
Character matter, and character in the classroom can make a huge difference on whether your year will be smooth or not. Most importantly, we need to set high expectations for children. Teachers want a positive classroom community. Cliques, bullying, and lying are just a few challenges teachers and parents work through with children. These problems can not only create drama in the classroom, but they can lead to long-term struggles for children. In fact, social interactions can make or break the school experience for kids.
What can we do to make a difference? How can we turn things around when we see a need for social skills intervention? I am certainly not an expert in this field, but I believe we as classroom teachers and community leaders can support children with a few changes in our classroom routine.
CHARACTER IN THE CLASSROOM TIPS
Use Class Meetings for Group Discussions

Class meetings do not need to be long to be effective. Many teachers post a morning message with a journal prompt for students to work on when they enter the classroom. If it’s been a crazy start to the day, this routine can be very calming.
Once all have arrived, it’s a great time to reflect on the goals for the day, the day’s events, positive happenings at home, and to work on character in the classroom.
Have scheduling issues? Sometimes your morning meeting may need to be a mid-morning meeting or an after lunch meeting. That is no problem at all. In fact, you may find after lunch the best time since kids typically have playground issues to resolve. Regardless of the time, class meetings are a must.
For information on using classroom meetings, check out [THIS POST] on Edutopia.
Include community building Activities all year
The things we do at the beginning of the year set the tone for the rest of the year, so that’s the best time to build a positive classroom community. How do we do that you might ask? Is it important to include refreshers? The answer in my opinion is with fun.
Students need to break through barriers and get to know their classmates. They need to recognize that every single member of the classroom has value, feelings, knowledge, and opinions. To feel safe to put yourself out there, you need to have trust in peers, and in order to have trust in a person, you have to know them.
character building activities
What can we accomplish when we build learning communities? Are learning communities limited to just classrooms? The answer is no. We, as teachers, need learning communities that offer all of the same traits (safe, trusting, supportive, etc.) Even teachers need to feel valued. No matter where you work, teams can make a difference.
To work on community building, you might include fun activities throughout the year purely to help your children feel they are valued and part of the whole. Below are a few ideas you might try out:
- Battle of the Airbands
- Two Truths and One Lie
- Team Architect
- Memory Wall (mid-year, end of year)
- Classroom Treasure Hunt
- This or That
With each of the activities I linked above, you can find a plethora of other ideas you may enjoy too. Each of the sites linked included a long list with directions, and rather than recreate the wheel, I figure you can check out the sites for more ideas.
Work on Character in the classroom through positive relationships
From day one, we have an extremely important role as the classroom leader. We can make or break a kid with the things we say and do, and it’s important to remember body language matters.
If we’ve had a rough day, there is nothing wrong with sharing in general that we’re having an off day and/or are not at our best, and if you are genuinely kind, caring, and invested in your kids, that’s the main thing. Your students will always remember how you made them feel.
Build character in the classroom by keeping focus
Our last superintendent did have one great piece of advise, and that was “Keep the main thing the main thing.” My interpretation of that is to get at the heart of teaching. Know your students. Value them. Respect them, and above all else, give each of them your very best every day. We are human, and there will be days when you forget to copy that one page you needed for your lesson or forget to return a phone call. Forgive yourself and move on.
Our last superintendent did have one great piece of advise, and that was “Keep the main thing the main thing.” My interpretation of that is to get at the heart of teaching. Know your students. Value them. Respect them, and above all else, give each of them your very best every day. We are human, and there will be days when you forget to copy that one page you needed for your lesson or forget to return a phone call. Forgive yourself and move on.
Model, Model, Model Character in the classroom
As we think about what we want for and expect from our students, the highest priority for all teachers is happiness and safety, but as a close second, we want children to become lifelong learners following their passions whether it’s engineering, nursing, cooking, or cleaning, we want kids to be passionate adults.
In the classroom, the best way to draw these things out of our kids is to show our passion for learning. Show them that curiosity counts and that it can drive us toward discovering things about ourselves and the world we live in.
In the classroom, we can model character in the classroom through the read alouds we share, through sharing our personal stories, through listening as much as talking, and through our interactions with other staff and students. My principal whom I adore said, “Your audience is listening.” Kids do not miss much, so as we make choices, we need to be mindful that little eyes and ears are watching and listening.
include character in the classroom with your curriculum
character education books
I mentioned sharing read alouds with positive characters, and if you look to the left, here’s a list of books you can use as starters. There are so many great books to choose from. You can also check the Pinterest board below for additional titles and book ideas.
The key is to build upon character themes. You might choose a theme a week and use pictures books or build your character theme around a novel you’re studying. Regardless, having a variety of resources helps you extend the theme across the curriculum and across a period of time. Kids need multiple teaching methods in all subject areas including building character in the classroom too.
character building poetry
Recently, one resource that I’m personally invested in is my Character Building Poetry Bundle. I wrote 32 different poems for the bundle on 32 different character themes such bullying, conflict resolution, perseverance, trust, empathy, integrity, honesty, patience, compassion, and procrastination. Each poem includes the following:
- vocabulary cards that you can post on a word wall for long after you use the poem and use for instruction
- a comprehension and word building page, a page for students to illustrate the meaning
- a concept building organizer to work on the skill,
- a page for student to illustrate examples and mark text evidence,
- and the poem on a blank page that you can project or include in a poetry anthology for reference all year long.
Poetry binders can be used for fluency work too, and they’re a great keepsake for the end of the year. Each of the poems can be tied with literature for more comprehensive work on the trait or as problems arise in the classroom. Several teachers have commented that they’re looking forward to using the poems during their morning meetings, and I thought that was a fantastic idea.
I am featuring this end of the year set as a subscriber freebie. Simply add your contact information, and you’ll be redirected to the link.
other posts you’d enjoy
- Teaching Theme with Each Kindness
- Building a Community of Friends
- Five Special Ways to Build an Inclusive, Loving, and Respectful Classroom Community
character in the classroom poetry bundle for SEL
This character in the classroom poetry bundle is available using the link below (or in my TPT shop). It is perfect for use during morning meetings to spark discussions of community and acceptance.
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Sale Product on saleSocial Emotional Learning Poetry Bundle for Character Education
$27.96Original price was: $27.96.$18.00Current price is: $18.00.
Key questions to consider in your plans:
- What are classroom characteristics?
- How do you show character in school?
- What are positive character traits for students?
- What does character mean in school?
Final thoughts
Our world is changing. We can not isolate ourselves and just take care of #1. We depend upon each other socially, emotionally, physically, and economically, and because of this, we must all be on the same team. Our students’ lives are just beginning, and the time we spend together in the classroom is a small fraction of their lives as a whole. However, if we as teachers dedicate ourselves to helping the whole child, then I believe our jobs will impact lives beyond just the curriculum that we teach. THIS BROCHURE from the DOE has great tips too. I hope you’ll check it out.
I hope these few ideas provide you with a little food for thought as you’re lounging poolside or just relaxing instead of lesson planning.