Friendship Lesson Plan for Special Education: Being a Good Friend
A friendship lesson where students practice sharing, inviting, and helping with a real peer during a partner build, with each opportunity scored.
- Social Skills
- Ages 6-10
- Group of 5
- 30 minutes
- Free printable PDF
Page 1 of 2. Page 2 is the data sheet.
What’s inside this plan
Objective: Students will name and practice three friendly actions, sharing, inviting, and helping, with a peer during a structured partner activity.
The goal it serves: Given a picture scenario, the student will identify one friendly action and perform it with a peer during a structured activity, with no more than one prompt, in 4 of 5 opportunities.
- 5 min Warm-Up
- 6 min Direct Instruction & Modeling
- 9 min Guided Practice
- 7 min Independent Practice
- 3 min Closure
Supports on the table: Social Story, Visual Countdown, Token Board, Positive Reinforcement, Choice Board. Differentiated three ways (more support, on level, more challenge), with accommodations and a per-student data sheet at an 80% accuracy target.
Frequently asked questions
- What friendship skills does this lesson plan teach?
- Three concrete actions rather than the idea of friendship: share a piece, invite a peer in, and help. Naming three observable actions is what makes the skill teachable and scoreable; being nice is not something you can take data on.
- Why does the building set have missing pieces?
- On purpose. A complete set removes the reason to share, so students perform the action for the teacher instead of for each other. Shorting the set makes sharing the natural way to finish the build.
- What if a student will not work with a peer yet?
- The more-support lane starts with an adult as the partner and one action only, with a scripted sentence strip to hand over. Move to a peer once the script is comfortable, not before.
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