Teaching Responsibility Through Classroom Jobs

Classroom jobs for students in kindergarten through fifth grade are really a great way to teach responsibility, more so than the actual job itself. Jobs can range from cleanup or organizational to procedural, or even just be fun. Having a classroom pet provides several very important jobs for students, and a pet is another great way to teach responsibility. Keep in mind, jobs where the results do matter, like feeding a pet, should have a built-in system for ease of correctness or double-checking by an adult.

Don’t forget, when you have a classroom pet, your students look to you as a model of responsible pet care. They notice how you treat the animal, and they pick up on the attitudes you project through both your words and deeds. Your interaction with the pet influences your students’ own attitudes and behavior toward the animal and possibly other animals they encounter outside of school.

Classroom pets bring a lot to the classroom, and that is why we created the Critters in the Classroom educational program. Debra, a Wisconsin based elementary school teacher wrote in:

“Thank you for providing my second graders with this opportunity! They love our new class pet (hamster) and can’t wait to take their turn at being responsible for him! It’s a great program—at little cost to the teacher!”

Please let us know how having a pet has affected your classroom!

Tags: critters in the classroom, Pet benefits

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 17th, 2010 at 5:32 pm and is filed under Teachers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.