OPENING DISCUSSION: Have any of you seen comedian Rodney Dangerfield in any movies? What line is he famous for? Often in his comedy routines you’ll hear him say, "I can’t get no respect." What do you think he means? 

One dictionary defines respect this way, "to have regard for or appreciation of a person’s worth; to honor, to esteem, to be courteous and considerate to."

WHY IS RESPECT IMPORTANT?  

In order to see the importance of showing respect, let's try to relive the feelings that come with being disrespected.  

MOVIE CLIP: (Either use the clip or remind them of this section of the movie.) In the hit movie, Back to the Future, Michael J. Fox plays Marty McFly, a student whose father was treated without respect all his life. Marty goes back in time and sees the abuse that his father endured in school. I want to show you a clip so that you can feel the humiliation along with him.

DISCUSSION BASED ON CLIP: Because of being treated like a loser in high school, Marty’s father lost his self-respect and ended up being a loser as an adult. When people treat others as losers, when they put others down instead of respecting them, it affects people profoundly. Some lose their confidence and are never able to take risks in life.

BRAINSTORM CHALLENGE!  

Divide the class into two teams, right down the middle of the class. Each team chooses a fast writer for the blackboard. Each team is to come up with as many examples of how people show disrespect as they can. They can use examples from school, home or community. After three minutes, ask them to come up with examples of how to show respect. After three minutes, count up the legitimate items on each side. Losers serve donuts to the winners, then themselves.

Debriefing: Which items that were listed bother you the most? Why? How do you think we can begin showing more respect to people? 

Disrespect hurts. Some never get over the hurt. You know how it feels. Let's move from understanding the problem to becoming part of the solution. Here are some steps for treating others with respect.

DISCUSSION: Does everyone deserve at least some respect? Why or why not? (Allow them to beat this around a bit.) I’d argue that although some people have earned our respect and thus deserve a higher degree of respect than others, all people deserve at least our courtesy. Why? Because all people have the potential to be something great. No matter how worthless a person may seem now, if someone were to only look beneath the surface and treat that person with some dignity, that person may very well become a totally different person.

ILLUSTRATION #1: Do you remember the part in the movie "Aladdin" when Jafar first approached the entrance to the vast cave of treasures? A voice boomed out that only one person would be allowed to enter. The voice said, "Bring me the…" What was he called? ("The diamond in the rough.") What do you think was meant by that phrase? (A diamond in the rough doesn’t look very beautiful. This is the way Aladdin appeared. He was born poor and had become a thief. But he aspired to be more. He didn’t look good on the outside, but he had the potential to be great.)

So, let’s treat people like they may be great one day, rather than as we see them today.

ILLUSTRATION #2: A young teenager named Steven didn't fit in at Middle School. All the other students thought that to be important you had to be good at sports like baseball. But Steven was a terrible player. And to make matters worse, he looked funny. Schoolmates would call him names. But Steven took an interest in photography and movies and found other people in his neighborhood who shared his interests. He wasn’t accepted any better in high school, where he called the artsy crowd his "Leper colony". But even in school plays he couldn’t get parts because he couldn’t remember the lines. So he just worked on the sets. But he continued to develop his interests in film and became famous as one of the greatest producers in the history of film. Anyone want to guess his name? Steven Spielberg. (Ask youth to name as many movies produced by Spielberg that they can remember.) The same people who laughed at him in school and called him "Spielbug" would probably love to have his autograph now. Or at least a week's salary!

So what can we learn from this illustration? (No matter how much of a loser someone seems like today, we can't see his or her future. It would have been easy to put down guys like Albert Einstein, Tom Cruise, and Steven Spielberg when they were teens. Let's see fellow students as diamonds in the rough. 

Solomon, a king who was known for his great wisdom, once said, "Death and life are in the power of the tongue." What do you think he meant by that? (Get some discussion.)

What do you think of the little saying, "Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never harm me."? I wish it were true. But it’s not. Words can dramatically change people’s lives.

But the tongue can also be powerful for good. Most of us haven’t grasped its power. Say the right thing to the right person at the right time and you may very well save a person’s life.

I often hear musicians say that when they get a letter from a fan that says they were positively impacted by one of their songs, it makes all their effort worth the while. But we don’t have to be popular musicians to share that same great feeling of having impacted someone’s life. Each of us can turn "diamonds in the rough" into incredible diamonds. For many students, parents and teachers, it just takes a little respect and encouragement from a student who cares. Why become a "diamond cutter?"

Educator John Dewey once stated that the deepest urge in human nature is "the desire to be important."

Psychologist William James said, "The deepest principle in human nature is the craving to be appreciated."

If Dewey and James are on target, then the person who can meet this need has great power to influence others. Let me tell you about a study of some youth that put this to the test. Tell me what you think the result was.

ILLUSTRATION: A study was conducted of 12 to 14 year olds. One group of children were told to run around a track and that they would be timed. No matter how well they did, the instructor told them, "I don't know what the problem is, but you are not as fast as the other groups. Let's try again."

A second group also ran the track. But this group was encouraged about their performance. They told them that they were very fast.

Which group do you think began to run faster and faster? (Let them respond.) The first group (that received the discouraging report) ran slower and slower with each succeeding run. Yet the second group ran faster with each run. The words of encouragement powerfully motivated them to perform better.

ILLUSTRATION: I heard a story of an unruly boy who was sent to the principal's office for his bad behavior in school. Apparently this was not the first time, and the principal looked at the boy, pondering what to do. This time, instead of scolding him, he looked down at the boy's hands. He told the boy, "Look at your hands. Thin fingers. Those are surgeon's hands. Go, fulfill your potential." All the boy could do that day was to look at his hands. Years later the principal heard from the boy, who had now completed medical school to be a surgeon. The turning point in the boy's life? The day he was encouraged by the principal.

One of the greatest feelings in the world is that you have positively impacted someone else’s life. One day I hope you can say,

• "When Amanda almost quit running track, I encouraged her to hang in there, and now she’s one of the best."
• Sean was ready to drop out of school, but after I told him that things just wouldn’t be the same without him, he went on to graduate.

We began with a clip from the movie Back to the Future where we found Marty’s dad living as an adult nerd. But when Marty spent time with his high school dad, Marty treated him with respect, encouraged him to respect himself and told him that he should consider publishing the science fiction he had been writing privately. The end of the story? Did any of you see the movie? When Marty went back to the future, what was his dad like? His dad was no longer a "diamond in the rough." He was a successful writer who was no longer a nerd. (You may want to show the clip toward the end of the film.) By encouraging this student in high school, Marty changed his entire future. Do you realize the impact of this? Do you think that by simply bringing out the best in someone else you could change their entire future?

Recommended Reading: Bringing Out the Best in People, Alan Loy McGinnis, (Augsburg, 1985).

Don't think your class will go for some of my ideas? Substitute games, activities, and stories from our large collection on the page  "Respect for Others."