Reasons To Teach Integrity In The Classroom
The leaders of tomorrow are sitting in your classroom today. What skills do those students need to fulfill these roles? An essential part of their skill set when they assume leadership responsibilities in the future world of work will be emotional intelligence.
The seeds of integrity are planted in every social emotional learning lesson you deliver in your classroom. Examples of emotional intelligence are evident when a student displays both personal and academic integrity.
Like developing any muscle in your body, integrity is built over time in students through modelling the behaviour, teaching lessons to help them understand precisely what it is and why it is important.
What is integrity?
It is a complex question but important to understand to teach this quality. Integrity is associated with the traits of honesty, truthfulness, compassion, and empathy. It is a product of a strong social emotional learning construct. Integrity is deemed an essential part of a functioning productive adult. It is what employers want in an employee.
What is the educator’s responsibility?
In his book Teacher and Child, the esteemed child psychologist and educator Dr Haim Ginott stated “as a teacher, I possess enormous power…I am the decisive element in the classroom.” Educators need to model expected student behaviour to give that behaviour credibility. Speak the language of integrity. Make integrity the norm and an expectation in your classroom. Create a classroom culture that honours hard work and respect for all. Students learn what they live.
Ensure an integrity focus.
In the classroom, use the word with regard and note people both publicly and privately that lead lives of integrity. Give them a clear picture of what integrity looks like in a person. Pay particular attention to the reasons why this is important. Students will question the importance of integrity. They need to know why it matters.
Ask the question what does integrity look like?
Doing the right thing when no one is looking provides a simple starting point. Why is that important? Exploring the aspects of truth will provide another discussion point. Who do they know that is trustworthy? Who do they know they can count on whenever they need them? Make that connection to how it makes them feel when someone is trustworthy.
Create rich learning opportunities around the topic of integrity. Use these questions and your own to develop discussion topics centered on integrity. This will solidify their knowledge and understanding of the skill.
One such topic would be volunteerism. What is the motivation to volunteer? There are reasons that can be explored to help them see that volunteerism is a complex and fluid societal issue. Often commitment expands with connections made in volunteer situations. People with money and without money volunteer. You give of yourself with no monetary reward. What propels them? Why do people volunteer at the local food bank?
More broadly discuss moral courage related to organisations like Doctors without Borders. They risk their lives to do the right thing. They do not see race, colour, or creed as a barrier to doing their job.
Now connect volunteerism to integrity. Compassion, empathy and care for others are hallmarks of integrity.
A simple writing lesson.
How would you describe a person of integrity?
What would a student look for in people with integrity?
Why should integrity be important?
Why is doing the right thing important even if no one is looking? Integrity might carry a stigma among some student social groups. It becomes a status symbol to lack academic integrity or cause a disturbance. This provides another effective topic for discussion. Why is going against societal norms acceptable to some people? This becomes an opportunity to discuss power and control and its negative effect in relationships.
Integrity figures prominently in friendships.
Schools have a highly charged social atmosphere. Strong social emotional learning skills are directly linked to healthy friendships. Integrity sits squarely in the mix. Anti-social behaviour like gossiping and manipulative relationships all contribute to negative social capital. Making good choices is a hallmark of integrity and promoting it promotes healthy social choices. Elevate their social skills with integrity lessons. When a student can step outside themselves and be empathetic to situations they are demonstrating their emotional intelligence.
Promote academic integrity in your classroom.
The onslaught of next generation AI provides many opportunities for students to challenge academic integrity. Look at your grading system holistically. Marks are just one aspect of an academic profile. Give the students opportunities to achieve through demonstrated persistence in the classroom, work group interactions and showing leadership skills. This elevates a grading system beyond marks on a paper.
Every building block in emotional intelligence will help raise self-confidence. Students with healthy self-esteem make better choices academically and socially. Their friendships are healthier because they can stand up for themselves, and a life of integrity can become ingrained.
Good leadership means making healthy connections with people. The good leaders of tomorrow will value emotional intelligence. They will see the need for it when dealing with employees. Just as classrooms benefit from a strong social-emotional learning platform, so too will the industry of tomorrow.
Educators prepare the next generation. They touch the future every day they step in a classroom. Having a strong social -emotional learning programme provides the gateway to embed integrity in society.
This article is available and can be accessed in Spanish here.
