I recently completed a project that involved the design of a workbook for Children on the subject of Value education. Value education is nothing but the time-worn Moral science Classes we studied when it was our turn at the chopping block. The book that I worked on had content designed by a team of experts with years of experience in academic environments and in the study of child behaviour. Apparently.
What I noticed immediately about the book was that it chose to completely side step essential questions and go on to beat around the bush with safe subjects. Worse, the book had no idea on what Morality meant as an area of instruction, let alone how it was to be taught. On a wider search, it isn’t just these publishers alone. Almost any NCERT modelled book treads very lightly where the areas of teaching morals is concerned.
Teaching Moral Values can be Dangerous
Morals are very indefinite animals, treading the vague line between behaviour that’s being anthropomorphised and a social code that keeps society in place. While philosophers, psychologists and neurologists still wrack their brains on the origins of Morality and moral behaviour as a trait, schools are being held hostage by various relegious groups threatening to storm classrooms if the status quo is disturbed. Consider the case of Vicki Frost taking the American School system to court over what she alleges is anti-christian teaching. Or the numerous cases where creationists actually attempt taking over science syllabi or as has been proven a number of times in the Indian context, messing around with the teaching of morality can be fatal.
What do you suppose would be the outcome of an famine stricken educational landscape when it comes to the teaching of morality, especially in a multi-cultural melting pot that is India. With no external system of validation, children learn narrow moral tenets specific to their own cultural eco-system, perhaps an immediate family or community. These little islands exist and are nurtured generation after generation, and I believe that one of the reasons for this is our unhealthy system of teaching moral science.
Attempting to teach the G-word.
What can be scarier to any teacher attempting to resolve the big what is God question that every child asks sooner or later? However one may try working around the G-word, it is inevitably linked to relegion in some context or the other. Most teachers perhaps paint an approximate, diplomatically right picture and leave the gaping void to be filled in my the child’s family. Which is perhaps the safe option here. This is unthinkable when teaching other subjects. Imagine glossing over Physics and letting mummy do the teaching of specifics.
Ultimately, whose responsibility is it to create a holistic system of teaching morality even when social values sometimes get in the way of religious ones?
Education in India/Project Journal 