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This small group will take place at Spring Hill Primary School, where the mascot is the Panthers. This small group, aimed at improving participants' abilities to make friends and be a good friend, will be called Panther Pals. This name will be easy for young students to remember, which is important because group members will not be older than second grade. It is important for students to feel like they belong and have peer connections at school.

Panther Pals will work together to learn what social skills make a good friend and why it is important to be a good friend to others. Good friends show kindness with their words and actions, respect others' personal spaces, and look for ways to make others feel included. Everyone has the power to be a good friend. Let's learn what it means to be a Panther Pal!

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Upon completion of the Panther Pals small group, students will have mastered the following ASCA (2021) behaviors...

M1. Belief in development of whole self, including a healthy balance of mental, social/emotional, and physical well-being.

M2. Sense of acceptance, respect, support, and inclusion for self and others in the school environment.

B-SMS 1. Responsibility for self and actions.

B-SMS 2. Self-discipline and self control.

B-SMS 3. Independent work.

B-SMS 5. Perseverance to achieve long-term and short-term goals.

B-SMS 6. Ability to identify and overcome barriers.

B-SMS 9. Personal safety skills.

B-SS 1. Effective oral and written communication skills and listening skills.

B-SS 2. Positive, respectful, and supportive relationships with students who are similar to and different from them.

B-SS 3. Positive relationships with adults to support success.

B-SS 5. Ethical decision making and social responsibility.

B-SS 7. Leadership and teamwork skills to work effectively in diverse groups.

B-SS 8. Advocacy skills for self and others and ability to assert self when necessary.

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Potential members of Panther Pals will be identified through teacher referrals. The counselor will send an informational email in early September asking for teachers to identify students who could benefit from a small group emphasizing making friends, improving social skills, and encouraging connectedness to the school. Once potential participants are identified, the counselor will send a google form asking the student’s teacher for more information about the student to make sure he/she will be a good fit for this particular small group.

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Once potential participants have been referred by teachers, the counselor will meet with these students individually to see if this group would be the right fit for him/her. If it is deemed the student would be a successful part of Panther Pals, the counselor will ask the student if he/she is willing to be a part of this small group focused on being a being a good friend and feeling connected to the school and others. If the student is willing, the counselor will then send home a letter of consent to parents.

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The counselor will send home an informational letter about Panther Pals with each potential participant, explaining the group’s purpose and goals. Attached to this letter will be a consent form that parents will need to sign before a student can join Panther Pals. This letter of consent will include the group’s beginning and ending dates, as well as the weekly meeting times. The letter will also explain the importance of confidentiality to the parents should their child share things about another student.

The counselor will need to also make sure the participant's parents have signed the Routine Mental Health consent form on Skyward that is now required under Senate Bill 12 for all students that the counselor interacts with.

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The counselor will explain to participants that there will be rules that each student will need to follow in order for the small group to be successful. Students must listen when the counselor is speaking or when another group member is speaking. The group should make sure every person in the group has a chance to share if they desire, because every member of the group is important. Students should also understand that everything that is shared within the group should not be discussed outside of the group. The counselor should ask the students if they have any other rules they think would be important to add as well.

Attached is an example of what a participant ground rules form could look like (Missouri Professional School Counselors and Counselor Educators, 2015).

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The three stages of group therapy are setting norms and building trust, working together to meet goals, and then ending the group (Missouri Professional School Counselors and Counselor Educators, 2015).

During the first stage of Panther Pals, the counselor will work towards building trust between the students. The participants will play ice-breaker games to get to know each other and discuss things they have in common. The counselor will explain that part of building trust with other people within the group is treating them with respect and showing kindness. With students of this age, respect looks like listening when someone speaks, not making fun of them, saying kind words, and encouraging each other. The counselor will make it clear that students who do not show respect or follow the set rules of the group will not be allowed to continue being a part of the group.

The second stage of Panther Pals will be where the counselor helps students really explore what being a good friend looks like. They will do group activities to practice their knowledge of kind words versus unkind words. They will be challenged to work together on a group activity while having good social skills, like sharing and using appropriate voice volume, and respecting others' personal space. The counselor will monitor each student's progress throughout the group, making note of the number of times each student has to be corrected and the number of times students show positive behaviors.

The counselor will make sure students are aware of when the third stage of the group will take place. Students need to understand when their last group will be and be ready to have closure. During the last group session, the students will do an activity that will allow each student to leave with a paper heart filled with positive affirmations from other group members and the counselor. This will be something tangible they can take with them to remind them they are important and capable of being a good friend. The counselor will also give each participant a certificate proclaiming that they are a Panther Pal.

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The counselor will use a participative leadership style with the Panther Pals small group. This type of leadership will allow the counselor to build a stronger connection with the students as they participate in the group (Cherry, 2023). This will also allow the counselor to demonstrate appropriate social skills during group activities that students can learn from. Young students will be more willing to participate if the adult counselor is also willing to take part in the activities.

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Yalom (1995) wrote that there are 11 therapeutic factors that group members could experience while participating in small groups. Members of Panther Pals will experience imparting of information as the counselor teaches them about the characteristics of being a good friend who is a valuable part of the school. They have the opportunity to experience altruism as they practice showing kindness to each other. They will also use imitative behavior as they work on developing socializing techniques, another factor explained by Yalom (1995). Students can watch how others are successful at being accepted as a good friend by their words, behaviors, and actions.

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The standards listed within this ASCA (2021) standards and competencies help school counselors across the nation know they are working within appropriate parameters. The standards help school counselors know how to set up their programs and how to manage services like group counseling.

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The counselor will need to make sure that each participant's parent has not only signed the parent consent for the Panther Pals small group, but has also signed the Routine Mental Health consent form that Spring Hill ISD has made available on the student's Skyward account. This consent form was made by the district based on the new Senate Bill 12 guidelines that were just put into place this school year (TEA, 2025).