Could we teach values in such a way as to support the basic goals of education? Like functional literacy? Could we help students understand important principles worth valuing? Could we encourage teachers to express their faith in principles they deeply value and thereby give them fulfillment in teaching? I certainly believe we can.
A new course is being developed at Fresno Pacific University. It should be ready by this summer (or even earlier) for online learning. The introduction of concepts of the course will be video taped and put on Youtube by January 31, 2012.
The goals of the course are the very questions that opened this post. One of the basic goals of education is to promote functional literacy. If a person cannot follow a list of instructions, they are not functionally literate. (I know, I know, try to follow the directions to put together a toy at Christmas time.) However, think about it. A job description is a list of instructions to an employee as to what they are to accomplish on that job. If the employee cannot or will not comply with these instructions, they cannot function as an employee in that position.
In the Teaching Values course, the students are presented with a story to illustrate a fundamental principle which is the theme of the short story. This is followed by a "check for understanding" exercise that begins by taking the principle of the story and transforming it into a learning objective. (What the student should be able to do at the end of the exercise.) Then, a format is introduced with main ideas being written on the left with matching analysis questions written on the right. (This is a Cornell Note style of format.) These open ended questions engage students to investigate the fundamental principle in the story in such a way that the answers shed light, step by step, on the meaning and value of the principle. At the bottom of the format is a horizontal line. On the left is the word "closure" and on the right are two or three statements students write to express either evaluation or synthesis of what they have just analyzed. This is followed by a creative next step on how students would do a new thing to implement the principle in some way. As the students follow each step, they are exercising two things at one time. First, they are using the upper levels of the cognitive domain: analysis, synthesis/evaluation, and creativity. Second, they are following a detailed set of instructions. They are practicing and applying functional literacy.
At the same time, students would be applying reading, writing, speaking, and listening to ways of thinking (paradigms) of learning. These paradigms are divided into two categories. First are ways of thinking, values connected to principles, that encourage a learning relationship between student and teacher. Second are those which encourage ethical choices which will result in improved, trustworthy relationships between students and anyone else in their lives.
Some examples of fundamental principles might be:
What is the relationship of truth inside my head to the truth outside my head?
Why should I care about treating other people the way I would like to be treated?
Why are relationships important to achieving things?
How do I determine actual justice?
Why is compassion important?
Why is faithfulness valuable?
Are there teachers and parents, members of the media and government, and concerned citizens out there who have a concern for our younger generation, for their functional literacy, for their trustworthy relationship to society? I truly believe so.
Come, let us reason together.
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