Moral Weakness,Moral Education and Self‐deception

Abstract

Despite the apparent advantages of incorporating logographic symbols in procedures intended to teach children with severe learning difficulties to recognise words, such procedures have never proved successful. Their failure has been attributed to a blocking effect that is induced by the additional cues. The blocking effect account predicts that any method that involves introducing additional stimulus cues will be inefficient for teaching word recognition, compared with a word alone method. A new technique was devised in an attempt to surmount this problem. The basis of the technique draws on a range of research areas. Children who had no reading skills and had previously failed to gain any sight vocabulary were taught to recognise 12 words. An experiment compared a word alone method with two variants of the new technique. Both versions were more successful than the word alone method at teaching the children to recognise the words. The findings refute the view that any procedure that incorporates additional cues will necessarily be ineffective. For students who have hitherto made no progress at all in learning to recognise words, the new technique offers an effective instructional procedure.     

Teachers' Views of Moral Education Topics – Taiwan and the USA

In a questionnaire survey, 94 teachers in Taiwan and 140 in the United States judged which topics among 20 moral issues would be appropriate subjects of study in grade six of the primary school and in the first year of the university. The issues related to religion, ethnicity, gender, health care, crime, alcohol, tobacco, gambling, guns, government corruption, birth control, caring for the elderly, and television programming. The results revealed great diversity of opinion within each group of respondents. No single topic was approved by all teachers in either group, nor was any topic rejected by all. Among the 234 teachers, no two offered precisely the same configuration of answers over the 20 topics. Nevertheless, some group trends could be identified for individual topics. For example, in both countries the great majority of respondents would teach about industrial pollution, whereas very few would approve of trying to identify the best religion. In the rationales teachers offered in support of their choices, the four reasons that figured most prominently in both countries were that a topic would contribute to the nation's welfare, would help students to make wise decisions, would be interesting for students, and would represent a peaceful way to face social problems.     

Moral Education of Youths in the Information Age

In Chinese societies, moral education has always been considered the most essential component of education because the nurturing of moral persons is the prime function of schooling. The implementation of moral education has relied on the inculcation of values that reflect moral ideals. The emergence of the Information Age, with a plethora of information and ideas being disseminated instantly through informational technologies, has altered the educational landscape of the world and challenged the conventional approach to moral education. Given this context, we argue that it is important for Chinese educators to find an alternative approach to moral education that can embrace the new realities of our networked world. In this approach, lofty moral ideals should give way to simple and easily understood concepts such as respect, information and ideas in the ＂cyber world＂ should be exploited rather than shunned, and the genuine interests of children and youths should form the basis of moral education that is at once relevant and enlightening. In proposing this approach to moral education, we also assume that moral educators in Chinese societies, which include school teachers, parents, and organizers of nonformal education programs, would endeavor to understand the complex world of cyber realities and devise feasible ways to suit contextual educational needs.     

Just the Facts? The Separation of Sex Education from Moral Education

In this essay Sharon Lamb considers how progressives have begun to win the longstanding battle to shape sex education and what they have had to give up in the process. After framing the battle in historical context, Lamb uses discourse analysis to explore the hidden values in the “evidence‐based” (EB) curricula that progressives currently favor and that pass for neutral today. As her analysis reveals, EB curricula privilege three discourses — a discourse of science, a discourse of healthy choices (with an emphasis on individuals), and a discourse of efficacy — all of which are grounded in ideology and serve to legitimize certain kinds of knowledge while undermining other kinds. Lamb concludes by proposing eight tenets for the future of sexuality education, which are intended to displace the eight tenets codified by proponents of abstinence‐only‐until‐marriage sexuality education.     

Introduction to “Racial Inequality and Education: Patterns and Prospects for the Future”

Abstract

American society is in the midst of profound economic and demographic changes. At the same time that the racial and ethnic composition of American society is changing, disparities in income and wealth have grown wider and more pronounced than ever before. This article explores the ways in which race is implicated in the widening gaps in wealth and opportunity, and how these inequities impact educational achievement.     

Schools and Moral Education: Conformism or Autonomy?

In pluralistic Western societies, schools have a specific task in moral education. This task is to be understood neither as the transmission of specific values, nor as the development of moral reasoning skills or universal values, but as teaching pupils to handle plurality in an autonomous way. The concept of autonomy is interpreted from a Vygotskian and Deweyan position, where learning in school means learning to participate in cultural activities in a reflective and critical way. Participation has both intellectual and moral aspects, and thus moral education can never be separated from cognitive education.     

Affect and the Moral‐Conventional Distinction

Abstract

The effect of inducing negative, positive or neutral affect on the recall of moral and conventional transgressions and positive moral and conventional acts was examined. It was found that inducing negative affect was associated with higher recall of moral transgressions while inducing positive affect was associated with higher recall of positive moral acts. Affect induction condition did not have a significant effect on the recall of the conventional transgressions or positive acts. The results are interpreted within the Violence Inhibition Mechanism model of moral development (Blair, 1995) and by reference to a new, hypothesised system, the Smiling Reward Response.     

When Christian education meets patriotism: Christian organisations’ response to the introduction of Moral and National Education in Hong Kong schools

Plans by the Hong Kong Government to introduce moral and national education (MNE) as a compulsory subject in primary and secondary schools in 2010 encountered strong opposition. The controversy over the plans has lasted for two years, with the government and its supporters claiming that the subject will help to instil a stronger sense of national identity in children and critics deriding it as biased and constituting a form of brainwashing. The subject is also seen as posing troubles or a considerable threat to local Christian schools because most of them have had their own religious education programmes for years. Most Christian school-sponsoring bodies and parachurch organisations oppose the subject’s introduction, urging the government to scrap its curricular guidelines, and many say they will boycott its implementation. To bring the issues surrounding MNE into sharper focus, this article traces the development of Christian education in Hong Kong and analyses how local Christian communities perceive and have responded to the official proposal. Three prominent themes commonly emphasised in the Christian discourse are plural identities, conditional patriotism and universal values. These themes could shed light on wider theoretical discussion about the positive roles of religion and religious education for citizenship education.     

Transformative Education? A Philosophic-Augustinian Response to the 2010 Albertan Reform Initiatives in “Inspiring Education”

The Alberta Government’s 2010 “Inspiring Education” reform proposals claim to be “transformational” in nature. This paper examines these proposals in light of ancient philosophy and various among the world’s wisdom traditions. Drawing particularly on the philosophic reflections of St. Augustine in his Confessions, it argues that the proposals are neither new nor “transformational,” but part of a long and problematic educational lineage that has its roots among the ancient sophists. As an alternative to the Alberta proposals and “sophist-icated” education, this paper advocates for the incorporation of philosophic or contemplative elements into the school day during which both teachers and students might learn the genuine meaning of school as schole through the practice of pursuing wisdom.     

Moral Education or Indoctrination in South Africa? A Brief Response to Potgieter

Abstract

This paper is a brief and informal response to Professor P. C. Potgieter's paper Moral Education in South Africa which appeared in the January 1980 edition of this Journal (Vol. 9 No. 2, pp. 130‐3). In response to Potgieter the author attempts to present some of the more obvious philosophical and sociological inconsistencies and problems appearing in Potgieter's paper. He concludes, basically, that Potgieter has assumed a marked consensual model of South African society and, therefore, his analysis serves only to misinform the reader as to the complexities of moral education in South Africa.     

Moral Education and Improvement of Coexistence in Secondary Education （12-16 Years） in Spain

Coexistence and moral education are areas of great interest in Spanish compulsory education, especially in the period that comprises between 12 and 16 years of age, named ＂compulsory secondary education＂ in Spain. With the aim to improve the processes of coexistence within this level, this research team on education from the University of Salamanca has conducted an experimental study, implementing a programme to provide moral education through ICTs （information and communication technologies）. So as to verify the positive influence of the programme, a series of means have been applied with consideration for two groups--control and experimental--and certain stages of pre- and post- test assessment. The first results denote that there has been an improvement in social-personal values in the students that were involved more actively in the programme.     

School Voucher Program and Its Enlightenments to the Education Reform in China

This article roughly retrospects the idea of school voucher program proposed by Milton Friedman, lately developed by Peacock, Wiseman and Jencks. The reasons like privatization in education, deterioration of public schooling and school choice promote this program. Then taking a simple look at the ramification of voucher program＂ and its value inclination and the practice of school voucher program in the USA and the problems existing in America. Finally, this paper introduces the school voucher program practiced in China and the enlightenments that school voucher program can offer to the education reform in China. With the idea and practice of school voucher program, the introduction of the market mechanism benefits the innovation of education fiscal system, the competition between schools, improvement of the education quality and parents＇ needs of school choice; it benefits the development of non-governmental education; it helps to build a better school governance situation. We should use two forms of constitutional transformation to ensure the widespread of school voucher program in China.     

“New Basic Education” and me

Initiated in September 1994, “New Basic Education” first underwent a five-year Exploratory Research phase from September 1994 to May 1999, which was followed by a second five-year Developmental Research phase from September 1999 to May 2004. Thus during the past ten years, “New Basic Education” has undergone a complete research process, including the presentation of the problem, the formation of results, and finally the dissemination, application, perfection, and development of its research. This study has preliminarily explored the transformation of schools, educational theories and educational research methods in China. The author hopes to respond actively to educational changes caused by our transforming society through her professional research. She presents in this paper the retrospective notes of her subjective state, such as her thought process, planning, actions and experiences while conducting and developing “New Basic Education” research. “New Basic Education” research originated from ten years of theoretical preparation (amassing basic educational theory, the methodology for educational research, and meta-research of educational disciplines), as well as from the author’s personal experiences conducting field research during the past three years and her profound reflections on the nature of the social transformations taking place in late 20^th century China. During the Exploratory Research phase, “New Basic Education” research—which consists of reconstructive research on educational theory and practice—regards the rebuilding of educational aims as its theoretical starting point. Additionally, “New Basic Education” research regards schools, which provide nine-year compulsory education as the entire unit of practical research. The research also focused on classroom education, teaching reform, and school management for the experimentation and reform of the schools. As for the core issue of methodology, the crux of the issue lies in how to deal with the relations between theoretical research and practical research and the relationship between theoretical researchers and practical researchers.