Forget Rules…Create Your Classroom Community with a Full Value Commitment (FVC)!

Ready or not, here they come!  If you work in a school, you are quite aware of what’s headed your way: kids…many who had their last real structure in a classroom back in June!  When that panic sets in, many of us follow our instinct to focus on creating a highly structured environment with clear rules that must be strictly enforced…it’s time to create order out of chaos!  While this is completely understandable (and sometimes necessary), I have a better idea.  Instead of Rules this year, create a Full Value Commitment (FVC).  The Full Value Commitment was originally created by Project Adventure as the Full Value Contract.  My book (Experiential Activities for Enhancing Emotional Intelligence, 2014) describes the FVC in more detail.  Click HERE to view the contents of my book or purchase.

While there are many similarities between rules and FVCs, there are some important differences.

Like rules or laws, FVCs lay out a set of behavioral expectations for a group of people. When expectations are broken, as with rules, there are consequences.  Here are some differences:

1. Unlike most rules and laws, the FVC is not created by a single leader (such as a classroom teacher) or administrators.  The FVC is created by the group (the class in this case).
2. While rules are generally monitored and enforced by an authority figure, the FVC is meant to be enforced by the group members themselves. This may take some time.  During that adjustment period, the teacher must enforce the FVC. For the many of us who are focusing on Restorative Justice practices as an alternative to traditional discipline, the FVC is a great tool (click HERE for an overview of Restorative Practices in schools)
3. While the FVC is essentially a set of behavioral expectations, it is also a set of group goals.  The students may not always actually meet the expectations, but should continually strive towards doing so.
4. While we tend to only refer to rules when we “make em or break em,” the FVC is referred to often to help the group monitor itself as well as work through Restorative Justice processes.

While the specifics of a FVC will vary from group to group, all FVC’s seek to create an environment where each person is fully valued and has equal say about the creation and monitoring of the FVC.  All FVC’s should incorporate expectations for interacting in a physically and emotionally safe way (i.e. Respect Each Other).

Creating the Commitment

The process for creating the FVC is often as important as the end result.  The fact that the participants are engaged in creating the expectations that will guide behavior in their community creates a higher sense of “buy-in” and ownership than traditionally created sets of rules.  The participants will utilize many important skills such as communication, debating, compromise and group decision-making.  While my book offers numerous activities to create a FVC, I will give you one of my favorites here (adapted from Character Card FVC, p. 67, Experiential Activities for Enhancing Emotional Intelligence, Goldsmith).  The process below may take more than one day. I would not have the group create their FVC right away.  Start the year with a basic set of rules for your students as you normally would.  This gives the group structure while they are getting to know each other.

1. Engage in purposeful activities aimed at helping the students get to know each other and feel somewhat comfortable in the classroom.  My book contains over 150 of these activities. There are also others available for FREE on my site HERE.  As I create new activities, I often add them to the site and BLOG about them on this BLOG.
2. When you have determined the group’s readiness, begin by having them brainstorm characteristics or behaviors that they feel would be important to create a safe environment where everyone can learn and be happy.
3. Once this list is created, divide the group into several smaller groups of four or five.  Each group should work in their own space and decide which of the five (or four or six…it’s up to you) characteristics on the list are the most important for creating their safe environment.  This can be a quick process or it may take some time to allow group members to debate their ideas.
4. Once each group has their top five, have them prepare to present their rationale to the other groups.  I often have each group lay out the cards in their groups’ designated area and have the other groups come “visit” while they present their rationale.  Do this with each group.  You will likely notice that while there may be some overlap between groups, there are also many differences in the characteristics and behaviors each group prioritizes.
5. Once each group has presented, inform the class that, as an entire group, they need to determine which are the most important five (or six or seven, again, you decide) to become the basis of the group’s FVC.  Often, the students have become quite attached to the ones they chose in the smaller group so some conflict may arise due to these connections.  That’s OK.  Help them work through it.  While it’s tempting to allow the group to keep more behaviors than you asked for, don’t do it!  The struggle to narrow it down to those final ones is extremely important in creating that high level of “buy-in.”  Also, resist the temptation to allow the students to use a “majority rules” method.  In the end, EVERYONE has to be in agreement.  This supports the “Full Value” piece.  Attaining consensus may require a significant amount of discussion, debate and compromise: all essential life skills.
6. Once the group has decided on the behaviors to include in the FVC, they must be written down and everyone, staff included, must sign off.  You can get creative with this part.  I often require the group to determine a design that has an inside and outside.  The included behaviors are written inside the design.  I have had groups draw fish tanks with each behavior written on a big fish with their signatures on smaller fish, a tree with leaves where the trunk was the most important behavior and the branches coming off were the other behaviors (kids signed on leaves) and a volcano with the behaviors spraying out the top while the names were all written on the volcano itself. 
7. Display the FVC prominently.  At any time, you can refer back to it.  For example, at the end of week 1, ask the kids “How are we doing on our FVC?”  “What things are we doing well? What needs to improve?  What can each one of you work on for next week?”

While this may seem like a great deal of work up front, it will almost definitely pay dividends down the line.  My friend Chris Cavert of FunDoing once told me a story about his days as a teacher.  For the first few weeks of school, he worked on creating a true community by focusing on activities and games that helped the students become more comfortable with each other and get to know each other better.  They also developed their FVC.  Many of the veteran teachers warned him that he was getting behind in the curriculum and should get moving.  By mid year, he had caught up, and soon actually passed the others as his class experienced far less behavioral difficulties than his colleagues!  Feel free to contact me with questions. I would love to hear how it goes if you give this a try!

 

Choose Wisely

Introduction:

I co-facilitated this activity with Pam Hall, a Substance Abuse Counselor who works throughout our school district.  The activity focuses on decision-making steps and dealing with the outcomes of our choices.

Props:

Decision-making step cards (see below), paper lunch bags filled with candy and other assorted items such as lip balm, pencils, little toys, etc…

Set Up:

Place several items in each of the lunch bags.  Make sure to vary the contents of each bag.  There should be bags that are more desirable and others that are less desirable in terms of amount and type of contents. Fold over the tops of the bags so that participants can not tell what is in them.  Place the bags in plain view on a table (see picture above). Create cards (or strips of paper)  with each of the decision-making steps on separate pieces of paper (using the attached template). Place the decision-making step cards in blank envelopes.  Make several sets.

When you gather your group, divide the participants into several smaller groups of no more than three or four.

The Action:

Open up the session by asking if any of the group members have ever decided to get arrested or suspended from school.  How about fail a class or get in trouble?  While they may not have made decisions to have these things happen, they may have made a series of seemingly small poor decisions that led to a disastrous outcome.  Discuss any decisions your group members choose to share and ask why they think they made those decisions and what the outcomes were.  Have your participants reflect on the fact that they are constantly making decisions.  Point out that they all have made many decisions already today!  For example, they all chose to get out of bed and come to school (or wherever you are working).  

Next, hand each small group an envelope with the decision-making steps and have the participants attempt to put them in the correct order.  Once the groups are done, check for accuracy and review the steps with participants.

Direct the participants’ attention to the bags.  Ask for one volunteer to come to the front and take one bag. He or she can not feel the bag or lift it up before choosing. Once the bag has been selected, ask the volunteer to explore it without actually opening it and seeing the contents.  Then offer them the option of trading it in for a different bag or keeping it. Be sure to tell your volunteer that they will only be offered one trade. If they trade their bag in, they must keep the one they take. As they go through this process, have the group determine what decision-making steps the volunteer is taking.  Once the volunteer makes their final choice, invite the rest of the group members to choose one bag without touching any other bags first. Once everyone has a bag, encourage them to explore it without opening it. Ask if anyone would like to trade in their bag, again, pointing out the steps in the decision-making process they are engaged in.  Remind them that their choice will be final.  Once everyone has their final bag, they may open them and keep the contents.

Have members reflect on their choice. Do they feel that they made a good or bad choice?

Debrief

Do you regret your choice to keep the bag (or trade it in)?  Why or why not?

How do you feel about your choice?  What emotions are you experiencing?

Have you ever made a choice that you later regretted?  How did that feel?

Decision Making Steps

 This activity was shared with me by Pam Hall.  Pam is a substance abuse counselor that works district-wide in the Manchester Public Schools.  She has been using this activity as the second session in a three-part series about substance abuse, although, it stands on it’s own well!  With this activity, Pam cleverly steers away from directly discussing substance abuse, rather focusing on decision making.

I Have a Goose Story

I have a goose story. It is not that nice story about how geese fly in a V formation so that each goose benefits from the updraft created by the goose flying in front of it or how when the lead goose tires, another flies to the point to take its place. You can see an inspirational video of that story HERE. My goose story is different. However, it solidifies the claims made in the other story. This is also a story about one of my “personal flaws.”

It was just after sunrise on Sunday, August 2. The glorious morning colors were just giving way to clear blue skies. My brother-in-law John and I had just trekked over a half-mile down Craigville Beach in Hyannis (Cape Cod, MA) to fish off a jetty. It was the first fishing excursion of our vacation and visions of huge striped bass splashed on the edge of my imagination. Anything could happen!

While it was near low tide, the wind was strong and steady, forcing the waves into a chop of small white caps. At the end of the jetty, I cast my line out as far as I could and set my brand new surf-casting rod firmly into the rocks. I loosened the drag on the line so that if a big fish hit, the line would pour off the reel instead of the rod flying into the water. Two minutes after setting my line, my rod went flying into the water.

Without thinking (my aforementioned personal flaw), I launched myself off the jetty into the water. In the brief moments between leaving the rocks and hitting the water, time slowed and I had several distinct thoughts, in this order:

1. That rod cost me $80 and I will NOT lose it on its first cast!
2. The fish on the other end MUST be worth this if it was big enough to yank the rod into the water!
3. I hope I don’t hit the jetty rocks.
4. I hope I can stand.
5. My phone is in my pocket.
6. It will cost $100 to replace the phone.  That’s more than the rod cost.

Splash! Feet on the sandy bottom, the waves were almost at chest level. A few quick strokes and I was able to grab the fishing rod as it was torpedoing towards open-ocean. I pulled back on the rod and felt the resistance on the other end. I tightened the drag and began to reel. About 50 yards out, I saw a group of geese, one appearing to be in distress, trying unsuccessfully to fly, honking madly. Then, the rest of the geese joined in its distress, creating a cocophonus chorus. I realized that the huge fish of my dreams was, in fact, a goose. I handed my sea-soaked phone up to John and began to reel the goose in without any specific plan.

As I reeled, John and I shouted back and forth over the surf as to how to handle the situation. The goose was clearly in distress and his five buddies appeared to be equally upset.   All of them refused to leave the goose that was on my line. As they got closer, I started to realize that while the geese were smaller than me and that while a single goose would provide me with a respectable opponent in hand to beak combat, a group of five angry geese with me chest deep in the water wasn’t going to end well for this human. But again, logical thinking is not necessarily my strong point.  I kept reeling.

Being an emergency room physician, John always came equipped for fishing excursions with several surgical tools. Why these tools came fishing with us, I had no idea. But on this day, it was clear that they might be useful. John handed me some sort of tool to cut the line when the goose was close enough. I think it was a knife…or a scalpel.

As the goose approached and his buddies began making direct verbal threats to me (it becomes very easy to understand goose language in this situation), I saw that the goose was not actually hooked but had simply gotten caught in my line. I pulled the two ends of the line together and moments before they executed their all-out attack, I cut the line leaving a piece of about 6 feet on the goose. Luckily, the goose was not actually tangled in it so it fell away with a few shakes.

The goose, completely exhausted, tried helplessly to fly. When it couldn’t, it began to slowly swim towards shore. I watched as the other five geese surrounded their tired friend and swam with him/her all the way back to the beach. Once they arrived, the goose who had been caught on my line sat down on the sand. The other five stood in a circle around him like the secret service guarding the president.

I climbed out of the water and inspected the wounds on my foot from scrapping against the rocks when I jumped. The phone was toast, but I had the rod. I looked toward the beach, worried about the goose but amazed by the camaraderie shown by its friends.

The gaggle stayed for about twenty minutes before re-entering the water and swimming off together. Eventually, the six geese took to the sky again. I couldn’t believe the level of dedication and self-sacrifice the other geese were willing to put forth. They put themselves in harm’s way, risking their own lives. They were like our soldiers living their creed “no man left behind.” If you haven’t watched that video above yet, this is a good time.

In our world, we see many examples of heroes selflessly risking their own safety to help others. We also see the opposite, by-standers who refuse to get involved or those who only care about themselves. Which will you be? I’d like to think that If I see someone who needs help I would jump in without thinking twice. Wait…didn’t I point that out as a personal flaw? Maybe I need to reconsider that.

How’s Your Trend Line? A New Group Activity

Introduction: Have you ever seen the graph showing the Dow Jones Industrial Average over the course of its existence (over 100 years!)?  How about the NASDQ?  These stock exchange graphs provide great examples of a “Trend Line.”  If you look at the graphs, you see dozens of peaks and valleys (ups and downs), however, the overall trend over the course of time is upwards.  In our own lives, we also experience “ups and downs” and have a personal “trend line.”  The hope is, that despite all the ups and downs in our lives, we can have a positive, upward-moving trend line.

Props: Stock market graphs above, markers and paper (or, alternatively, pieces of rope or raccoon circles)

The Action: With your group, review what the stock market is (a market in which small, of companies are exchanged.  These parts of companies are known as shares.  The price of these shares goes up and down.  If you buy cheap and sell shares at a higher price, you make money. If you sell your shares at a lower price, you lose money).  Show the group the graphs above and discuss how the stock market has had many ups and downs over the course of its existence but the “Trend Line” is positive.  You may want to point out some areas when the trend line was flat (1934-1949) or even trending downward (Dow Jones 1965-1982).  I am sure, if you lived during those years, it seemed like things would never turn around.  But as you back up and take a more long-term look, things ALWAYS got better.

Have your group participants think about their lives.  You can have them look at their lives birth to present or choose a certain period of time (i.e. the last five years).  Consider all the ups and downs.  Have participants draw their own graph/trend line with all its ups and downs.   Have participants share their graphs with others.

 Debrief: The Debrief for this activity takes place as participants share their graphs.  Note the direction of the trend line.  If the trend line is negative or flat, what would help get it moving upwards?  Be aware that you may very well get some intense, deep and emotional sharing during this activity.  Be prepared.  You also may counter resistance as the activity demands a great deal of reflection and sharing.  Encourage participants to only share what they are comfortable sharing. 

Variation: Instead of having students draw their graph, use pieces of rope or raccoon circles (15 foot sections of nylon webbing) to create their graph on the ground.

National Day Project Days 1 & 2

Hello! Please check out the fun we’re having on our first two days of our National Day Project: National No Rhyme Day and National Blueberry Popsicle Day.  It’s not too late to join in the fun and post your own celebratory creations.  Tomorrow is National Welsh Rarebit Day…what’s that?  Check out our page and find out!!!!

http://tinyurl.com/nz7eunu

Use #NationalDayProject

Scott I. Goldsmith, M.S., LPC

Owner, Outside the Box Experiential, LLC

http://www.outsidetheboxexperiential.com

OutsideTheBoxExperiential@gmail.com

Twitter: @scottigoldsmith

Instagram: OutsideTheBoxExp

National Day Project: Join in the Fun!

Educators and kids look forward to summer all school year and head into fall with dread. This September, I want to give everyone something to look forward to. My idea stemmed from a confluence of events.

On a recent steamy, August morning on Long Island, the amazingly inspirational Tough Mudder Emcee Sean Corvelle was getting Tough Mudders (including my friends and I) pumped up with his starting line speech.

Something he said caught my attention. He asked, “When was the last time you did something for the first time?” Sean encouraged us that we should try to do something every day, big or small, that we’ve never done before. That stuck in my head.

Fast forward to August 20th, and my daughter Mallory informed me that it was National Lemonade day. How and why she knew this, I have no idea, but it reminded me of what Sean had told us at the onset of the Tough Mudder about trying something new each day. I replied that every day seemed to be some sort of national something or other day. Hearing this, my buddy sneaked off and printed up the September National Day Calendar. Sure enough, there’s at least one thing to celebrate each day.

So, here is my open invite to the world…let’s celebrate each day in the oft dreaded month of September. My guess is that these celebrations will give most of us something new to try each day! Here’s how it works:

1. I will notify you (via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or Pinterest) what the national day is for the following day.
2. I will tell you how I am honoring it and suggest ideas as to how you can honor it and share it with the rest of us. Also, invite others to join in the fun! I will post to this page and everyone else can too (as well as Instagram, Twitter, Youtube, Pintrest, etc…)
3. Anyone involved can honor the day and share their pictures and stories on the Facebook page and other social media using the following tags:‪#‎nationaldayproject‬

Stay tuned for our September 1st day!

Find me on Facebook at Outside The Box Experiential, follow me on Twitter @scottigoldsmith, Instagram at Outsidetheboxexp and Pinterest at OutsideThe Box Experiential

Why We Do What We Do: Attribution Style, Locus of Control and Mindset

We’re going to look at three closely related concepts that have everything to do with why we do what we do in life.  They are Attribution Style, Locus of Control and Mindset.  Issues with these concepts are at the crux of many problems in our lives.  Let’s see how….

Attribution Style (based on Attribution Theory) looks at how we determine why events happen and evaluate successes and failures in our lives.  Basically, we can “Attribute” cause to one of two broad categories:

1. Factors outside of us
2. Factors inside of us

For example (and I will take the liberty to brag a little here…), several years ago, I made it to a semi-final round in a national guitar competition.  Winning a preliminary round in my home state of Connecticut, I competed in Boston with 8 other guitarists from Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and New York.  I lost (end of bragging).

I realized that as well as I played, I was not quite on par with the winner.  A few style tweaks and more hard work were what I needed to possibly do better the next year. In the parking lot after the competition, another competitor (who also did not win) was yelling and swearing about how unfair it was and how the judges sucked and that they were biased towards the local “favorite”.  While I was attributing my “failure” to factors inside myself (not being quite as good), the other fellow was attributing “failure” to factors outside himself (the judges’ competence and bias).  These different viewpoints can have a major impact on future behaviors. For me, the result was an examination of what I needed to do to do better the next year.

The other guy?  Well, since it was the judge’s fault in his eyes, it was unlikely that he would change anything about his playing.  I figured he wouldn’t compete again.  According to his expressed viewpoint, no matter what he did, he wouldn’t have won anyway.  This is where Locus of Control comes in.  Locus of Control has to do with where we perceive the control in our lives as coming from.  Do we feel as if we are in control of outcomes in our lives or do we feel that outcomes in our lives stem from factors and people outside of us?   At the competition, I had a quote taped to the back of my guitar:

“Destiny is a choice”

That’s pretty much the epitome of an “Internal Locus of Control”.  It reflects my belief that I am responsible for the outcomes in my life.  In that way, if I don’t like an outcome, I change my behavior to bring about a different outcome.  The other guy? He clearly possessed an “External Locus of Control”.  The outcome (failure to win) was brought about by factors outside of himself.  Again, this thinking is unlikely to lead to changes in behavior that produce a different outcome.  Most likely, he would avoid the competition the next year.

Finally, all of this is related to what Carol Dweck, Ph.D. calls “Mindset” in her 2006 book of the same name.  Dweck explains that there are two primary mindsets.  The first, a Growth Mindset, asserts that personal characteristics (such as intelligence and talent) are not fixed but malleable with passion, effort and dedication.  With a Fixed Mindset, she explains, people believe that these aspects of our selves are fixed and cannot be meaningfully changed.  As with Attribution Style and Locus of Control, one mindset will lead you towards self-improvement and growth while the other will keep you locked into your current performance levels.

The importance of these concepts cannot be underestimated.  While most people will describe themselves as having an internal locus of control, an internal attributional style and a growth mindset, if you truly examine behaviors, you’ll often see things differently.

For example, kids who fail at school often blame teachers or the school.  I remember speaking with a 10^th grader who was failing miserably and couldn’t wait to transfer to a nearby high school.  I asked him why he believed he was failing and why he thought changing schools would help.  “Because this school sucks and that one doesn’t.” Hmm….would he do better at the new school? Not likely.

While it’s true that what’s happened to us in the past effects our present, it doesn’t give us an excuse to not take responsibility for our choices and solving our own problems.  It matters a lot less where the problems stem from than what we do about them!!!

To paraphrase an old adage, “It’s not the hand we’re dealt but how we play it.”

See the next BLOG entry for an experiential activity that focuses on helping others understand these concepts 

You can learn more about Scott I. Goldsmith, M.S., LPC and Outside The Box Experiential and his book

“Experiential Activities for Enhancing Emotional Intelligence”

at http://www.OutsideTheBoxExperiential.com