Character Education I. Background to Character Education: Issues, Theories Controversies Daniel K. Lapsley Darcia Narvaez A. How is Character Defined?: Psychological considerations Ball State University University of Notre Dame 1. The Problem with Habits 2. The Problem with Traits Handbook of Child Psychology 3. The Problem with Virtues B. Philosophical considerations Abstract 1. Bag-of-Virtues and Foundations 2. Character and Virtue Ethics Character education is both popular and controversial. A psychological 3. Virtues and Character Education approach to understanding its central constructs is proposed. We review C. Educational considerations philosophical conceptions of virtues and conclude that character education 1. Genre of Discontent cannot be distinguished from rival approaches on the basis of a distinctive 2. Broad Character Education ethical theory. We review several educational issues, such as the manner in 3. Direct and Indirect Methods which the case is made for character education, the implications of broad 4. Mimesis and Transformation conceptions of the field, whether character education is best defined by 5. Oratorical and Philosophical Traditions treatments or outcomes, and whether character education is best pursued D. New Approaches to Character Psychology with direct or indirect pedagogies, a debate that is placed into historical 1. Identity, Exemplars and the Moral Self context. We note that character education requires robust models of 2. A Social Cognitive Approach to the Moral Personality character psychology, and review several new approaches that show II. Approaches to Character Education promise. Six general approaches to character education are then A. The Eleven Principles of Effective Character Education considered. Integrative Ethical Education is described as a case study in B. Caring School Communities order to illustrate theoretical, curricular and implementation issues. We C. Service Learning and Community Service summarize issues of implementation that are challenges to research and D. Positive Youth Development practice. We conclude with several challenges to character education, chief E. Social Emotional Learning of which is the need to find a distinctive orientation in the context of F. Character Education in Higher Education and the positive youth development. Problem free is not fully-prepared, but fully- Professions prepared is not morally complete. III. A Case Study: Integrative Ethical Education (IEE) A. Character as Expertise Development B. Pedagogy for Cultivating Character Expertise To appear in Vol 4 (A. Renninger & I. Siegel, Vol. Eds.) Handbook of Child C. Self Regulation for Sustainability Psychology (W. Damon & R. Lerner, Eds.). New York: Wiley. D. An Implementation of IEE: The Community Voices and Character Education Project E. Lessons Learned IV. Issues of Implementation V. Open Questions and Future Directions 1 Character Education “Enlightenment Project.” I. Background to Character Education: Issues, Theories This ideological division sometimes surfaces as a technical Controversies argument about pedagogy, for example, should one endorse direct or indirect methods of instruction. It shows up in how one conceives The moral formation of children is one of the foundational goals of fundamental questions concerning, for example, the source of our moral socialization. The ambitions that most parents have for their children values or the epistemological status of our moral claims. It shows up in our naturally include the development of important moral dispositions. Most understanding of the very goals and purposes of education in liberal parents want to raise children to become persons of a certain kind, persons democratic polities; and in our understanding of what an ethical life who possess traits that are desirable and praise-worthy, whose personalities consists of — what it means to be a moral agent, to possess virtue, and to are imbued with a strong ethical compass. Moreover, other socialization live well the life that is good for one to live. It shows up, too, in the sort of agents and institutions share this goal. The development of moral character developmental literatures, constructs and metaphors that one finds is considered a traditional goal of formal education. It is a justification for compelling. the work of youth organizations, clubs and athletic teams. It is the object of homily and religious exhortation. It shows up in presidential speeches. It There is a certain value, of course, in casting large, fundamental has preoccupied writers, educators, curriculum experts and cultural scolds. and deeply felt perspectives into such stark relief. It often is useful to draw The number of titles published on character and its role in private and sharp boundaries around contesting points of view in order to discern better public life has increased dramatically over past decades. So have curricula their strengths and weaknesses. Yet Dewey (1938) warned of the folly of for teaching the virtues in both schools and homes. Several prominent construing educational options in terms of Either/Or. In so doing, he foundations have thrown their resources behind the cause, and professional argued, one runs the danger of advancing one’s view only in reaction meetings dedicated to character education are marked by significant against the rival, which means that one’s vision is controlled unwittingly by commitment, energy and fervor. And in 2003 a new periodical, the Journal that which one struggles against. “There is always the danger in a new of Research in Character Education, was launched to bring focus to movement,” he writes, “that in rejecting the aims and methods of that which scholarly inquiry. it would supplant, it may develop its principles negatively rather than positively and constructively” (Dewey, 1938, p.20), with the result that it Yet for all the apparent consensus about the need to raise children fails thereby to address “a comprehensive, constructive survey of actual of strong moral character, and for all the professional attention devoted to needs, problems and possibilities” (Dewey, 1938, p. 8). the cause it is a striking fact that character education occupies contested ground in American society. Indeed, the issues that surround character In this chapter we review the literature on character education but education are riven with such partisan rivalry that the very terms of in a way that avoids, we hope, the dangers of Either/Or. It will be reference seem to function like code words that betray certain ideological necessary, of course, to sketch the contours of the great debates that have and political commitments. Whether one is for or against the character characterized this field. Fortunately, however, there has emerged in recent education movement is presumably a signal of whether one is a liberal or years a literature that has attempted to bridge conceptual and ideological conservative; whether one is sympathetic towards traditional or progressive divide (e. g., Benninga, 1991a,b; Berkowitz & Oser, 1985; Nucci, 1989; trends in education; whether one thinks the moral life is more a matter of Goodman & Lesnick, 2001; Ryan & Lickona, 1992a), or at least to face it cultivating excellence than submitting to obligation, or whether moral squarely. Our search is for the via media that provides, in Dewey’s words, evaluation is mostly about agents than about acts; or whether one prefers the “comprehensive, constructive survey of actual needs, problems and the ethics of Aristotle and classical philosophy to that of Kant and the possibilities.” 2 We do not approach our task in complete neutrality. Our own How is Character Defined? view is that character education would profit from advances in other domains of psychological science (Lapsley & Narvaez, 2005). Indeed, Character is derived from a Greek word that means, “to mark” as character is a concept with little theoretical meaning in contemporary on an engraving. One’s character is an indelible mark of consistency and psychology, although it has been the source of ethical reflection since predictability. It denotes enduring dispositional tendencies in behavior. It antiquity. An approach to character education that is deeply points to something deeply rooted in personality, to its organizing principle “psychologized” would look for insights about moral functioning in that integrates behavior, attitudes and values. There have been numerous contemporary literatures of cognitive and developmental science, in the attempts to define character more precisely. It is a “body of active literatures of motivation, social cognition and personality. Of course, tendencies and interests” that makes one “open, ready, warm to certain aims researchers in these areas rarely draw out the implications of their work for and callous, cold, blind to others” (Dewey & Tufts, 1910, p. 256). It is understanding the moral dimensions of personality and its formation. Yet it made up of dispositions and habits which “patterns our actions in a is our contention that a considered understanding of what is required for relatively fixed way” (Nicgorski & Ellrod, 1992, p. 143). It refers to the effective character education will be forthcoming only when there emerges good traits that are on regular display (Wynne & Ryan, 1997). Character is a robust character psychology that is deeply informed by advances in an individual’s “general approach to the dilemmas and responsibilities of developmental, cognitive and personality research. Moreover, effective