So here we are, in the 3rd month of the school year, with our character education program well established. We have:
A theme to guide the year
A poster created & distributed throughout the school.
The 10 Virtues of the Month for the year picked & the month assigned to each.
Mini posters for each month created with the Theme, an Image, a Quote & the virtue & distributed monthly
A Bulletin Board created & undated monthly
A Road Sign updated monthly
And Daily Announcements being made
It may be a great time for ‘Pausing for Applause’ for the students who have been working hard to make this all happen. It was our ‘Leadership Workshop’ where we used lots of activities to learn the 5 Strategies of the Virtues Project™. November is a great month for this. The school year is launched, midterms have happened, the festive season hasn’t happened yet and exams are still a couple of months away.
We were fortunate enough to have access a large hall with no charge which was in walking distance from our high school. I felt it was really important to get the students ‘off campus’. It made the day feel special and it minimized distractions.
We took care of 2 key elements. Food and transportation. We provided snacks, drinks, pizza lunch. And we kept our program within the school day so that everyone had access to transportation – this allowed for equitable participation.
Sometimes our Workshop was one day, some years we had 2 days, but it was always hands on experiential learning using activities, dramatization, art, music and team building initiatives to create those ‘teachable moments’.
The students came back feeling appreciated, acknowledged and energized for what was next!