The Importance Of Moral Education In Schools

In today's world, most of the children are not aware of morally teachings. They are lack of them.

“Developing in students the desire for the good is the ideal in character development. In this way, students come to a place in which they choose to pursue morally good behaviors, rather than the alternative, as a matter of

While in middle school and high school, many of our teachers use to teach us about adolescents and warn us about our hormones and sex, but they never really touch on the topic about our mental change and how moral reasoning would change in such an unnoticeable manner. I honestly believed that I still had the same mind set from high school, until I learned about moral reasoning and watch the video of the three different age groups and it showed each mind set and their moral reason for the situation that was given. After watching that video, I reflected on the memories of middle and high school and realized, that I made a lot of dumb choices that I’m not proud of.

Many students come to school without a solid moral and ethical foundation because it has not been a priority at home. The lack thereof must not be used as an excuse. Educators must assume the responsibility to be effective caregivers, moral models, and ethical mentors. Successful character education is an integral part of a school’s culture, most effective when the virtues are integrated into the academic curriculum (Dean, 2014).

C.S Lewis once said, “Education without values, as useful as it is, seems rather to make man a more clever devil.” Ethics, defined by Merriam-Webster, is a “set of moral principles.” Ethical behavior should create an ideal learning environment that builds the foundation of an ethical environment. The experience gained in an ethical AP English classroom will greatly affect the student’s future. Education is not limited to academic study, but is rather the holistic growth of a human being.

The scale of morality wavers from one family to the next, furthermore, standards and virtue should be taught in the home. Sex education in school must stick to the facts. Proper education gives people power to make informed decisions and no one should be judged for engaging in sexual

Out of all of the stories that the class has read this far there have been two that expressed the importance of moral lessons. So what is a moral lesson? Well a moral, according to Dictionary.com is, “of, relating to, or concerned with the principles or rules of right conduct or the distinction between right and wrong; ethical”. And a lesson according to Dictionary.com is, “Something to be learned or studied.” If you put the two definitions together you get that a moral lesson is a lesson learned from doing something wrong. The first story that teaches a moral lesson is The Coquette by Hannah Webster Foster which contains a various amount of literary devices as well that help communicate the moral lessons taught. Both authors wrote a story

Lawrence Kohlberg’s theory of moral development has served as basis of the investigation of many issues related to morality. Building on Piaget’s belief that the moral judgment of children derived from their cognitive development, Kohlberg attend to identify cognitive stages that underline the development of moral thinking.

Another issue regarding this topic is the commonly held belief by parents that children are “innocent little angels”. On the contrary, children are sentient beings who observe their surroundings and make judgments according to what they perceive. Therefore when children seek answers from their parents about higher level questions, the parents themselves are forced to question what they believe. Coles stresses this, “Moral education is more than a series of rules handed down, and in our time one cannot assume that every parent feels sure of his own actual beliefs and values to make an explanation effect toward moral education. Because are unsure of their own beliefs, they just push what they were taught to their

Recently, those within education have begun to focus on not only teaching content, but also helping children to develop socially, emotionally and morally. Many teachers use activities in the classroom can help to improve students ability to develop their social identity, their emotional recognition, and their moral values. Furthermore, these types of activities can be useful for teachers in helping to establish an open, safe classroom environment where students can expand on their values and beliefs in a comfortable way. One activity that has commonly been used to improve these abilities is morality based questioning.

The general problem is that because of a decrease in character values taught in the home and in the classroom, an increase in disruptive behavior among young children ages four years old to eleven years old have been dominate in elementary schools (Embry, & Flannery, in press; Topo, 2003;) Manning (2011) notes that proven moral intellect is a crucial factor in aggression and school violence. Also, enough research displays moral reasoning of aggressive and antisocial children tend to be self-oriented, focused on the attainment of peripheral rewards, and the evading of punishment. The specific problem is that there is a need for moral virtues to be taught daily to young children and upper elementary children in the classroom among poverty area elementary schools to help students with the issues of inappropriate behavior (Berkowitz & Bier, 2005; Character Education Partnership, 2003; Davis, 2007).

What does education mean if ethics is sacrificed for academic gains? As Aristotle once said, “educating the mind without the heart is no education at all”. Not to mention, ethics is the key in shaping moral identities in people, especially students. This essay examines the importance of teaching ethics to students and the challenges that come with it. Educating students on ethics can minimize academic misconducts, guide students to become self-reliant in decision-making and attain wisdom. Yet, less experienced teachers, ignorance towards the importance of ethics and the increasing pressure on teachers regarding students’ academic standards have become inevitable challenges in the implementation of ethics in education.

When we are young our morality is shaped as we learn from our family and the environment. “Psychologists say a child must develop a sense of values by the age of seven to become an adult with a conscience” (Rosenstand 4). Children experience a plethora of information and subsequently build their personalities based on what they learn from growing up in their given culture. We are a product of our environment in the sense that we

Morality refers to the concept of proper human action in terms of "right and wrong," also referred to as "good and evil. According to Hobbes (1994:11), morality is simply a declaration of rules and beliefs that are considered absolute guides for human behaviour. According to Hare (1981:27), “Morality is a system of principles and judgments based on cultural, religious, and philosophical concepts and beliefs, by which humans determine whether given actions, are right or wrong.” Moral values and graciousness, in the past, were prominent in most teenagers. Every individual has capacity for growth. But a seed cannot grow without nurturing. And farmers don’t get to neglect their crops. So moral values has to be inculcated from infancy. Many years

The first aspect of similarity between the Malaysian and Japanese moral education is the subject is taught as an independent subject. The teaching period for Malaysian moral education is allocated in the school timetable. It is one of the core subjects taught to non-Muslim students in all primary and secondary schools in Malaysia. In a week, three teaching periods of forty minutes each are allotted for the subject (World Data on Education, 2011). Similarly, following France which teaches moral education as a separate subject, Japanese moral education was established as special hour in the official Course of Study (World Data on Education, 2011). Therefore, as a teaching subject in school, like any other subject lessons, the Japanese moral education develops, incorporates and enhances its own instruction. Classified as general studies rather than academic study, it is taught once a week in elementary and lower secondary schools, allowing Japanese students from the first grade to the ninth grade to have 35 lesson hours of moral education in a regular school year (Bolton, 2015).