Wrinkled Heart Activity: Powerful Anti-Bullying Lesson with Crumpled Paper
Inside: Instructions, video, and free crumpled paper activity pdf for the Wrinkled Heart Activity. Learn how a piece of crumpled up paper becomes an impactful anti-bullying lesson for elementary students.
The Wrinkled Heart Activity or Crumpled Paper Bullying Lesson is a powerful way to teach children about the lasting effects of bullying.
This simple activity is a valuable friendship lesson that shows students how difficult it is to undo the damage from unkind words and actions!
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Key Takeaways from the Crumpled Paper Anti Bullying Lesson
- Use this as one of your go-to bullying activities for elementary students to visually demonstrate how unkind words leave lasting emotional marks.
- The crumpled paper meaning becomes clear as students try to smooth out the wrinkles — a metaphor for how apologies don’t always erase harm.
- This activity uses a simple crumpled piece of paper to teach empathy, emotional regulation, and the importance of kindness.
- It’s a powerful, low-prep option among anti bullying class activities, ideal for assemblies, classroom circles, or small group reflection.
- Pair it with mindfulness practices like breathing exercises or loving-kindness meditation to help students pause and process big emotions.
- Encourage deeper learning with journaling prompts, compliment challenges, or follow-up stories like Enemy Pie to reinforce restorative thinking.
- Aligns with SEL competencies including self-awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making.
- For broader impact, combine with school-wide kindness initiatives or peer mentoring programs.
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Who could imagine that a single sheet of scrunched up paper could be so effective in demonstrating the devastating impact thoughtless words and actions can have on people?
The crumpled heart activity is a powerful low-prep friendship activity for teachers. It's quick and easy as it just requires some paper or a paper heart (download here). It's a big hit with elementary and middle school students as an engaging demonstration that can have a long-lasting effect, but I will offer a word of caution.
When using this activity, students often become excited when they stomp on the paper because it requires them to be active and it's fun. However, teachers should be careful to rein in their enthusiasm and have students focus on the message. This activity should not be turned into a fun game instead of the powerful life lesson it's intended to be.
Extend Your Kindness Lesson by Pairing the Crumpled Heart Activity with Enemy Pie Friendship Resources
This powerful friendship lesson teaches kids important social skills they'll use for life. It helps them understand feelings, reflect on their choices, and see how actions affect others as they learn about empathy and friendships.
A mix of craft, comprehension activities, writing, and reflection worksheets that turn the much‑loved story Enemy Pie by Derek Munson into a meaningful SEL experience.
I believe this anti-bullying experiment was originally used by a teacher in New York who used scrunched up paper to show her students the lasting impact cruel or nasty behavior can have.
When I used the wrinkled heart activity during an assembly at a school, it was obvious it had quite an impact. I substituted a plain piece of paper for a red paper heart for younger students and a cut-out of a person for older students.
I have included instructions for my version below along with a link to print the wrinkled heart lesson template mentioned above.
If you're working with high school students, use the crumpled paper bullying lesson as shown in the video below by Tony Brent.
The Crumpled Heart Activity
This bullying activity is an immensely powerful way to deal with bad behavior in a group or grade. It can really help a bully to understand just how hurtful their words and actions can be and the lasting impact it can have on someone's mental health and self-esteem.
The Meaning of the Crumpled Paper Analogy
The crumpled paper shows exactly what happens when someone is hurt by unkind words or actions. Even if you try to smooth it out, the wrinkles stay, just like how someone's feelings can still be hurt long after an apology. It’s a simple but profound way to show kids that bullying and name-calling leave a mark that doesn't just go away.
As the saying goes: "Trust is like a paper; once it's crumpled, it can't be perfect again." -Oscar Auliq-Ice
This moment often hits home for kids. They get quiet and thoughtful after the excitement of stomping on the paper. You can see the shift as they realize that words have power and that protecting someone’s heart is about more than just following rules. It's about understanding the weight of our impact on others.
So, when students ask, "What does the crumpled paper mean?" or "Why are we doing this?", here’s a simple way to explain it:
"The wrinkles are a reminder that even when we say sorry, the damage can still be there. That’s why we need to be gentle with our words and actions from the start."
Why This Activity Works for SEL
Kids are visual and hands-on learners, and that’s what makes this activity so powerful. When you crumple a piece of paper or wrinkle a paper heart, it gives them something they can actually see and feel. Unlike a lecture, this kindness object lesson provides a physical metaphor that bridges the gap between a thoughtless action and its permanent emotional consequence.
Reinforce This Activity with the Enemy Pie Lesson
Truly one of the best and most relatable friendship lessons to pair with the Toothpaste Activity to help students understand the weight of thoughtless actions.
Together, these anti-bullying activities will be some of the most memorable and impactful and help restore or build a positive classroom community.
By physically stomping on and then trying to repair a paper heart, students aren't just hearing about empathy, they're feeling the weight of their actions.
This high-impact experience helps the lesson "stick" and encourages a more supportive, inclusive classroom environment where students are motivated to protect their peers from the permanent damage of unkind words.
Instructions for The Crumpled Heart Activity
- 1Download the instructions and print the heart templates onto red or pink paper. You'll need one for each student. Choose between two designs: one with pre-written text and space for a name, or a blank heart where kids can add their own message. Have students cut out their own hearts to save time and build motor skills while getting them more involved!
- 2Ask kids to look at how beautiful and perfect their heart is and imagine it's their own, real heart. Now they have to trust their heart with the person standing beside them. As they hand it to their neighbor, they ask them to love and care for their heart as if it was their own.
- 3Instruct students to say mean things to the heart they were given. Crumple it up into a tight little ball, throw it on the ground, and stomp on it. There should be a lot of laughter about now which is fine but center students again by reminding them how hurtful it is to be the person receiving an insult.
Help Students Connect with This Friendship Fortune Teller Craft, Bingo & Investigative Worksheets
- 4Have students pick up the little crumpled ball, look at the child who owns the heart, and say they're sorry. Turn their attention back to the crumpled ball and apologize. Say they didn't mean to be so thoughtless; they didn't know what came over them and could they please forgive them? While apologizing, carefully uncrumple the paper heart. Place it on a table and try to smooth it out.
- 5Ask your students to return the heart they have to its owners. Have each person hold up their crumpled heart and ask them how it looks. Does it still look as beautiful as it did before they gave it away? Did the person they trusted it with care for it? How do they feel about the person who didn't take care of their heart?
- 6Explain that every time a person hurls abuse, belittles, talks behind someone's back, bullies, writes unkind things on social media, etc., they are responsible for adding a wrinkle to someone's heart.
- 7Even though they may apologize later, that wrinkle cannot be smoothed out. Sure, it may fade over time, but the heart will never really be the same and the scars can remain for a lifetime.
- 8Take the opportunity to talk about the responsibility we all have to care for other people and their feelings. Explain that being unkind has a lasting effect on the hearts and minds of the people they are mean to. It changes the way people feel about them and can give them a bad reputation.
Repair and Rebuild
Once your students understand that words have power, they are often eager to find ways to be "heart protectors." This is where I'd immediately pivot to a restorative activity that helps them practice positivity and rebuild classroom connection.
Here are two of my favorite resources to help your students turn this lesson into a daily habit of kindness:
1. The Kindness Quilt for Visual Learners
After seeing the permanent impact of unkind words, your students will be ready to practice the opposite: the power of positivity. Get them working together to repair and protect hearts, and build a supportive classroom community with a collaborative art project!
My best-selling Kindness Quilt is a high-impact SEL activity that reinforces the kind actions that help kids make and keep friends. Kids love coloring the 30 fun designs and adding their own messages of friendship.
Teachers love this friendship activity because:
2. Teach Students to Lift Others Up with Compliments
Instead of Criticism!
These fun compliment cards are loved by teachers and students because they boost self-esteem and teach kids to see the good in one another. If you need something to turn the dial up on engagement and win your students over as a fun teacher, this is the resource you need.
Kids participate in a calm coloring activity where they compliment their schoolmates with kind messages and then sneak off on a secret mission to hide them in the library. The excitement goes through the roof as they do their best to fly under the radar during this covert operation.
Teachers love these Compliment Cards because:
If taught well, this activity can be highly effective. But again, I want to caution teachers to be mindful of the serious nature of the crumpled heart activity. I was told that in one class, some students thought it was okay to repeat mean things they'd heard others say during the activity. They told their parents it was okay because it was just a game.
If you do not believe your students are mature enough to understand the lesson the activity delivers, please do not use it.
If you've used the crumpled paper activity, I'd love to hear about your experience. Please get in touch and let me know how successful it was!
Teacher Tips for Using the Crumpled Paper Activity
1. Do it early in the year
Use this activity within the first few weeks of school to set the tone for how you expect students to treat one another. It's a great way to reinforce kindness, empathy, and respect as classroom norms.
2. Pair it with a story
Reading a book with strong social-emotional themes can help kids make deeper connections. The books below reinforce kindness and inclusion.
3. Use a visual display
Hang up a large wrinkled heart with student pledges or kindness promises written on it. Seeing the “hurt” heart every day reminds kids that words matter and helps reinforce the lesson long-term.
4. Revisit the message regularly
Don’t let it be a one-time thing. Bring the heart back during conflict resolution discussions or kindness challenges. Ask, “Are we wrinkling someone’s heart right now?” to help kids reflect on their behavior.
5. Extend the learning
Have students write about a time someone hurt their feelings and how it made them feel or how they made someone else feel better. You can also turn it into a class book on caring and empathy.
6. Adapt for different age groups
For younger students, keep it hands-on and simple. For older elementary kids, you can go deeper into cause and effect, peer pressure, and how emotional damage builds over time. If students are comfortable sharing, ask them to recount a time they felt they were bullied.
7. Combine the lesson with other SEL tools
This activity fits beautifully into a larger unit on kindness and empathy. You could follow up with compliment coupons, classroom jobs that promote helping, or role-play scenarios where students practice kind responses.
Pin The Crumpled Paper Activity for Your Next Lesson
Other Post and Activities to Build Emotional Intelligence
While the Crumpled Paper lesson is a powerful way to address unkind behavior, following up with additional relationship activities is important for strengthening classroom connections and emotional awareness.
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Updated September 3, 2025
AUTHOR: Lisa Currie - Ripple Kindness Project
Lisa is passionate about contributing to a happier world by building emotional intelligence in kids through fun and engaging social-emotional learning resources. Her core value is kindness as she believes it to be the “mother” of all character traits. She started Ripple Kindness Project to spread kindness in schools and communities. She also founded an outreach program to support disadvantaged families.
