Tuesday, June 26, 2018

Moral Education

I went looking to see where we are as a nation in terms of educating our students on morality. I came across this article in the Atlantic by Paul Barnwell entitled Students' Broken Moral Compasses. The tab shows Why Don't Schools Teach Children Morality and Empathy?

How did I get here? I'm seeing that unity is important to me. And social harmony. How do we get along together? And I am realizing that we need to have a common ethical and moral framework to get there.

I've been floating around this topic before. The article hit some points that I've discussed recently. Here's one:
A reluctance to teach about religions and value systems is coinciding with a steady decline of teen involvement in formal religious activity...And while attending church is only one way young people may begin to establish a moral identity, schools don’t seem to be picking up the slack. 
Here's another:
Narcissism is on the rise, especially in the Western world, as more teens concur with the statement: “I am an extraordinary person.” If empathy is crucial to developing a moral identity, then this trend should be troubling to parents and educators who hope that students foster the ability to see the world through others’s eyes.
So what I'm understanding is that young people aren't learning morality or empathy in school, and most aren't getting it at church either. So are they getting it at all?

1 comment:

  1. What are they learning from us parents? How are we using the influence and opportunity we have?

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