Character Counts is Important to Teach in Schools

Character Counts is a program that some schools use to teach children values. It has six pillars or areas of concentration: Trustworthiness, Respect, Responsibility, Fairness, Caring, and Citizenship. Many children today come from homes where values may not be taught and not very many children go to Sunday school anymore. It is very important that as a teacher you teach these areas of Character Counts in the classroom.

When I first starting teaching 13 years ago my school taught Character Counts lessons. Every month we focused on a different strand and the principal made packets with lessons that teach that particular strand. I thought it was great because on a monthly basis you were reminded of at least one strand on a weekly basis and taught lessons based on that strand.

A few years later was when "No child left behind" came about, this Characters Counts program became left behind. It became more important to teach all children to pass the state test and become proficient in the state standards. It was a shame that we no longer had time for this program. As as result of not doing this program, I began to notice discipline problems on the rise school wide. Students were no longer being reminded to treat others with respect and be responsible. As a result, students were breaking the school rules and being mean to others.

Last year we began to teach this program again and modified it some to work for our school. We focus on 4 areas: Caring, Learning, Respect, and Responsibility. We show students what it means to be respectful in the class and cafeteria. Since beginning this program again, the discipline problems are slowing getting less again.

In my first grade class you will hear me many times during the day asking, "Are you being a good learner? When you did that, were you being respectful?" The students are only 6 years old, but they can tell you how what it looks like to show respect. They also recognize wrong behavior and tell me, "He was not being responsible." It's great to see that first graders are learning so much about respect and responsibility.

Although it is difficult to squeeze in lessons on teaching character you can integrate them into the core curriculum. Last week we wrote about what we did over the weekend to be responsible. The week before that made a graph that showed acts of respect. Many of these lessons are also done as discipline problem occurs. When a student asks to go to the bathroom for the fourth time in the day, we stop for 3 minutes and talk about responsibility. There are also many books written that talk about Character. I try to pick these type of books to read to my class at the end of the day.

When children learn to have respect for themselves they will also begin to show respect to others. When children realize why they need to learn in school, they will be more successful. These children are the adults of our future. It is important to teach them values now so that they will be successful adults.