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Click here to view a complete image of this bulletin board. |
Forsyth (Missouri) Elementary School wants to be a school that doesn't just talk about being kind and showing compassion. We want to take a stand against bullying: it is not going to be allowed in our school. With that as our goal, the first thing we did was to define bullying:
Bullying is deliberately hurting other people with words and actions.
Next, we introduced our definition at our Monday morning character education assembly. We also introduced our Anti-Bullying Pledge to the PreK-4 students at our school:
I make a COMMITMENT to take a stand against bullying.
I will treat others with RESPECT and KINDNESS.
I will have the COMPASSION to not be a bully
and the COURAGE to not be a bystander.
It is my RESPONSIBILITY to help others being bullied
and to report bullying.
I should mention that this pledge is not original to Forsyth Elementary. Many schools in our area do a terrific job with character education, and we first saw this pledge used at one of those schools, Reeds Spring Elementary.
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Students "signed" the pledge and added their handprints with their names to the Anti-Bullying Pledge bulletin board in our main hallway. (The picture above shows just about half the length of the entire bulletin board!) The bulletin board offers a very visual display of how many people are in our school and how everyone has committed to follow the guidelines set forth in our Anti-Bullying Pledge.
If a student behaves inappropriately -- breaks their pledge -- their handprint is removed from the board until the child thinks they can make better decisions about their behavior.
Contributor:
Carol Hawkins, principal, Forsyth Elementary School, Forsyth, Missouri
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