Category: character education

“One man cannot do right in one department of life while he is occupied doing wrong in any other department.  Life is one indivisible whole.”

Mahatma Gandhi 

The best way to know where you are going and what you are about is to write a personal mission statement.  A personal mission statement is a philosophy or creed that focuses on what you want to be and do.  It clarifies your values and principles.  It is unique, because it is you. 

Every classroom teacher should have a personal mission statement.  This powerful document expresses your personal sense of purpose and meaning in life.  It acts as a governing constitution by which you evaluate your decisions and choose behaviors. 

The importance of this cannot be understated because the challenges of teaching are so great.  Your mission statement can be your compass in times when it’s easy to lose your way.  Stress, troubled students, pressures from administration and your own personal life will tax your energy and resolve.   The process of writing a mission statement allows you to reevaluate your old scripts and create new ones based on principles. 

Creating a mission statement involves as much discovery as it does creation.  It gives you a chance to explore the future using the four endowments of self-awareness, imagination, conscience and independent will.

The benefits of a personal mission statement are:

·       It encourages you to think deeply about your life

·       It helps you examine your innermost thoughts and feelings

·       It clarifies what’s really important

·       It expands your perspective

·       It imprints self-determined values and purposes firmly in your mind

·       It enables you to make daily progress toward long term goals

Take the time this holiday break to begin the process of writing a mission statement. Just begin by listing things you want to have in your life that are important.  Identify the five most important things.  Ask yourself what you daydream about, what you see yourself doing if you had unlimited time and resources.  What activities do you consider to be of your greatest worth? 

This is the start of enhancing your own quality of life and expanding your personal leadership.  Your leadership as a classroom teacher and in your personal life will make you a person of influence.

“What lies behind us is nothing compared to what lies within us and ahead of us.”

Anonymous

More to come on mission statements and leading your students to discover their right paths.

The New York Times recently reported that the 52^nd week of the year is becoming the last week of business for many in America.   For those still open for business the 52^nd week can either be a molasses slow or a nice quite stretch and a time for reflection and planning. 

My stock went up the 52^nd week every year I worked in the middle school.  As the last stop before suspension my room became a clearinghouse for all pre holiday woes and worries.  One year so many students accused me of ruining their Christmas that I was tempted to hang a sign on the door that said, “Home of the Grinch.”   Anticipating the holidays exacted a heavy toll of stress upon my usual customers (those students with behavior and learning problems).  All of this forced me to question the sanity of our rush to celebrate and to shop while raising expectations.  Children quickly fall into disappointment when they compare their own family’s holiday with the expected traditions.  Working in a school it’s impossible to deny that holiday’s exposes dysfunction.  They create a divide between those who seem to have it all and those who don’t.

So how do you survive the 52^nd week and still be an effective and compassionate teacher?

One way is to devote this week to a very important job.  The very important job should be service related.  The service that is appropriate for your classroom can be in the form of simple community service tasks for your school building and grounds or if possible it could be expanded to embrace the larger community.   Some of the very important jobs I utilized with students were:

• Create groups to clean up the cafeteria after each lunch period.  Some prep work is required for this.  Cleaning the detail with your custodial staff, and providing adequate supervision during the clean up is a must.   If cleaning the cafeteria is not possible find alternatives; some possibilities are the media center, commons area or main entry, restrooms, and if weather permits outside trash details.  It’s also possible in some districts to arrange for schools buses to be on site for some inside cleaning. 
  • The immediate results for cleaning make these jobs very gratifying for students, not only can they see the results of their hard work but also experience the appreciation of those who directly benefit.

• Arrange for field trips to local nursing homes, animal shelters, and homeless shelters.   All of these require preplanning and with a little effort can be on the calendar every year the 52^nd week.  Exposing students to the disadvantaged, the weak and the needy is a paradigm shift for most and an experience they won’t forget.   Trips outside of school should have a quality of a life lesson, at the very least something not forgotten and at best inspiring.  

• Finding prep work from other teachers in the building.  One year the life skills teacher needed first aid kits assembled for her 120 students.  The job was time consuming and tedious but fit my definition of work for someone else.  In the past I was able to find similar jobs from the tech ed teacher, the art teacher, and various science teachers for labs.   I viewed these tasks as “sweat equity” and explained to students how real work creates something tangible and useful. 

My 52^nd week lesson plan was to expand student’s definition of the holidays, to find a way to experience meaning and connection.   Reading aloud Charles Dickens’s “A Christmas Carole” or O’Henry’s “The Gift of the Magi” are two wonderful literary works that departs from our ideas of the holidays and also gives a glimpse of the different expressions of love. 

It’s challenging to structure a disciple program that teaches something but with a bit of imagination and effort students will have more than a time-out from the classroom they will gain important life skills.   

How do you observe the holidays in your school?  Is your school ethnically diverse?  Are there more than three religious groups represented?  Is there extreme socio-economic disparity?

The holiday season can be complicated but it doesn’t have to be.   At the core of the Christian Christmas is a celebration of the possibilities and a hope for peace. Teaching students that peace is a way of being can be the theme for your school during the holidays.

So how do you teach peace to children? 

Mahatma Gandhi said, “There is no way to peace. Peace is the way.”  In order for children to practice peace they first have to learn it’s language.  The language of peace relies on the rational thinking of the higher brain.  Our lower brain is instinctive because our emotions are centered there.  Unfortunately for children their emotional responses feed their egos.  They feel hurt, sad, offended, and inferior; it’s a long list when you begin to consider those negative responses.   But the lower brain is also the chief agent for bonding.  When you look into someone’s eyes and recognize a loving expression, what’s happening is irrational, in the pure sense that your brain is bypassing the cortex and going directly to its intuitive and emotional centers. 

The first lesson for peace is to model and practice the look of loving kindness every day.  Children can learn this by observing your own personal greeting to them.  Do you smile from the heart?  Teach your students that the first rule of good manners in your classroom is to greet each other with a smile.   Now maybe for some that smile will be forced but eventually that smile will become automatic.  Scientists know that the very act of smiling increases the production of healthy hormones in the brain. 

As your students practice smiling they can begin the school day with a simple Metta mediation, metta means loving kindness.   One way to do this is to begin the day by meeting in a circle holding hands.  Students should close their eyes as they recite along with you:

May I be filled with loving-kindness,

May I be peaceful and at ease

May I be well,

May I be happy.  

A variation of this mediation is for each student is to recite the name of a classmate. You might suggest they say the name of the student next to them.  In this way each student is sending their good intentions to someone else.

This is a practice of undoing the chemistry of negativity, of anger and frustration.  Making an intention to create a kind loving environment is the first step in achieving that goal. Children react well to habits and structure, the standard of smiling, patience, and acceptance is powerful. 

Since the higher brain is our rational center you can challenge your students to create expressions of peaceful resolutions with stories, artwork, and music.  Teach them the values of character (respect, forgiveness, honesty) as you guide their creations.  

Whatever your core religious or moral beliefs are what better expression this holiday season than to establish a peace community within your own classroom and perhaps your entire school.   Peace is a vision, one that must grow on its own.  But the vision can follow your inner desires for a better world.

What is good quality character education in schools? 

No Child Left Behind mandates that schools teach some sort of character education.  The dilemma is how to implement this.  How does a school structure the time to create an effective program for it’s students given the demanding academic benchmarks it is required to teach?

Character, ethics, and civility need not be taught as much as they need to be modeled.  All of these are part of a broader constellation of attitudes, behaviors, motivations and skills.  Often when schools think about character what comes to mind first are the undesirable behaviors.  The motivation to teach character is fueled by the need to eliminate certain behavior and discipline problems.   What’s really needed is a paradigm shift.   

Character education that helps create a caring school community and fosters moral leadership must be part of the school climate.  This climate is influenced and created by the attitudes of the adults in charge.  Each individual classroom teacher can shift this very climate by negative or positive degrees.    To create a positive shift teachers must recognize how critical it is that they be a person of high integrity.  

Teachers with this level of integrity act out of a place of love and patience.  The key to the ninety-nine is the one – particularly the one who is testing your limits.  It is the love and discipline of the one student that communicates the love for the ninety-nine. Stephen Covey author of the 7 Habits for Highly Effective people said it most eloquently,  “How you treat the one reveals how you regard the ninety-nine because ultimately everyone is the one.”

When a teacher acts out of integrity it also means avoiding communication that is deceptive, judgmental or beneath the dignity of their students.  A teacher who embarrasses a student, is a harsh critic or uses disrespectful language  (i.e. shut up) must be able to use sincere words:

• That was unkind of me
• I showed you no respect
• I was wrong

Using these words gives students a model to follow in their missteps in life it also allows for the very human act of making a mistake and making amends.

This idea of showing love, of being a daily example of patience and civility might seem like it’s asking too much for today’s stressed and over worked teachers.  But think on this for a moment; this daily practice is like putting money in the bank the interest will grow.  And although difficult at times it’s a process of personal enrichment for the teacher as well.  Not only will their school relationships shine but this commitment will enrich their personal relationships as well. 

Character education that is this focused and deliberate can’t help but impact the lives and hearts of students.   Nowhere else will students find a safe and quality environment as in this nurturing classroom. 

If you as an educator are looking for a program of character education that can guide you on this path Creative World Connection gives you the template to help your students “sharpen the saw.”   Our daily messages promote academic and social achievement as well physical and emotional health. 

When you enter the Museum of Tolerance In Los Angeles California you will watch a video on the vast variety of prejudices all designed to show you that everyone has a few.   And then you will go into the main part of the museum through one of two doors.   One door is marked prejudiced the other door is marked unprejudiced.  The door marked unprejudiced is locked in case anyone misses the point.   Occasionally a few people will demand to enter through the locked unprejudiced door.   

Each one of us has biases whether we admit it or not.  Our brain is designed with blind spots making it difficult to question our own thinking.  It’s hard to see when we are wrong even when the wrong thinking is made clear like the locked unprejudiced door at the Tolerance Museum.  

Prejudice is a paradox because it’s the greatest thing that divides us and also the greatest thing that connects us because it’s something we all share. National Public Radio did a segment recently in which they examined their coverage of both presidential candidates.   They had received an enormous amount of mail from viewers from both parties criticizing the amount and type of coverage given to the opposition.   So they examined the number of hours given to both parties and type of coverage.  The results were surprising; both candidates had received almost the same amount of airtime. Despite what some viewers thought their coverage seemed to be balanced.  

Teaching tolerance to children might be any teacher’s greatest challenge because before this universal inclusion can begin the teacher must first acknowledge and accept his or her own biases. Teachers must look at their own thinking to begin to expose these blind spots.   One good way to start is next time you are tempted to use a stereotype to explain someone remember to someone else you are a stereotype too. 

This same introspective thinking can be practiced with students.   Create informal games in which students can label and then unlabel the stereotypes they believe about each other.   Allow them to recognize how limited stereotypes are.  Learning tolerance is essentially knowing the importance of appreciating the differences of others and how to treat every individual with the same level of compassion, kindness and respect. 

The Internet is a great resource for teachers wanting to incorporate tolerance lessons into the curriculum

• Education World at www.educationworld.com - has a lesson planning articles on teaching tolerance with five lesson plans
• Scholastic Magazine on Diversity scholastic.com/professional/teachdive/ offers lesson plans and professional resources to help teachers develop a diversity curriculum
• Teaching Tolerance Magazine www.tolerance.org/teach/indes.jsp distributes information to support the efforts of K-12 teachers and other educators to promote respect for differences and appreciation of diversity.

Recently I heard Barack Obama talk about his early childhood.  He recalled how his mother would get up at 4:30 in the morning to get ready for work.  His mother got him up as well to review his lessons for the day.  He said as an eight-year-old child he would complain about this early rising and his mother replied that she didn’t like it any more than he did but that it was necessary.  

Barack Obama’s mother was creating a habit for her young son.  She was instilling in him the importance of learning and that the momentary hardship of getting up early was part of becoming a successful person.  His mother had a clear understanding of the destination.  She was beginning with the end in mind. 

In parenting if you want to raise responsible self disciplined children you have to keep the end clearly in mind as you interact with your children on a daily basis.  You can’t behave toward them in ways that undermine their self-discipline or their self-esteem.

Anytime you make a plan in life you are beginning with the end in mind.  Planning a trip you determine the destination and the best way to travel before you leave.  Planting a garden you plan it out before you plant.   The end in mind is the creation of a desired future.  How you get there is taking the responsible steps and living in harmony with the plan. 

Beginning with the end in mind is based on personal leadership.  Unfortunately in many schools directing students to a desired outcome is based on management.   Management is doing things right, leadership is doing the right things. 

So how can a school truly direct their students with the end in mind?  One simple way is to have a dedicated program of character education.  It must be consistent and deliberate and everyone from the youngest student to the oldest staff member must be part of it.  

Creative World Connections daily messages are one such program.   It is a simple tool to give students direction and purpose.  Both of these help create self-awareness.  With self-awareness students discover their imagination and conscience.  Their decisions can be in harmony with doing the right things.

You have to be amazed at the profound influence that Barack Obama’s mother had on him.   Her end in mind helped inspire a person who in turn inspires others every single day.  

The potential for greatness lies in all of us.   Oliver Wendell Homes said, “What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.” 

America is the world’s leading manufacturer of hope.  America fills  the expectation that good things will come.  It’s the reason immigrants all over the world want to come here.  The wonderful thing about hope is that it’s like a giant umbrella that protects us from the storms of disappointment, failure and hardship.   Recently at the Democratic National Convention Michelle Obama spoke about her childhood.  Her account was a story of a childhood filled with encouragement, appreciation and love.  She demonstrates that when a child is lifted up a desire to make a worthy contribution is a predictable result.

This week children in America return to school.  Many with fear and anxiety about what’s to come but most with the hope that their teacher “will be nice” and “will be fair.”

Despite what children experience at home their expectations for fairness in school is constant.  It’s almost like a primordial need that school show them empathy, respect and kindness.   Sounds like a simple agenda but in reality the layers of challenges that teachers face putting loving kindness first is often difficult.  A typical classroom is a mini diverse society with competing levels of ability and need all vying for the attention of this one absolute authority “the teacher.”  For teachers meeting all these needs can be a super challenge.   But practicing one tactic can help. 

It’s important for each teacher to keep in mind the vision that brought them to teaching, hopefully the vision of making a difference in the life of a child, of opening the door to learning and doing so in way that ignites the curious mind and invites exploration.  One way to do this is to honor the need of all children to be loved and to belong.  The desire to care and be cared for, to give to others and to be part of a family or group is the most basic need below survival that all children share.   Creating a safe environment in the classroom, an environment that promotes kindness and respect first is the foundation for meeting this most basic need.

History teaches us that whatever is done to children they are likely to do to society.  If children find the world a place where social justice is limited and doled out like rewards then they are likely to engage in this system where fairness is not for all. 

My hope for this school year is that teachers will become the nation’s leaders in honoring and respecting this single important value and practicing it everyday so much so that it becomes contagious, that children see one standard, one way to be and pass it on and on.   Let’s inspire this generation of children, lift them up and see where it leads the possibilities are endless!

Does artistic talent come naturally?  Are some students born with special innate talents or can talent be cultivated?

In Venezuela the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra believes talent can be cultivated.  This amazing system of education is called “El Sistema.”   This thirty-year-old program has made classical musicians out of a million and a half young Venezuelans, and transformed the lives of these underprivileged and at risk youths in the process.  Almost every major orchestra around the world has members who began in El Sistema. 

The concept for El Sistema looks at talent in a different way, it doesn’t take those from the gifted pool and gives them enrichment, enrichment is for everyone.  In this brilliantly conceived system music is literacy, it is a daily devotion that is filled with joy.   Exposure to music is not the low standard ad hoc program that most US schools currently have.  El Sistema takes everything students learn and rolls it all into one endeavor.  Music is rhythm, it’s motion, it’s coordination, it’s balance, it’s counting, it’s reading, it’s a social system and it’s a physics experiment.   The concept recognizes that talent exists in everyone, but it must be cultivated and nurtured to blossom.

If this simple philosophy were used as the standard in all schools imagine the possibility for achievement.  The children in the Venezuelan orchestra believe in their own ability to become great musicians, even given the improbable circumstances of their poverty.  If all students grew in the belief that they are capable to learn and master difficult concepts and skills schools would be challenged not with how to teach low achievers but with how to provide more enrichment.

This might sound like the ravings of some wild-eyed optimist but remember who the members of this orchestra are, they are children used to running bare-footed and dirty, they are children who come to school hungry.    Schools must increase their stock in optimists, in those who find joy in teaching and recognize children’s ability to greatness.

Anyone who has ever planted a garden knows the single most important ingredient is the soil, cultivating and enriching the soil gives many rewards.   A rich soil can withstand extremes of temperature and compensate for what’s lacking.   This same principle applies to everything.  Begin the journey in education early by enriching the mind.  Start with pre-school  give children music and art in abundance.  Continue this and  give children a chance to find joy and see their work not as boring drills and practices but a devotion to becoming better.  

Have you ever been surprised with an unexpected kindness?  There was a recent story of an older man who regularly jogged some remote roads in the hills of southern California.   His biggest fear was of an attack by a mountain lion but since he rarely strayed into the denser areas so he was not worried.  One particular day as he jogged he heard the loud blare of a car radio and the lyrics of a rap song.  The beat of the music got closer and closer.  This man had encountered rude drivers in the past but the noise and the approaching speed of the car worried him.    Suddenly a car full of teenage boys sped past him and slowed to a stop.   Filled with fear the man worried how he was going to jog past the car without incident.  As he got right next to the car one of the boys handed him a Popsicle out the window. 

Simple acts of kindness like the gift of a Popsicle seem strange and out of the ordinary.  Why is that? 

Unfortunately today in workplaces and schools across the country reports of harassment and violence have increased.   P. M. Forni author of the Civility Solution writes that most school and workplace violence began in rudeness.  The roots of rudeness are a failure to value the intrinsic goodness of each person.  When individuals are not seen as worthy and competent its easier for  rudeness to erupt.  

Most people see rudeness as something done to them instead of a symptom of a culture that reacts to any  injustice with anger.  This anger is like lightening in a bottle, when directed at others it scorches everything in its path, work relationships, friendships, families and eventually the health of any institution.   Rudeness can become anger burning out of control. 

School can be the one consistent place in this society where children can learn to practice compassion and simple acts of kindness.  A compassionate mind learns to look at a situation more broadly, seeking a solution that’s acceptable to everyone. 

So how can you as an educator begin to practice and teach children to cultivate the compassionate mind? 

Begin first with yourself.  Examine your daily habits, how do you interact with your co-workers.  Are you tolerant of their shortcomings or do you react with criticism and gossip?    Next evaluate your relationship with your students, are you inpatient with their inattentiveness, disruptions and little unkindness?   When you become the model of compassion you can create a vibration in your classroom that will resonate into all your relationships.

Teach your students to practice sitting with their frustration and anger.  Tell them that in their body there is a biochemical surge that has it’s roots in primitive man.   The fight or flight response was a holdover from the days when the main threat to our survival was a saber tooth tiger and not waiting in line or a redundant question. 

Feelings of anger manifests differently in each person, some of us get so revved up that we can’t think straight.  To address this  teach students deep breathing.  Begin each day with a classroom-breathing lesson, instruct students to close their eyes and begin to observe their breath.  Instruct them to begin to breath more deeply inhaling in for 7 to 10 seconds and exhaling through the nose for the same time.  Repeat this exercise for several minutes. 

Anytime you see agitation tumbling onto rudeness and anger take a time-out to breathe.  Students will begin to practice this and take their cues.  Compassion does not come naturally.  For students to truly become wiser they need a wise and compassionate teacher.    

Do you hit the brakes or the accelerator when you encounter stress?  What is your stress temperament?

You probably know someone who lives in the eye of a crisis storm; their life is a series of minor dramas, which replay over and over.  You also probably know another person who weathers all kinds of storms yet seems to be happy. Scientific studies have discovered a link between personality, temperament and the ability to deal with stress.  Individual responses to life situations vary greatly.  Instead of beating yourself up for your inherent temperament become aware of how you respond to changes.   This awareness can lead you to develop new habits and promote healthy hormones and neurochemicals.

Once you become aware of the language spoken by your autonomic nervous system you will discover the power you have to create joy, abundance and health the same way you create stress, fatigue and disease. 

The implication of using this information in teaching children in school is powerful.  Every teacher creates their own classroom environment and students respond in different degrees based on their own stress temperament.   The first step in creating a healthy environment is to recognize your own stress temperament.  Ask: how do you respond to periods of high activity and inattentiveness with your students and what methods do you use to calm and discipline disrupting students?  

One way to establish a healthy classroom environment is to factor in de-stressors every day.   Educate yourself about the practice of mindfulness.  The practice of mindfulness is an effective tool to enhance academic performance while promoting emotional and social well being.   Its focuses on developing a student’s capacity for attention and awareness. 

Begin every day with three minutes of silence.  Instruct your students to close their eyes and simply notice their breathing as they focus on the space between their nose and upper lip.  As your students get into this habit they will become more aware of their emotions.  This technique is a system that allows the mind to settle down and focus.  You can develop and expand this practice during the school year by adding more mindful minutes including the practice of loving kindness (sending loving kind thoughts to another person while you are silent).   You don’t have to become an expert to create a different kind of calm for your students you only have to be willing to experiment and create this peaceful space.  

The benefit is not just to your students but also to yourself.  It allows you to be the best kind of teacher; one who is truly present in the classroom engaged with students and subject making the connections that open the mind to real learning.