An Introduction

Nature of the Curriculum

The Good Neighbors Curriculum is designed to nurture Good Neighbor skills and values while promoting a commitment to learning and positive self-identity within children. Four characteristics point to the nature of the curriculum.

1. Values-based – the curriculum teaches values common to religious and non-religious groups: caring, fairness, integrity, honesty, responsibility, restraint, respect for self and others.
2. Asset-building[1] – the curriculum seeks to build skills and assets in children that will help them flourish, including positive identity, a commitment to learning, decision making, motivation to make a difference, and peaceful conflict resolution skills.
3. Expanding Circles of Care – the curriculum promotes an awareness of our interrelatedness with and responsibility for others near and far, including our relation with the natural world.  The four week curriculum sequences attention to self, family, community, and world – our four expanding circles of care.
4. Community-based Learning – the curriculum supports and is supported by a learning community of college interns, volunteers, and children, surrounded by a community partnership of churches, schools, and civic organizations.  Life together in a learning community becomes the curriculum itself, where values, assets, and awareness of expanding circles of care are learned through stories and shared practices. 

Teaching Good Neighbor Values and Skills in our Community through Stories, Daily Practices and Circles of Kindness[2].

We teach children through stories and through the ways we live together.  The Good Neighbors Curriculum is designed to help interns and volunteers practice what the curriculum seeks to teach, making methods consistent with desired outcomes.  The following methodologies for teaching-learning and for peace-building within community serve to foster Good Neighbor values and skills.

• Daily Practices: Nurturing Character Development in Children 

The Good Neighbor Curriculum views character development as a natural dimension of our humanity that supports well-being in children and equips them to live peaceful and responsible lives. Character development, therefore, should be nurtured in positive ways.  Daily practices within a community setting help to build community and nurture this development.   

Character growth can be nurtured by music, art, nature, and community practices that promote sensitivity to the wonder of life and the interconnection of all living things.

In daily, simple practices of reflection, expressing gratitude and circles of kindness, the Good Neighbor Curriculum is designed to support children as they examine the characteristics of Good Neighbors.

• Circles of Kindness  

 A circle of Kindness involves a peacemaking process which draws on Native American tradition.  This process has been used in schools to solve behavior problems and create positive climates.  An approach to community building that hinges on storytelling, circle processes engage children in becoming problem solvers as they listen to others and tell their own story.

[1] The Search Institute introduces the notion of asset-building in children and youth.  They suggest a set of 20 external and 20 internal developmental assets that help young people succeed in life. See What Kids Need to Succeed and What Teens Need to Succeed by Peter Benson, Judy Galbraith, and Pamela Espeland.[2] See The Little Book of Circle Processes by Kay Pranis.  Published by Good Books in cooperation with

Eastern Mennonite University