Overview

The course is intended to begin with teaching the children the importance of rules. This part of the course includes written work, reading, plenary sessions and playing a game and covers why rules are important for how to behave in a group – be it in our class or in society; creating class rules – which includes the children’s charter on tolerance and respect; understanding concepts such as democracy and dictatorship; and understanding the importance of the Magna Carta and how rules are made today in the United Kingdom to help us all get along better.

Having discussed the core values of tolerance and respect as being part of the rules of the class, the course is then intended to move on to discuss issues around what could go wrong in our classroom and society. This part of the course is intended to tie in with anti-bullying month.

In these lessons we use what we would describe as “a feeling story”. These stories use image and metaphor to help children to identify and empathise with characters or situations and so get in touch with their own feelings about an issue. With these stories we aim to provide an avenue for children to explore their own feelings about being different (such as feeling lonely, feeling left out or bullied), and engage with these feelings without the child feeling exposed. See: Clarence the Clumsy Calf and the online videos of The Ugly Duckling and Lambert the Sheepish Lion.

This part of the course includes watching videos, reading, plenary sessions, written work, and playing games and covers understanding that we, as humans, have a need to be connected to other human beings and belong to groups; labelling people and passing judgment on who a person is, is unhelpful and often wrong; bullying is behaviour we want to stop; and the words we use can harm, so we should use words and actions properly.