Just as societies create laws to help their citizens live and work productively together, classrooms need to create rules that help their “citizens” live, work, and play together. John Dewey viewed the classroom as a model of a democratic society, and believed that democracy was a central ethical value of education. At Bennet Day School, citizenship is one of our values and we respect children as capable and competent members of their classroom community. Therefore, we believe it is important that they participate in creating the rules for their classroom.
The JK class gathered in the Tinker Lab to talk about the rules they felt we should have to make our classroom a safe, productive, and caring learning environment. As the children shared their ideas, the teachers wrote them on the whiteboard.
Young children think in concrete terms, and so they often think of rules related to physical behavior. It is also easier for young children to articulate what not to do than what they should do, and many of the rules they suggested reflect both aspects of their development: “no hitting”, “no pushing”, “no kicking”, “no running in the classroom”, “don’t grab things from other people”, “don’t knock down other people’s blocks”, and “don’t write on other people’s work”.
After the children had created a lengthy list, the teachers helped them think about rules that could be grouped together into an overarching rule. When the teachers asked why it would not be OK to hit, push, or kick, the children quickly responded that those behaviors would hurt other people and were not safe. This became our first and most important rule: Be safe.
To scaffold the children’s thinking from concrete to more abstract, the teachers asked, “Can you also hurt people with words?” The children nodded in agreement and shared examples of words that would be hurtful, such as: “You can’t play”, “I don’t like you”. Our second rule then became: Do not hurt other people with your body or your words.
The teachers asked the children what rules they thought we should have during Morning Meeting and other group times. “Listen to the teacher” was a consistent response. Further discussion lead the children to conclude that the third rule should also include listening to each other: Listen to the teacher and to your friends.
The last group of rules the children suggested related to caring for materials in the school. The teachers helped the children extend that concept to include people as well: Take care of our school and each other. Near the end of our discussion, one child suggested what became our fifth and final rule: Work together as a class.
The teachers asked the children what rules they thought we should have during Morning Meeting and other group times. “Listen to the teacher” was a consistent response. Further discussion lead the children to conclude that the third rule should also include listening to each other: Listen to the teacher and to your friends.
The last group of rules the children suggested related to caring for materials in the school. The teachers helped the children extend that concept to include people as well: Take care of our school and each other. Near the end of our discussion, one child suggested what became our fifth and final rule: Work together as a class.
The next day we reviewed the five rules at Morning Meeting, and the children agreed that they should be our classroom rules. Several children volunteered to write the rules for a permanent display.
We read the rules the following day at Morning Meeting, and the children all signed their names to indicate that these are our rules for our classroom.
The children remember and often refer to the rules. Our role as teachers is to help them internalize the “why” of the rules, so that they can then internalize the appropriate behaviors associated with them.
they are the same or different from our classroom rules. We invite you to share these discussions with us, both to strengthen the home-school connection for the children and to help us continue this important conversation in our classroom.
Talking about the JK classroom rules with your child provides a natural opportunity to discuss your family’s rules - what the rules are, why they are important, and how