Learning Good Behavior with Behavior Bear and Miss Joni
Behaviors and respect seem to go hand in hand for with respect of others you are more likely to have good behaviors, too! Like listening ears and focus on the speaker. One tends to follow society and trends, so let’s have good behavior from morning til days end and hope that others will also chime in!
Hi, Behavior Bear, just one of the nine Characters of Character. I simply bloom with good behaviors!
Teaching good Behaviors is important because it helps children understand, model, and practice the rules in life. Our homes have rules, schools have rules, society even has rules and when a child can understand them they are more apt to have good behavior.
Behavior Bear shares why good behavior is important…
Behavior Bear makes learning Fun and Engaging…
Children connect more easily with stories and characters. Behavior Bear turns lessons about manners, kindness, and responsibility into exciting adventures rather than lectures, such as BEHAVE yourself, and helps kids want to behave well. Kids tend to want to be like the character they can relate with. And, can you imagine their face when they meet the character in costume, it becomes real! Children see themselves in the character. When Behavior Bear makes good choices or even not so good choices, children can reflect on their own behavior through the character and this helps them learn why certain behaviors are better and how they also affect others.
Behavior Bear Encourages Positive Reinforcement…
Behavior Bear celebrates good choices like sharing, using kind words, and listening — reinforcing that good behavior leads to positive outcomes. Kids feel proud and motivated to repeat those actions. We offer a Certificate of Achievement here.
Behavior Bear Builds Emotional Understanding…
Through Behavior Bear’s stories and conversations, children learn about emotions their own as well as others. Understanding feelings is key to empathy and strong social skills.
Behavior Bear Promotes Consistency Between Home and School
When parents and teachers both use Behavior Bear, it creates a shared language (“What would Behavior Bear do?”). This consistency helps children develop strong, lasting habits of good behavior. While I was a Teaching Assistant on our school Reading Team, I had the opportunity to Pilot my characters. They even earned a National Promising Practice Award! You could hear the conversations between the students referencing the characters and the staff would make reference to them which the students related to. We did introduce them to the community with an all school assembly!
Behavior Bear Strengthens Character Development
Behavior Bear doesn’t just teach “rules” the characters builds character. Kids learn core values like respect, honesty, kindness, and responsibility and our other traits that shape who they become as people.
I AM ALL ABOUT VISUALS
While many children don’t have the opportunity to actually meet the characters in person, there are many ways they can! Through our social stories and activity books are one way and so is a tee shirt! This is a great reminder to have good behavior and open conversations. My husband and I wore our shirts on the train one day and a mom stopped us and had her two boys read them: One said, DO NOT BULLY and the other said I HAVE GOOD MANNERS! That alone opened the window to more conversations and helped her reinforce the importance of good character. True story!
Another true story that I’ll share is from when I taught preschool. I had one student who was disruptive and one morning he came in with both barrels loaded if you will. As I engaged the other students in an activity for distraction, I then crawled under the desk which this little boy had flipped and hid behind. I sat there with him and asked him this: “Giovanni, how can Miss Joni help you to behave better?”……………Wait for it! He simply said: “Teach me” and from here on I scheduled a conference with the parents who were having difficulties at home with him, too. We all made a behavior plan of encouragement for him and I reinforced the rules in the classroom and the parents reinforced the rules at home. Problem solved, so simple. This just shows us that children don’t know what it means when you say BEHAVE, they need to understand it. Just as when we teach them a new word in our language, we describe what it means. This is no different and yet for me, as a parent, I had never thought of it that way. The truth is that we should be teaching our children vital core values at home where it all begins. Their behaviors at home follow them into the community, into their classroom and into their visits with family and friends. Let’s build a firm foundation and allow them to grow into the best they can be, together….
Doing activities and having conversations with your children is important. This blog has additional ideas to support you in this!