Fun with Character: Be All That You Can Be
Discuss the Army slogan of “Be All That You Can Be” with the students. (If they don’t know it, you can use the video below to play the commercial for them.) Then write out the letters to the word ARMY vertically on the board, or you can reproduce it on paper for each student or group of students. Using these letters, ask the students to come up with words or phrases that start with these letters that describe someone who is Authentic. Some suggestions: A – actual, R – real, respectful, M – moral, mean what they say, Y – Yours truly. (This almost certainly requires a Thesaurus.)
The second part of this exercise is to use the A for Always and the R for Rarely, and come up with authentic and insincere behaviors that would fall into these two categories. When you are done with that, go back to the word ARMY and the letters that are left spell MY, so have them choose a behavior from either list – one they recognize in themselves. If it is on the A list, they will want to continue it, or if it is on the R list, they will want to work on eliminating it. It is not necessary for them to share which one they choose.
To process this activity, ask these questions:
Had you heard the Army slogan before?
Was it difficult to think of ideas to use for this exercise?
Why do you think it is important to be all that you can be?
If you were choosing a friend, would you want them to be authentic?
How would others look at you as a friend? Do you think they believe you are authentic? (silent answers)
The next time you are making a choice of how to behave, will you think of this exercise and the lists and determine which list it is on before you do it?