A few summers ago, I was starting a new grade level (5th) in a new district and spent a lot of time on Pinterest looking for some fun ideas for my fresh start. I decided to dig deeper into classroom rights and responsibilities and logical consequences. I figured that 5th graders would value being part of the process of establishing our norms, and, honestly, I wanted their insight. I was new to 5th graders and how they worked!
The process of creating these rights and responsibilities has been one of my favorite discussions with my class over the last couple of years. For students, thinking about what they want their rights to be is more powerful that just coming up with the standard class rules - be respectful, take turns, etc. Also, having this discussion at the beginning of the year gives me good insight about what the "personality" of my class is and what is important to them.
