Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
Definition of Morals
Morals are the rules which people use to guide their behavior and thinking. When an individual is dealing with, or capable of distinguishing between, right and wrong.
Definition of Values
A principle, standard, or quality considered worthwhile or desirable
Some Stats
In a statewide poll of adults in Wisconsin, 91% thought that schools should emphasize character education, teaching students values such as respect for others, personal responsibility, and citizenship.
There were significant findings in the NEA polls regarding three different questions.
What has the most potential to create a positive effect on a childs moral and ethical standards?
Parents72% Peers/Friends.26% Teachers18% Clergy15% TV.8%
Character Education
Lets get one thing perfectly clear you are a character educator. Whether you are a teacher, administrator, custodian, or school bus driver you are helping to shape the character of the kids you come in contact with. Its in the way that you talk, the behaviors that you model, the conduct you tolerate, the deeds that you encourage, the expectations that you transmit. Yes, for better or for worse you are already doing character education. The real question is what kind? Are you doing it well or poorly? By design or default? And what kinds of values are you actually teaching?
Character Education
Character education often is used synonymously with terms such as moral education, values clarification, and moral reasoning. It has been defined as the intentional intervention to promote the formation of any or all aspects of moral functioning of individuals.
Respect Showing high regard for an authority, other people, self and country. Treating others as you would want to be treated. Understanding that all people have value as human beings. http://www.ilovethatteachingidea.com
Class discussions
Group Discussion
In your opinion, is it being done well or poorly? Do you think it is done by design or default? What kinds of values do you think should be taught?
Patriotism
What does it mean to be an American?
September 11 has raised this question that few Americans have seriously considered since WWII. Young people especially need to reflect on patriotism, for they will soon hold the future of our democracy in their hands.
Patriotism
Most teachers have been urged to mark September 11 with lessons that stress the need for enhanced tolerance and diversity. Few have lessons about Americas founding principles, or the cost at which our freedom was won.
If students are to become patriots they must understand and embrace the principles of liberty, equality and justice on which the nation is founded. They must develop the qualities of character that mark true citizenship: courage, responsibility, gratitude, and self sacrificing devotion to the common good. As educators, our task is to help young people see that America is worthy of their love, and to help them become worthy of their heritage as U.S. citizens.
A way to go about doing this is to change the way that our schools teach history government and literature.
Most schools use standard- issue textbooks in history and government classes. Unfortunately these text are generally dry, lacking in detail, and monotonous in style. Students can never grow to love America by reading these types of text, and need stories that engage their imagination, excites their gratitude.
Pledge of Allegiance
The court said a profession that we are a nation under God is identical, for the establishment clause purpose, to a profession that we are a nation under Jesus, a nation under Zeus, or a nation under no god, because none of these professions can be neutral with respect to religion.
Pledge of Allegiance
The pledge of allegiance is considered to be an important recognition of the freedoms on which the united states was founded and a tribute to those who have defended the ideals of liberty, equality and justice for all.
Pledge of Allegiance
Virginia State Senator Warren Barry says not enough schools make a regular practice of saying the Pledge of Allegiance these days. As a result he says he feels these students dont have a real appreciation of the Pledge and should know the flag is symbolic of our freedoms, our liberties, and our culture.
Discussion
Should the Pledge be recited everyday? Do our students understand and respect what the Pledge stands for? Do you think that it is unconstitutional to recite the Pledge?
Many people have come to the realization that our society is in deep moral trouble. Some of the signs of this include:
The breakdown of the family The deterioration of civility in everyday life Rampant greed at a time when 1 in 5 children is poor A sexual culture that fills our television and movie screens with sleaze Beckoning the young toward sexual activity at even earlier ages The enormous betrayal of children through sexual abuse A report (1992) indicating that the United States is the most violent of all industrialized nations.
Theodore Roosevelt stated it best, to educate a person in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society. William Killpatrick adds that the schools are failing to provide the moral education they once did; they have abandoned moral teaching. Character education was taught in the earliest days of schools through discipline, the teachers example, and the daily school curriculum. Why then did Character education decline?
Darwinism
Logical positivism
Personalism
Three causes:
The decline of the family
Schools have to teach values kids arent learning at home and schools, in order to conduct teaching and learning, must become caring moral communities that help children from unhappy homes focus on their work, control their anger, feel cared about, and become responsible students.
Developing Character
In order to establish Character Education, each teacher needs to:
Act as a caregiver, model, and mentor Create a moral community Practice moral discipline Create a democratic classroom environment Teach values through the curriculum Use cooperative learning Develop the conscience of craft Encourage moral reflection Teach conflict resolution
Developing Character
The school as a whole should:
Foster caring beyond the classroom Create a positive moral culture in the school Recruit parents and the community as partners in character education
The factors that will determine if Character Education will take hold in American schools and succeed are:
Support for schools Role of religion Moral leadership Teacher education Educating for character is a moral imperative if we care about the future of our society and our children.
Challenges Ahead
Which Values?
Some have argued that it is not possible to reach an agreement regarding which values to teach. Others are concerned about the separation of church and state and believe any attempts to teach values or morality will introduce religion into the classroom. Whether or not we deliberately adopt a character or moral education program, we are always teaching values. Even people who insist that they are opposed to values in school usually mean that they are opposed to values other than their own.
The fact is that there are a lot of values we all share. Nobody argues that discrimination is morally appropriate or that lying is better than telling the truth. There is no way of teaching subjects without teaching values. So lets be up front about that and have explicit curriculum. If we dont, we are going to teach values only in hidden and most devious ways. Lets have discussions about the values we want to transmit.
Values
Today, we have children raising children, we have children in overcrowded adult prisons and jails, we have children attending drug and alcohol treatment centers, children suffering and dying from illness and sexually transmitted diseases, children killing themselves and children killing other children. This is what happens when we do not teach our children morals or live as an appropriate example.
Moral Controversy
Sex Education
Interesting Facts
During the 1960s, schools expelled pregnant students (married or unmarried) and school re-admission after delivery was prohibited. The attitude in the 60s was that a pregnant students was socially contagious and that pregnancy would spread among students. As sex education has increased over the decades the teenage birth rate has declined and no longer are teen mothers punished by denying them an education.
The United States has the highest rate of teen pregnancy out of any country in the developed world. Experts say that restriction to sex-ed, contraception, and condoms fuel this rate, while in European countries (who have less than half of the amount of teen pregnancies) teens are given confidential access to contraceptives. In 1996, the teen pregnancy rates were: 93.0 per 1000 in the United States 62.6 per 1000 in England and Wales 42.7 per 1000 in Canada 15.1 per 1000 in Belgium
However
Worldwide Controversy
Although some sort of sex education is part of many schools' curriculum, it remains a controversial topic in several countries as to how much and at which age schoolchildren should be taught about contraception or safer sex, and whether moral education should be included or excluded. In the United States in particular, the topic is the subject of much controversial debate. Chief among controversial points is whether sexual freedom for minors is valuable or detrimental, as well as whether instruction about condoms and birth control pills reduce or increase out-ofwedlock or teenage pregnancy and STDs.
Statistics
Only 7% of Americans say that sex education should not be taught in schools. 15% of Americans believe that schools should teach the Abstinence-Only-UntilMarriage Program. 36% believe that Comprehensive Sexuality Education should be taught.
Abstinence-Only-UntilMarriage Program
Federal funds are available to schools who teach using this method. President Bush has been pushing for this program since he was first instated into office. Emphasizes abstinence from all sexual behaviors and does not cover information on contraceptives, STDs, masturbation, etc.
and health gains to be realized by abstaining from sexual activity; teaches abstinence from sexual activity outside marriage as the expected standard for all school age children; teaches that abstinence from sexual activity is the only certain way to avoid out-of-wedlock pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases, and other associated health problems; teaches that a mutually faithful monogamous relationship in context of marriage is the expected standard of human sexual activity; teaches that sexual activity outside of the context of marriage is likely to have harmful psychological and physical effects; teaches that bearing children out-of-wedlock is likely to have harmful consequences for the child, the child's parents, and society; teaches young people how to reject sexual advances and how alcohol and drug use increases vulnerability to sexual advances; and teaches the importance of attaining self-sufficiency before engaging in sexual activity.
A researcher named DiCenso compared comprehensive sex education programs with abstinence-only programs. Their review of several studies shows that abstinence-only programs not only did not reduce the likelihood of pregnancy of women who participated in the programs, but that 'abstinence- only' actually increased it. Four abstinence programs and one school program were associated with a pooled increase of 54% in the partners of men and 46% in women. The conclusion of this review was that "the overwhelming weight of evidence shows that sex education that discusses contraception does not increase sexual activity".
Final Quote
Education is the responsibility of the schools whether it is about smoking, alcohol, drugs, violence, racial diversity or sex. The assumption that these are the sole responsibility of someone else is a disservice to our children. Parents have a key role in the total education of their children in partnership with the schools. But too many parents fail part of their responsibility resulting in this country's highest teenage pregnancy rate in the industrialized world. Charles Gershenson