This Month's Best Practice
Each Month the Maryland Center for Character Education (MCCE) picks one of the Best Practices from a Character Education award winning school to share with you.
JANUARY
This month's Best Practices is from an award winning school from 2008-2009.
BEST CHARACTER EDUCATION PRACTICES
School: Pikesville Middle School
Address: 7701 Seven Mile Lane, Baltimore, MD 21208
Principal: Mrs. Maria Talarigo
E-Mail: mtalarigo@bcps.orgPhone: 410-887-6725
Character Education Contact: Mrs. Lois Rothberg
E-Mail: lrothberg@bcps.org
Title of Best Practice: The Pikeville Way
Primary Principles Emphasized: 1, 3, and 4
Objective(s): To provide a daily school-wide character education, desinged to teach, reinforce and practice values which will prepare students with skills to succeed in school, the community and the world of work.
Description:
How does The Pikesville Way Provide a Comprehensive Character Education Program at Pikesville Middle School?
Every day of the school year is a character development day at Pikesville Middle School. The Pikesville Way is a school-wide character education program, delivered each morning at Pikesville Middle School in Baltimore County. Homeroom teachers present a lesson which focuses on teaching our school’s core ethical values: respect, responsibility, cooperation, and accountability.
Our character education program teaches students the meaning of each core virtue, provides discussion time to explore the values and holds students accountable for practicing the values. The Pikesville Way lessons are sequential with each lesson building on prior content. The Pikesville Way connects character education lessons with students’ real world experiences, making this character education curriculum relevant and engaging.
Students are held accountable for all skills taught. Since all students hear the same lesson on the same day, and teachers and administrators implement the character education lessons, everyone in the school takes ownership for exhibiting our core values and is committed to creating a caring school community.
The Pikesville Way addresses the needs of our diverse school community. Our staff recognizes that our students transition to our school from different elementary schools, different family backgrounds and with different skill sets. It is our job to teach Pikesville Middle students what is expected from the moment they enter our building each morning. Students must learn and practice our school’s core values so that they can be prepared for success in school, the community and for the future in the world of work. The Pikesville Way was designed to address this mission.
What is the sequence of activities in The Pikesville Way?
The Pikesville Way is a daily ten minute character education lesson that is presented during homeroom. The same format is utilized for each lesson.
Every Pikesville Way lesson consists of the following components:
• Spotlight: Introducing the daily topic
• Introduction: Connecting the topic to the students’ real world experiences
• Discussion: Developing questions to explore values and success strategies
• Summary: Synthesizing the discussion material
• Today: Practicing the target behavior in the school setting
At the conclusion of the morning announcements on the intercom, homeroom teachers are instructed by the Principal, Mrs. Maria Talarigo, to begin The Pikesville Way lesson. The homeroom teachers present students with the Spotlight, read the Introduction, and conduct the Discussion portions of the lesson.
Ten minutes later, the principal, Mrs. Talarigo, returns to the public address system to read the Summary and Today portions of The Pikesville Way to the entire student body. Mrs. Talarigo’s role in introducing the lesson, summarizing the lesson and assigning a practice behavior for the day sends the message to our students that The Pikesville Way lesson is important for the entire student body.
Who is responsible for the Pikesville Way?
The Pikesville Way lessons are written by Mrs. Lois Rothberg, School Counselor. Mrs. Rothberg distributes the week’s lessons to homeroom teachers. Mrs. Talarigo, Pikesville Middle School Principal, assumes responsibility for presenting the public address portion of the lessons. Each homeroom teacher and all staff members are expected to model and reinforce the target behaviors in every school setting.
What are the observable results of The Pikesville Way?
Administrators and teachers credit The Pikesville Way character education program with creating a school wide language and a caring school community. Since our expectations are clear, consistent and school-wide, students are respectful when redirected and take greater ownership for their behavior. They understand that school is their job and that the values they practice in school are important preparation for success in the future. In fact, students seem to appreciate that the adults at school are committed to preparing students for success in school, relationships and the world of work.
At the end of each school year, students complete a written evaluation of The Pikesville Way. Data collected from the 2008 indicate:
• 100% of students listed a Pikesville Way topic that was helpful.
• 98% of students learned something about succeeding in school.
• 98% of students indicated something they learned from The Pikesville Way about getting along with others.
• 98% of students specified something they learned about themselves from The Pikesville Way.
• 97% listed something they learned from the daily lessons that would prepare them for high school success.
• 95% of students specified what they had learned from The Pikesville Way lessons that would help them succeed at work
From observable behavioral changes within the school, to data from the end-of-year Pikesville Way Evaluation, we conclude that both students and staff identify learning and growth attributed to our school-wide school-wide character education program.
Addressing the Principles of Effective Character Education Using
The Pikesville Way
Principle 1: Promotes core ethical values as the basis of good character.
Administrators and staff at Pikesville Middle school identified core ethical values for our school community: being responsible, respectful, cooperative, and accountable. The Pikesville Way comprises our school-wide character education initiative program. Every Pikesville Way lesson focuses on one of our four core ethical values to show students what each value “looks like”, the importance of each value for living a moral life and how demonstrating these virtues will increase students’ chances for reaching their potential. Although many students can define the words respect, responsibility, cooperation and accountability, The Pikesville Way deepens our students’ understanding of each value, identifying at a developmentally appropriate level how each value can be expressed in observable behaviors in school. Due to the fact that all students in our building participate in The Pikesville Way each day, everyone in the school community is working towards the same objective: to create a caring community of learners. To reinforce the behaviors, our staff refers to The Pikesville Way throughout the school day when discussing appropriate behavior. In fact, a teacher may address inappropriate behavior and redirect a student in the classroom, cafeteria or hall by saying, “That’s not the Pikesville Way.” This reminder about our school values results in behavioral change without confrontation. Since we want students to extend these ethical behaviors outside of school, within the family and community settings, we incorporate our core values into our school improvement plan and newsletters. The Pikesville Way character education program teaches and reinforces school and life skills which are vital for success in school and in the world of work.
Principle #3: Effective character education uses a comprehensive, intentional, and proactive approach to character development.
Pikesville Middle School’s character education initiative, “The Pikesville Way”, is a daily, sequential character development curriculum. Lessons are written to address our core values, the developmental needs of middle school students, and objectives of our school management plan. Students realize that character education is a priority at our school because we devote time every day for discussion and reflection about virtues. The Pikesville Way is a comprehensive character education curriculum with each lesson building on what has been previously taught. Students are held accountable for demonstrating the principles included in our program and there is periodic review of what has previously been taught. During these review lessons, students are asked to do self-evaluation regarding which Pikesville Way skills they have mastered and use on a regular basis and which Pikesville Way skills they still need to incorporate into their daily behaviors.
Principle #4: Effective character education creates a caring school community.
A key objective of The Pikesville Way is to involve students, teachers and administrators in working together to make school a comfortable place to learn. Pikesville Way lessons address values such as tolerance, perseverance, resilience, honesty, forgiveness, empathy and compassion in addition to our core values of respect, responsibility, cooperation and accountability. Teachers and students have credited The Pikesville Way with creating a more positive school climate. Lessons on communication, respect for others, apologies and positive attitudes enable students and teachers to use a shared language for improving interpersonal skills among students and between students and adults. Administrators and teachers have always known that students learn best in a place where they feel cared about and valued. Now, students feel empowered to realize that they can play a major role in making school a positive learning environment by using The Pikesville Way values as a guide for daily behavior and decision-making. School pride has grown as everyone works together cooperatively in an atmosphere of mutual respect.
Spotlight on Life Skills—The Pikesville Way Lessons
Teacher Resource for Middle School Students
Written by Lois Rothberg
Spotlight on Life Skills:
Spotlight on Life Skills is a school-wide character education program containing 170 lessons for middle school students. The program is designed around a daily character building lesson. Each lesson provides a topic for the day, introduction, discussion questions, summary and behavior goal. The homeroom teachers introduce the daily topic and conduct a discussion with the students. Following the 10 minute lesson, an administrator uses the public address system to present a summary of the lesson and a behavioral goal for students to practice related to the lesson. Thus, every student hears the same message on the same day, has an opportunity to practice new skills during the school day and is held accountable for these behaviors. Through daily teaching and reinforcing of school and life skills, character education is infused into every school day.
Topics in Spotlight on Life Skills include:
• Responsibility
• Respect
• Cooperation
• Accountability
• Personal growth
• Friendship skills
• Coping skills
• Work habits
Spotlight on Life Skills is also an excellent resource for group counseling, classroom lessons, behavior intervention programs and a social skills curriculum.
Spotlight on Life Skills teaches students the character education skills that students will need for success in school and in the world of work. This program has been effective in creating a more positive school climate and helping student understand school expectations.
Spotlight on Life Skills is available at MarCo Products, Inc. online at www.marcoproducts.com or by phone at 800- 448-2197.
For More information Contact:
Lois Rothberg
Pikesville Middle School
lrothberg@bcps.org
The Maryland Center for Character Education
29 West Susquehanna Ave., Suite 300, Baltimore, MD 21204
E-Mail: MCCEcharacter@aol.com
