character education » Special Education and Learning Differences

From Jennifer of Colorado Springs, CO, comes our next intriguing teaching strategy. Jennifer is a junior high school Center Based SIED Level IV teacher. She strives to teach students with emotional and behavioral disorders that they can learn and exhibit the characteristics of being a leader.

Her project: Character Education: Leadership!

Using past and present leaders to teach students with severe emotional and behavioral disorders, how to be a leader. Students are taught through video clips, power point, and their own experiences how to be a leader and what characteristics all leaders have. It is important to be a leader in today’s society. Students learn a new character trait each week. Some traits already learned this year are respect, responsibility, being ready to learn and honesty. The students really respond well to the multi-media format and are eager to learn positive characteristics to show their families and others to learn how to do the same.

Learning Objectives:

Students will learn the importance of positive character. Through character education, students are able to focus their behaviors in a positive manner. Students engage with their peers to practice positive peer interactions and how to support others. Character traits that will be discussed and learned are: being trustworthy, caring, hardworking, compassionate, leadership skills, responsibility, being respectful, ready to learn, being independent, understanding, dependable, helpful, proactive, and many more.

Materials:

In my character education class, I use Power Point, projector software, video clips from classic movies or educational videos, student knowledge (K-W-L charts), and student input.

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Brought to you by We Are Teachers partnership with PCI Education’s Grant Ask: http://www.weareteachers.com/ideas/partnerask/teachingidea?app=%2016870&grantId=75

A Curriculum That Builds Character and Reading Comprehension Skills

Character education has long been a shared responsibility of parents, teachers and members of the community throughout history. It is a learning process that should be exemplified in a school community to help students understand, care about and act on such core ethical values as respect, justice, civic virtue and citizenship, and responsibility for self and others. These core values serve as the foundation of our society.

Whether a student has learning disabilities, developmental disabilities, or special needs, developing a strong character is essential to everyone. It affects developing good behavior skills and social skills as well. Because students spend much of their day in classrooms, teachers have an opportunity to explain and reinforce core values upon which character is formed.

Character education must be approached comprehensively to include the emotional, intellectual and moral qualities of a person or group. We must offer multiple opportunities for students to learn about, discuss and enact positive social behaviors so that being a person of strong character becomes a part of a student’s beliefs and actions. We must practice character for it to have a lasting effect.

PCI Education has designed a curriculum that provides diverse activities to develop character, practice positive behavior skills, and build reading comprehension called Bugg Books. These books infuse important life skills into engaging tales and entice struggling readers. As the main characters in each book work through everyday situations, they learn the value of good citizenship and having a strong character. The Bugg Books character lessons include:

• getting along with others
• learning to share
• practice makes perfect
• dealing with bullies
• respecting others
• sticking to the truth
• facing your fears
• paying attention
• doing your best
• consequences of stealing
• the trouble with tattling
• believing in yourself
• controlling your anger

Teaching character education along with reading comprehension skills is easy with the Bugg Books. The curriculum features two distinct lessons and exercises for each of the books in the series. The first lesson focuses on reading comprehension. The second lesson focuses on the character education lesson of the book with a wide variety of activities to specifically engage students in the lesson, extend it to their own everyday situations, and make personal connections. The curriculum also includes activities that families can do at home to reinforce each lesson.

Students with special needs, learning differences, or developmental disabilities can also evolve in character education, understand social values and learn positive behavior skills. It is vitally important we instill core values in all our children so they, too, can embody and teach the next generation a strong sense of character, values, and citizenship.

Within the character of the citizen lies the welfare of the nation. — Cicero