Pixel International Conferences

As teachers we frequently face situations where we are expected to make moral judgements and act upon them as a part of our pedagogical practices. It can, for example, range from conflicts between pupils in the classroom to pedagogical choices of which assignments or methods that would serve best for specific pupils or the group as a whole. This is one reason why practitioners and researchers tend to agree on that teaching is an essentially moral practice where what we say and do can influence pupils in different ways [1] [2] [3]. However, they often seem to disagree on how teachers ought to treat ideals, norms and values in their pedagogical practices [4] [5]. According to recent development within moral psychology, we often make judgements based on emotionally driven intuitions and afterwards make up reasons to explain them. In other words, moral judgements involve both emotional responses and rational thinking, where the importance of the latter often has been overestimated [6] [7] [8]. This is, of course, a challenge for the traditional views of moral education. Thus, the overall aim of this paper is to present and critically discuss what the theory can contribute to moral education. Initially we will provide a background of the theory and argue why it seems to provide an important contribution to our understanding of the normative dimension of education. Finally, however, we will use philosophical method in order to critically examine of some of the core features of the model and discuss which consequences it has to, for instance, aspects of care which is inherent in an educational context.

Keywords: Moral education, Moral psychology, Care ethics.

References:

[1] Bourdieu, P., & Passeron, J-P. (1979). The inheritors, French students and their relation to culture. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
[2] Jackson, P.W., Boostrom, R.E., & Hansen, D.T. (1998). The Moral Life of Schools. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers.
[3] Campbell, E. (2013). “The virtuous, wise, and knowledgeable teacher: Living the good life as a professional practitioner”. Educational Theory. Vol. 63: 4.
[4] Kohlberg, L. (1966). “Moral Education in the Schools: A Developmental View” i The School Review, The University of Chicago Press Vol. 74, No. 1, 1-30.
[5] Carr, D. (1983). “Three approaches to moral education”. Educational Philosophy and Theory. Vol. 15, No. 2, pp 39-51.
[6] Haidt, J. (2001). ”The emotional dog and its rational tail: A social intuitionist approach to moral judgment”. Psychological review. Vol. 108 No. 4.
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[8] Greene, J. D. (2007). The Secret Joke of Kant's Soul. Moral Psychology. Vol. 3: The Neuroscience of Morality: Emotion, Disease, and Development. (W Sinnott-Armstrong, Ed.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press