Project Cornerstone
The vision of the Washington Open Project Cornerstone Program is to continue to build developmental assets in youth by fostering a positive, compassionate, and inclusive community where all kids are intentionally supported by caring adults and feel valued, respected, and known.
- What is Project Cornerstone at WO?
- This Year's Books
- Last Year's Books
- (Paper) Chain of Kindness
- Be Your Class' Project Cornerstone Reader
- More About YMCA Project Cornerstone
What is Project Cornerstone at WO?
At Washington Open, Project Cornerstone’s ABC (Asset Building Champions) program is where caring adults read stories about kindness and respect in the classrooms each month, engage students in discussions, and teach empowerment skills and anti-bullying techniques through activities and play.
One of the many positive benefits of the ABC program is that students can incorporate many of the concepts and skills they’ve learned in elementary school into middle school and beyond. By having everyone understand Project Cornerstone’s common language, students can advocate for themselves when struggling and learn to communicate more effectively with their peers.
This Year's Books
Have You Filled a Bucket Today? (K-2nd)
Buckets, Dippers, and Lids (3rd-4th)
Growing up with a Bucket Full of Happiness (5th)
Social Emotional Learning Message (Relationship Skills)
Have You Filled a Bucket Today? uses a bucket to symbolize our need to be filled everyday with positive experiences. The power of affirming words is captured by the simple concept of bucket filling. By expressing and doing acts of kindness and appreciation, we create happy feelings and good thoughts that fill our bucket and the buckets of others. Kindness is a quality
that doubles when you share it.
With this in mind, students and adults will learn to use the strong visual imagery of bucket filling as a tool to build friendship skills and a climate of kindness and respect school wide.
Simon’s Hook: A Story About Teases and Put-Downs by Karen G. Burnett
Social and Emotional Learning (Responsible Decision Making)
The focus of this book is to help students recognize the choices they have in responding to teasing. It empowers them to avoid perceiving themselves as a powerless victim of hurtful behaviors like name calling. Children can get so involved with their own emotional reaction to a tease that they react impulsively, rewarding the teaser with entertaining reactions that accentuates their feelings of loss of control and power. This book introduces five specific skill to use in response to teasing. These five responses allow youth to choose from a variety of techniques to help them stay in control.
Simon's Hook compares teases to fishing hooks and promotes the idea of swimming free of those hooks by choosing a response that will keep youth feeling free from the teases.
The Recess Queen by Alexis O'Neill
Social and Emotional Learning (Self-Management)
Recess Queen is written entirely in rhyme with the text and illustrations capturing the energy of the playground. Underneath the lighthearted rhyme is the painful reality of mean or bucket dipping behaviors that can occur while “playing.”
In this book, there are 2 main characters.
Mean Jean is lonely and acts out toward other students to cover up her hurt. She is the recess queen. Katie Sue perceives that she has an empty bucket and demonstrates how to build a relationship with Mean Jean by using kindness and empathy. She also uses her lid to prevent Mean Jean from dipping into her bucket and fills Mean Jean’s bucket! Students who are taught social and emotional skills for safe and inclusive play at recess, have more positive attitudes in school and improved academic achievement.
One by Kathryn Otoshi
Social and Emotional Learning
(Responsible Decision-Making Skills and Relationship Skills)
“The theme is acceptance and tolerance. How one voice can count and affect change. Many times, we think, ‘I'm so small. What can I do?’ But we do have an effect!
It's about changing thinking. When one person stands up for something, it might be just enough to tip the next person over and inspire him or her to also stand up.”
Life lessons about boundaries, friendship, and standing up for yourself and others are beautifully illustrated in this month’s ABC book. The author reflects, “Pictures are a glorious way to engage young readers because they understand images before they learn to read. Children's books are all about showing, not telling.” This book will allow students to consider
others’ well-being and practice making safe and constructive choices about relationships.
More Than Peach by Bellen Woodard
Social and Emotional Learning (Relationship Skills)
The Pot by Demi
Social and Emotional Learning
(Self-Awareness and Responsible Decision-Making)
This book explores the concepts of courage, honesty, integrity, responsibility and perseverance (CHIRP). These tools will empower students to value being true to themselves even when it is not easy. This book illustrates the importance of attitude and behavior in building character. Students will understand that the end result isn’t as important as trying your best, to trust in yourself, and listen to your own judgment to make a good decision. CHIRP makes trust bloom.
Say Something by Peter H. Reynolds
Social and Emotional Learning (Relationship Skills and Social Awareness)
Last Year's Books
Champion Year • Empathy:
The focus of these books is Connect with Empathy. By modeling appreciation for different types of people, caring adults can foster understanding, challenge stereotypes, promote equality, and encourage diverse and inclusive communities. It’s important that we guide children in understanding and caring for people who are different from them and who may be facing challenges very different from their own challenges. Embracing and valuing differences leads to a more compassionate and inclusive society.
The Invisible Boy by Trudy Ludwig
SEL Core Competency: Relationship Skills
This book discusses the importance of making everyone feel welcome and included. It helps students develop the ability to establish and maintain healthy and rewarding relationships with a variety of people. Moreover, it allows them to see the perspective of
others, even if their views, experiences, or culture is different.
I Wish You Knew by Jackie Azúa Kramer
SEL Core Competency: Social Awareness
This book promotes the empathy building skills of active listening, examining biases, and perspective taking. The power on connection through empathy helps students improve their mental health by learning to understand underlying issues in a person’s life. The use of active listening allows students to gain insight into the speaker’s experience, encouraging perspective taking and building empathy.
Ruby Bridges Goes to School/Ruby Bridges This is Your Time by Ruby Bridges
SEL Core Competency: Relationship Skills
This book honors those who have the courage to stand tall for equality and social justice. By supporting discussion of intolerance and injustice, students are guided toward actions that will build a more caring, just, inclusive, tolerant, and safe school community for all.
Clovis Keeps His Cool by Katelyn Aronson
SEL Core Competency: Self-Management
This book demonstrates ways to control reactions to strong emotions by using personal power to control response. However, it acknowledges that sometimes one can lose control and lash out. In this story we learn about how to resolve conflict, the importance of second chances, and the power of forgiveness.
Eyes that Kiss in the Corners by Joanna Ho
SEL Core Competency: Self-Awareness
The focus of this book is to embrace gratitude and appreciation for the uniqueness of everyone. By developing an understanding and respect for those different than yourself, you can recognize and cherish your own talents and strengths.
The Dot by Peter H. Reynolds
SEL Core Competency: Self-Awareness
This book shows how having a growth mindset can lead to developing a new spark. Learning new skills that you had mud thoughts about originally, can encourage great leaps of confidence and lead to clear thoughts. Encouraging youth to engage and practice in new experiences contributes to helping them grow into competent, caring, and healthy members of our community.
BIG by Coleen Paratore
SEL Core Competency: Responsible Decision-Making
This focus of this book is to learn about becoming a BIG person, a person who thinks BIG about the world and their place in it. Youth will look within themselves to see how they can tap into their
personal power to become a valuable member of their world as they look for ways to contribute through acts of service.
(Paper) Chain of Kindness
At the end of 2023-2024 school year, we ended with the book "Big", and were inspired to end the year in a BIG way!
In the book, "Big", Big is not defined as large or tall, but a person who thinks BIG about the world and their place in it. Being BIG as a journey made up of small things we say and do every day. Students will look within themselves to see how they can tap into their personal power to become a valuable member of their family, school, neighborhood, community, country, and world.
The Project Cornerstone team spearheaded the (Paper) Chain of Kindness Project throughout our school, both literally and figuratively. They provided colored strips of paper where students, staff and families wrote down or drew the acts of kindness they witnessed or performed. Our chain of kindness became incredibly long in a short amount of time, and it truly brought joy and pride in our Washington Open Community!
Be Your Class' Project Cornerstone Reader
I love when Michelle comes in to read a Project Cornerstone book! She listens to what everyone wants to share. And she's teaching us all how important being kind is.
Children thrive when they have caring adults in their lives. Research consistently shows that positive relationships with adults, both within and outside their families, contribute significantly to their well-being and success.
As a Project Cornerstone volunteer, you become an essential part of the classroom and overall school community! Parent volunteers who take on the job of Project Cornerstone reader becomes a uniquely trusted adult in their child's classroom, and the children know that they are valued, respected, and truly understood.
Your involvement goes beyond reading—it's about building connections that can positively shape a child's educational journey and overall development.
Become a Project Cornerstone reader in your class this year!
More About YMCA Project Cornerstone
Founded in 1999, Project Cornerstone is a community initiative, led by YMCA of Silicon Valley, with the mission to create an environment where all adults support youth so they grow up to be healthy, caring, and responsible adults. The programs are structured around the 40 Developmental Assets established by researchers at the Search Institute. Developmental Assets outline the positive experiences, relationships, skills, and values that children and teens need to grow into thriving adults.
Project Cornerstone is committed to helping all children and teens in Silicon Valley feel valued, respected and known. Our programs and services help individuals and communities build a web of support around young people so that they grow into healthy, caring and responsible adults.
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