a few strategies for doing so.
The second scene shows what happens when the boys are arguing over a small issue in the car and the narrator points out a suggestion to make things seem more fair. The video is a little under 2 minutes, so it's a great one to show students as an example of compromise to spark some discussion. (Full disclosure, I had a lot of trouble finding an “excellent” video to represent compromising in hard situations where one may not want to compromise their wants or beliefs because they think their idea is the best or right thing to do. If you know of a better video for compromise that works for upper elementary students, please share!!!) If you are looking for done-for-you resources on compromise, check out my Compromise Morning Meeting Unit.
10) GOAL SETTING
Teaching children how to think about and set goals and develop personal action plans for working on or achieving those goals is my jam! I began integrating personal goal setting into my classroom right from the start. “One Step at a Time” is the perfect video to introduce or enhance your students’ understanding of setting goals.
This hand-drawn video imparts many great messages about goal setting—that it requires “step-by-step progress,” “takes focused effort over time,” and that we can move forward by thinking about “one step at a time” rather than getting overwhelmed. Around minute 1:38, the doodler writes in example goals that a person may have. Since these goals skew towards adults, I’d take the time to generate a list of goals students may have that are big enough that the “one step at a time” strategy would be beneficial.
During my goal setting unit, students rate themselves on a number of academic, personal, and social-emotional areas. Based on that reflection, students to brainstorm goals related to academics, social and behavioral interactions, and a personal area and I guide them to come up with strategies for achieving that goal.
11) FRIENDSHIP
Our Friendship morning meeting unit has a big focus on symbolism, and this Friendship soup video is a great way to introduce the topic! What would your students put in “Friendship Soup”? Be sure to generate a list of ingredients before showing this video to your students!
I love sharing this video with students because we also read The Fruit Salad Friend by Maria Desmondy during our unit. Then, students come up with their own symbol to represent friendship after we read The Big Umbrella by Amy June Bates.
Our Friendship morning meeting unit has a big focus on symbolism. Friendship is one of my favorite topics to discuss with upper elementary students because although students think they understand “friendship,” there’s still such a depth of opportunity for us to develop a greater understanding of what friendship truly means and how it enhances our lives.
12) COURAGE
"Have Courage and Be Fearless" is one of my favorites. It features an upper elementary school-age girl who is super personable and engaging to watch. She gives several examples of fears that she has overcome because she powered through and had courage.
This video is a great choice to use if you want to initiate a classroom discussion about times that students have needed courage to accomplish something. You may also be interested in this courage demonstration I do with my students and learning more about the 4 types of courage and more ideas for teaching courage.
Upper elementary students * sometimes * struggle with managing their emotions—stress, anxiety and worry, anger, jealousy, sadness, even excitement—can be tough emotions to manage! I address all of these emotions in my Managing Emotions Morning Meeting Unit.
I especially like to highlight anxiety because it is an emotion that I think all students can relate to but often have trouble identifying and verbalizing. I love this Fight, Flight, Freeze video explaining the different ways anxiety can present itself and why it is a normal biological response, even if it is one that feels uncomfortable. Teaching students to better managing their emotions is truly a skill that can improve the quality of their lives.
14) RESPONSIBILITY
Oh, the struggles of lack of responsibility with upper elementary students and how that wreaks havoc on our classroom environments and our personal stress as teachers! It’s so important that we discuss responsibility as a topic and that we give our students time to process how they can act with responsibility in unique situations.
"Be Responsible" is a good motivational video about the importance of taking responsibility of one's condition or circumstances, and therefore one's life. The speaker stresses that the moment someone blames someone or something else for their circumstances, they are giving their power away! This pep talk encourages people to take control of their lives by taking responsibility and being the driver of their own lives. If you’re interested in more resources for the classroom on this topic, check out my Responsibility Morning Meeting Unit here.
Intrinsic motivation is one of my favorite morning meeting topics. I like to address motivation head on to help students take ownership of their potential and learn to rely on outside motivations less often. "Never give up, Believe in yourself!" is one of those videos that will either give you chills or bring tears to your eyes.
The viewer sees hundreds of examples of people of all ages who are trying, failing, and sticking with something that is important to them while you hear various voices talking about setting goals, finding happiness within, never giving up, etc. There are SO many great quotes in this video clip that I recommend watching it again and again with students. One of my favorite quotes is, "Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you." This video is a "must share" with students!
During our Intrinsic Motivation unit, students rate themselves on a list of statements about motivation (like, “Praise is really important to me.”), generate lists of personal “motivators” and “de-motivators,” decide if certain scenarios represent intrinsic or extrinsic motivation, flip an extrinsically motivated situation to be intrinsic, and more! Students truly develop an understanding of motivation during this unit!
16) GROWTH MINDSET
Tons and tons of videos focused on Growth Mindset now exist, so it was hard to choose one Growth Mindset video for this list. However, I found John Spencer’s animations and explanation of growth mindset to be a great introduction for students. Key concepts about growth mindset are presented on a level that students can understand! Check it out and share it with your students!
GM is one of my favorite topics to help my students learn about. (Have I said that 16 times yet?!) I’ve made my entire Growth Mindset unit resources a free download for you! Be sure to subscribe below if you are interested in getting these free growth mindset teaching materials.
QUICK TIP FOR SHOWING VIDEOS!
As you plan to incorporate videos into your morning meeting routines, be sure to find opportunities to show them again and again! Often times, I will show a video without much of an introduction, ask students what they noticed when the video ends, and then show the video again to see what else they pick up on. While students are watching the video, I can jot down discussion questions and follow up ideas to plan for my future morning meetings.
Creating a strong classroom community and teaching for social and emotional growth through morning meeting is so important to the function of our classroom and the well-being of our students. I hope this list of videos gives you some new ideas and topics to discuss during your morning meetings!
A Bit More about Theme-Based Morning Meetings
My morning meeting topics are taught through theme-based morning meeting lessons. I focus on one topic or theme for 1-3 weeks (depending on how deeply I want to investigate the topic with my students and based on how greatly my students need to develop their abilities in that area).
I have developed each of these morning meeting topics into morning meeting theme sets that utilize picture books, online videos, group discussions, theme-related quotations, key vocabulary, suggested activities, student journal pages, and much more. Not only do I teach my students about the themes listed above, but through morning meeting topics designed around common themes in literature, I am able to enhance and teach quite a bit of my ELA standards.
THEMES TO GUIDE YOUR MORNING MEETINGS ALL YEAR
If you’d like more social emotional theme units with a focus on encouraging students’ social, emotional, and academic success, you may be interested in the Morning Meeting Mega Bundle of 17 theme units. With units focused on kindness, compassion, growth mindset, gratitude, perseverance, responsibility, managing emotions, and so much more, your engaging morning meeting plans are done for you and your students will love them! Also, each of my theme-sets include a secret YouTube playlist with a handful of videos that you can use when teaching about those topics! The work of searching YouTube is done for you! You can save 10% on the Mega Bundle of all 17 themes with the code MM10.
FREE MORNING MEETING PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
If you want to learn more about theme-based morning meetings, you can sign up for my “Getting More out of Morning Meeting” professional development where I go into detail about my morning meeting routine, the importance and benefits of theme-based morning meetings, and tips and advice on scheduling morning meetings into your school day. If you want to learn more about the training before signing up, you can read the details here.
As we all know, online content is always changing. If you have found any outstanding videos that help teach students one of the themes above, please share the wealth with us all in the comments!
