Create time and space during the school day, perhaps during morning meetings or advisory. This process will take two sessions: one to gather input and one to share and collect feedback about identified expectations/agreements.
- Student Session 1:
- Ask students to share a value or characteristic that describes them when they are at their best (e.g. kind, honest, accepting) OR ask the students to share a value or characteristic about how they want to be treated in school. For younger students, you might ask students to bring in a stuffed animal and ask them to tell us something that they could do for their animal friend to help them feel safe and happy at school.
- Collect and share these values/characteristics. (Consider using presentation software such as PollEverywhere, MentiMeter, or Wordle.)
- Review the values/characteristics that rise to the top. Then ask students: “What agreements do you need from yourself and others in order to be your best self at school?” Note these agreements. (The same presentation software can be used to show the agreements from different classes/advisories.)
- Team Meeting with Student Representatives:
- Later that day or within the same week, convene your leadership team with several representative, volunteer students, review the responses, and categorize/theme them.
- Identify 3-4 expectations/agreements that the team would like to propose to the school.
- Consider asking this expanded team, “Are there any of these expectations that you’re not willing to try to keep?”
- Student Session 2:
- Within a week of the characteristics/values activities, share the identified expectations/agreements with students in classrooms or advisories.
- Consider asking students, “What do you like?” “What is not clear?” “Is there anything missing?” Then take a moment to debrief the whole process.