Sustainability

The chart should be filled in with examples of how a student displayed this moral skill in their lives, but they could also add examples or suggestions of how they could work on developing the skill in different theoretical ways. The idea of building a chart emphasizes our school message of building a sustainable world with a community. Our teaching of moral life skills teaches our students how building their own sustainable lives enables them to make even more meaningful contributions to a sustainable world. Many of our moral life skills focus on becoming aware of one's actions, their effects on others, and how to be more conscientious of our impact.

The school theme projects that interact with the community will give the students opportunities to fill in the last two columns, but the individual column really focuses on how they act as a single person. Every month there will be a ceremony to recognize the students that have completed one life skill across the three columns. During this ceremony, the students who have fulfilled one moral life skill will fill our large, clear and hollow sculpture of a globe in the outside eating area with their choice of ½ cup measured dry material. Whatever the student wishes to contribute will be added to the globe; for example, a student could choose sand from a local beach, or dried flower petals from their garden to contribute. In this way, our students are building our sustainable world through their individual efforts and community participation. Every contribution is unique and lasting, and the students will physically see the world becoming full from their efforts. This contributes to the school message of participating in a sustainable community that relies on individual efforts to succeed.

The life skills would be posted in all classrooms as a reminder to students to be aware of how these skills are or could be constantly used in our school. At the beginning of the school year, teachers will frequently mention the moral life skills during activities and lessons. They will ask students what the qualities mean, how they are being shown in the classroom, and what they are studying has to do with these moral life skills. If a student has a particularly difficult time with fulfilling one moral life skill, the teacher will facilitate peer group support for that student, but never directly lecture the student on how to fulfill that skill. We believe self discovery is a much more meaningful way for students to learn and become aware of these skills in their lives. Copies of moral life skills charts are filed for every student and always available for them to review. When they graduate from our school, a portfolio of their old charts will be presented to each student, along with a picture of each of their material contributions to our globe. In this way, our students can visually see their moral development and deeper understanding of these life skills. We hope this is a reflective growing opportunity for our students.