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Character Education
Educational systems today are focused on raising standards of academic achievement. However, as we consider the world in which we live, we understand the importance of helping students to learn much more than the subjects they study. Appropriate environments, activities, the arts, and service projects can help students to learn responsibility, compassion, integrity, civility, leadership and cooperation. These and other elements of healthy, well-developed character can be learned by example and opportunities to exercise them, as discussed by the authors of articles in this area.

Articles

The Heart of a Teacher: Identity and Integrity in Teaching
Parker J. Palmer
Character education is connected primarily with the integrity of the teacher.

Roadmaps For Life, Notes From The Journey
Midge Bowman
Ms. Bowman shares her thoughts on moral education and challenges us to make acts of kindness and love a living thing within the school community.

Education by Intention, Not Default: How Independent Schools and Families Create Respectful Learning Cultures
Ellen Taussig
Education takes place within the culture of a society, which is reflected in schools and households. But does our society have a culture? This article explains how one independent school creates a microculture congruent with that of the families whose children it serves.

Understanding Good and Evil in Children's Literature
Dr. Renee Fuller
Fuller maintains that it is no accident that stories of good and evil appear in all cultures -- they are essential to the mental health of young children.

From Outside In: How Out-of-School Programs Enrich Student Learning
Nancy Bacon
The Director of Educational Programs at the World Affairs Council of Seattle defines key elements of citizenship today and then explains how out-of-school programs connected with in-school curriculum support education for citizenship.

Making the Most of "Teachable Moments"
Steven Carr Reuben, Ph.D.
Parents and teachers can find many ways to teach ethical behavior to children by recognizing the "teachable moments" that crop up every day.

Giraffes and Bats: A Giraffe Field Report
The Giraffe Project

Recommended Reading

Bibliography

Moral Questions in the Classroom: How to Get Kids to Think Deeply About Real Life and Their Schoolwork
by Katharine G. Simon
Yale University Press, 2001
ISBN: 0-300-09032-3

The Soul of Education: Helping Students Find Connection, Compassion and Character at School
by Rachael Kessler
ASCD (Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development), April 2000
ISBN: 0871203731

The Courage to Teach

by Parker Palmer
San Francisco CA: Jossey-Bass, 1998
ISBN: 0-7879-1058-9

Teacher: The One Who Made a Difference
by Marc Edmundson
Vintage, 2003
ISBN: 0375708545

Tuned In and Fired Up: How Teaching Can Inspire Real Learning in the Classroom
by Sam M. Intrator
Yale University Press, 2003
ISBN: 0300100221

Soul of a Citizen: Living with Conviction in a Cynical Time
by Paul Rogat Loeb
New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 1999
ISBN: 02-312-2043503

Character Begins at Home: Family Tools for Teaching Character and Value
by Karen D. Olsen and Sue Pearson
Books for Educators, 2000

A Hidden Wholeness: The Journey Toward an Undivided Life
by Parker Palmer
Jossey-Bass, 2004
ISBN: 0-7879-7100-6

Related Links

Character Education Manifesto

Center for the Advancement of Ethics and Character

Boston University's Center for the Advancement of Ethics and Character

The Character Education Partnership

© August 2006

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