What Not to Wear!

Dress code in our Middle School (Grades 5-8) has been a constant source of frustration in our community. I try to remind myself that if this is our issue, I guess things are pretty good. This year, we have tried to shift gears and clarify the inconsistencies by having teachers intentionally come to school out of dress code during our morning assemblies. I'm looking for some creative ideas and some visuals (videos, power point presentations) that address the situation. Lastly, I'm hoping someone knows of a good resource for working with adolescent girls about body image.

0 members like this

▶ Reply to This

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by James Dykstra on September 17, 2008 at 3:10pm

Dove's Campaign for Real Beauty has an amazing video that might help with some of those girls.

http://www.campaignforrealbeauty.ca/bblank.asp?id=6896

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on September 17, 2008 at 3:56pm

There's an article in the new Time magazine about teen girls. Don't know if there is any helpful info in it for your situation.

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Cathy Nelson on September 17, 2008 at 5:57pm

John, our first week of school was spent reviewing the handbook, which includes the dress code. Each teacher has an advisory group so we have a small number of students (15 or less.) We were charged with teaching the content in interesting ways. For dress code, i gave out pictures that I scoured the internet and magazines for and made my class break up into groups to discuss the issues that may come form the pictures. Some were right on the money for appropriate, while others were way off. Once The groups had accurately divided into okay and NOT okay, I asked them to stand in front of their peers and explain what the handbook said, and why the inappropriate dress did not meet the code. it was an interesting "student-led" conversation. I had to research myself because our handbook bans "wife beater" tops, which I had no clue was--apparently it is like a plain white tank undershirt of sorts. It was a fun student led conversation. The biggest problem I had was the graphic tee's I used in pictures. Te kids just did not what the issue was with some of them. They told me the graphic tee are just a play on words, and that older people apply older meanings (i.e. "pimp my ride" = the term pimp is okay because it is not used to promote prostitution or vulgar behavior.) Others they just did not get, like the grey sirt with what appeared to be a box of Tampax, using the baby blue box with a pink swoosh that read Tampa....more). But it looked like a box of tampax on the shirt. They just did not get what was so wrong here. It wos really tough to explain that one. All other rules were easy to identify and discuss. But sadly not the graphic t's/