At my school, we believe in teaching students how to be better people, which we do by integrating the 40 Developmental Assets into our curriculum. I think this has been really amazing, and I have seen huge improvements in my own classroom because of the 40 DAs.
At the beginning of the school year, I started my students out by doing an “Above/Below the line” activity to determine what are and are not acceptable behaviors in the classroom under the categories “Be Safe, Be Respectable, and Be Responsible.” The students came up with the behaviors, then we narrowed them down to general categories, and then finally to some basic rules for the classroom. Each student then pledged to follow the rules THEY created by signing the posters. Here are some of those pictures:
This was a great activity that I believe has helped our classroom community. The kids have started to correct their classmates, without much interaction from me. They know that our class runs much more smoothly when we are all following the rules. By taking ownership of these rules, they feel that they need to make sure they are being followed. I LOVE this! I really love that they are becoming little cops, enforcing their own rules, in a respectful and responsible way. I can’t wait to see how our classroom community evolves because of these student created rules.
— Stephanie
