Building Community Through Respect (Freebie)
I was so eager to get back to my kids this week. Eager to hug them and talk to them and let them know I loved them.
Coincidence or not, on Friday I pulled my kids together to talk community building and all things family. I have always been so big on building community in the classroom, whether it be through morning meetings or at random times throughout the year when I feel like my kids need it. Many of us do it those first weeks of school, but then forget about it all year long.
In retrospect, I’m so glad I did this on Friday. Who would have thought we’d have to come in on Monday with such heavy hearts. The theme behind this community building activity was respect. There really was no purpose behind it, and I didn’t come to the table bringing my dog and pony show. Sometimes, the best community builders are the ones where you just get to sit and talk with your kids.
We started by defining respect so that students could understand what it is.
Then, we read Thank you, Mr. Falker. This is such a great book to start a discussion on respect.
After we finished our mentor text, we brainstormed answers to these questions on our anchor chart to get the conversation started:
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LOVE everything about this post(especially the little artist you have in your class)!
Jen
Aww thanks Jen! He brought that poster in and I was like WOAH!! Haha! Thanks for your comment!
I love this! I am going to have to do this with my 5th graders in January! Thanks!
Kim
Literacy Sundae
Thanks so much Kim! I’m so happy you can use some of these ideas! My kids still talk about these lessons days and even weeks after we complete them.
Love this–such a great reminder that we need to focus on the kids in a different way right now.
Thanks for the respect poster. Our school has begun focusing on this aspect and this complements our activities perfectly. Thanks again.
Even though I have first graders, this is a lesson that needs to be taught. Thanks for the ideas, I will take them into consideration with my lesson.
I am often finding myself having conversations with my students about respect. Thanks for sharing your ideas!
You’re welcome! I believe it’s these little conversations that show BIG positive changes in the classroom all year!
I’m curious which stories you read from the Chicken Soup book