In addition to the activities described above that are largely initiated by the school leadership team, each teacher has committed to sustaining the focus on social responsibility through classroom activities, typically involving integration with specific subject areas. A sampling of their teaching and learning activities are described in this section. A lesson plan for one popular activity is included. Samples of student work from various grade levels are provided.

Integrating Social Responsibility and Literature

Teachers at all grade levels frequently integrate social responsibility with literature, inviting students to “rate” the social responsibility of various characters, to role-play ways that characters could have behaved more appropriately, rewriting story episodes or creating new stories to illustrate socially responsible behaviour. An sample lesson plan is provided.

A kindergarten teacher used the social responsibility standards as part of a fairy tale unit. Children worked with rating cards for two levels: not yet within expectations, and meets expectations. They rated the behaviour of various characters (e.g., Goldilocks, the Three Little Pigs, Cinderella) then painted pictures showing evidence from the story to support their rating.

Students in several classrooms have written poetry on the theme of social responsibility. Many of these are in the form of acrostics.

A grade 5 class wrote Recipes for Friendship using what they had learned about information writing. Some students decided to write Recipes for Social Responsibility instead.

Integrating Social Responsibility and Fine Arts

Students in one classroom have created puppets and puppet plays on the theme of social responsibility. They perform their plays, then invite other students to rate the behaviour of the characters. (They use the rating cards described above.)

In the context of a unit on aboriginal art, grades 4 and 5 students discussed how diversity has helped to create the amazing country we live in.

Personal Planning/Social Studies

A K/1 class has completed a unit, Everyone’s different and that’s important. They began by comparing pairs and groups of children in their classroom, asking, What’s the same? What’s different? As part of their discussion, they talked about their own heritage. They then looked at characters in various books and stories, again asking, What’s the same? What’s different? They created a hallway Valentine’s display by painting big hearts that enclosed words that showed what diversity meant to them. They titled their display, Everyone’s different and that’s ok.

Grade 4 students write weekly reflections about their experiences and their learning; these often focus on the social responsibility goal identified in the morning messages. One week, the focus was patience, and the morning message read:

• One of our school goals is the create a socially responsible learning community. This week we are focusing on patience. Patience is being willing to wait for things you want. We can practice patience by being gentler with others when they make mistakes. Have a patient day!

That week the principal accidentally missed a grade four class in the hockey rotation. One of the students wrote the following reflection (note - we have corrected her spelling):

"Patience! Patience, patience, you will get your hockey day. Patience is important when something that you want gets delayed. For example hockey days. If you did not get your day for a long time you have to be patient. To be patient you need to wait your turn and not make a big deal about it. I have learned how to be patient at Blakeburn, have you?"

Dealing with Problems

A grade 1/2/3 class routinely uses the performance standards and “bubble thinking” to work through problems that occur in the class or on the playground. They draw what happened, and include “thinking bubbles” to show what each person was thinking. Then, they rate the level of social responsibility each person showed. Next, they draw a different version of the incident showing what could have happened—how the people involved could have been more socially responsible. Again, they include thinking bubbles and label the level of social responsibility each person shows.

Classroom Jeopardy

· A grade 5 teacher created a Jeopardy game to help the class review important concepts and information they had learned in various subject areas. One of the categories was social responsibility.