Clearing Your Conscience and Telling the Truth

Classroom Guidance

Grades: 7th and 8th

Time required: 50-60 minutes

Purpose: This lesson will help students determine why it is important to be honest in and outside
of school.
VSCA Personal/Social Development Standards:
Grades 6-8 Students will:
MP1. Recognize the effect of peer pressure on decision making
MP2. Understand the consequences of decisions and choices
MP5. Demonstrate appropriate skills for interactions with adults and
developing and maintaining positive peer relationships

Objectives:

Approximately 80% of students will be able to define honesty

Students will be able to recognize the importance of honesty in their daily interactions
with peers, parents, and teachers
Students will be able to identify how honesty cultivates trusting relationships and the
consequences of lying
Students will be able to examine their sincerity, loyalty, and integrity within themselves
and evaluate if they are honest people

Materials:
Pencil
Notebook Paper
3 X 5 Index Cards
Projector Screen
Clear Jars (2) One labeled Guilty Conscience, the other labeled Truth Juice
Food Coloring
Bleach
Procedure
Stimulus
Begin lesson by discussing what things we discussed in the Fairness and Justice lesson.
1. Is it fair to lie to someone? Why or why not?
2. What is wrong with lying to your friends? Your parents? Your teachers?
Honesty definition: free of deceit and untruthfulness; sincere
Examples: Being honest with your teacher if you did not do your homework

Activity
Truth Juice Activity- explain to students that you will have them raise their hands and tell lies
(make sure they are not telling lies about another person). Every time the students tell a lie,
explain that the Guilty Conscience Jar is what their conscience looks like every time they tell a
lie. Your conscience is what tells you what is right from wrong, and what makes you feel guilty
when you lie. Add food coloring to the jar (already filled with bleach) every time someone tells a
lie.
Processing Questions:
How do you feel when you tell a lie to someone?
How do you feel when someone else tells a lie to you and you find out they are lying?
Guided Practice
Discuss the Ten Tips for Being More Truthful and have the students give examples of how
each step would help them from lying. As you go through each step, and students give their
reasons, add a little bit of bleach from the Truth Juice jar.
Discussion questions:

What did you think about this activity?

How did this represent lying and telling the truth?
Which jar would you want your conscience to look like and why?
Why is it important to tell the truth?

Evaluation
On an index card, write one of the ten tips for telling the truth.
Follow-up Activity
Have the students document their progress of telling the truth since the lesson. Have them write
down things that they have come clean about and how they felt after telling the truth.
Lesson Source:
Lewis, B. (2005). Honesty. In P. Espeland (Ed.), What do you stand for?: For teens : A guide to
building character (pp. 115-117). Minneapolis, MN: Free Spirit Pub.
Truth Juice activity adapted from Truth Juice Lesson by Sarah Bazemore

Ten Tips for Being More Truthful

1. Make a commitment to tell the truth

Would it be easy or hard for you to make a commitment to tell the truth?
Why or why not?
2. Tell someone about your commitment
Who would you tell about your commitment and why?
3. Think before you give a dishonest answer, explanation, or reason
What kinds of things do you think about before you tell a lie?
4. Be careful of when and how you use exaggeration, sarcasm, or irony
If you tell a story to one of your friends and you exaggerate the details, is
this lying? Why or why not?
5. Be careful not to twist the truth or leave out part of it
What is an example of twisting the truth?
6. Dont indulge in little white lies
What is a little white lie?
Can this be just as harmful as a big lie? Why or why not?
7. Watch out for silent lies
A silent lie is when you know about a lie and choose to keep quiet about
it; you are allowing the lie to continue because you chose not to say
anything.
Share one time that you knew about a lie and decided not to say anything
8. When you catch yourself lying, throw you mouth into reverse
How could you stop yourself from starting to tell a lie?
9. Talk to yourself
What kind of things could you say to yourself before telling a lie?
10.Treat yourself when you tell the truth even when its hard to do
What is something you could do for yourself when you have told the
truth?