Character Education

Connecting the novel The Outsiders to an anti-bias framework helps middle school students examine their biases.

There are plenty of opportunities for teaching young children how to take action on issues that are important to them.

Amid a national controversy, a teacher leans on literature to help students make sense of events.

Build social and emotional skills into any class.

Ideas for guiding girls toward positive interactions with each other.

A group of elementary or middle school students are unruly, disrespectful, and underperforming academically and socially in the classroom. They do not appreciate the value of education. The teacher, despite good intentions and passion, is viewed as an adversarial or irrelevant authority figure. The students are unwilling to participate in tutoring or traditional mentoring programs. So what can be done?

Encouraging student commitment ultimately brings better results than the external motivations of reward or punishment. These seven self-persuasion strategies will get you started.

SMART goals are specific, measurable, action-oriented, rigorous, and tracked. Help your students develop them through a series of ongoing peer interviews.

Phrases like "random acts of kindness" and "pay it forward" have become popular terms in modern society. It seems there are good reasons why we can't get enough of those addictive, feel-good emotions, as scientific studies prove there are many physical, emotional, and mental health benefits associated with kindness. As minds and bodies grow, it’s abundantly clear that children require a healthy dose of the warm-and-fuzzies to thrive as healthy, happy, well-rounded individuals.

Instead of assigning disciplinary consequences when students don't meet behavior expectations, why not deal them as we would deal with academic failures and missteps?

Explore resources and case studies that demonstrate how to bring restorative justice to your school or classroom.