Abstract
This paper asks the question, “What is the current status of provincial moral education polices in the five Canadian provinces which have mandated or optional moral education programs: Saskatchewan, Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia, and Alberta?” It then offers a response through an analysis of the relevant policies in those provinces that draws upon Sanger and Osguthorpe’s Moral Work of Teaching Framework. It concludes with the finding that there is a lack of clarity, consistency, and coherence in those policies which could be addressed through their ongoing examination, combined with the development of standardized terminology, and clearly stated definitions and assumptions.
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Notes
Character education is but one approach to moral education. Other approaches are: values clarification; cognitive-developmental; ethic of care; no moral stance; religious; non-religious but spiritual; citizenship. A comparison of those approaches is provided in Table 1.
The original study upon which this article is based focused on the ten provinces as the three territories are under federal control and their autonomous policy and program development are limited. For example, the Northwest Territories while having its own Education Act, uses programs of studies developed by several provinces, most significantly, Alberta. Table 2 provides an analysis of the assumptions from the territories based on the limited information available. That information has been added since the completion of the original study. The study's intention was to focus on provincial policies which would be applicable to all students within that province’s jurisdiction excepting those programs which would have limited application or where there were alternative policies specific to private, religiously based schools or other alternative independent schools such as Charter schools and home schooling arrangements.
The approach of Kohlberg (1981, 1984), which is often referred to as the moral education approach, is more specifically identified as the cognitive-developmental or justice-reasoning approach (Yu 2004). Character education is sometimes used in a similar vein to moral education referring to anything designed to impact moral behaviour.
Grounded Theory is emergent in nature and hence does not presume a pre-existent structure. As well, albeit as a limitation, the assumptions identified in this study were frequently determined by using what King et al. (1994) referred to as descriptive inference; using observations from the world to learn about other unobserved facts. According to King et al., valid scientific inferences should be unbiased and consistent. Using the Moral Work of Teaching Framework helped minimize bias and support consistency by applying its criteria as consistent frames of reference for the identification and interpretation of coded passages in the various provincial policies reviewed in this study.
Sanger and Osguthorpe (2005) developed the categories of the Moral Work of Teaching Framework to guide in identifying and explaining what determined or informs the characteristics of moral education as they appear in accounts of various approaches: (1) methods of instruction, (2) curricular materials, (3) programmatic ends and (4) moral content.
Psychological assumptions under the framework, psychological assumptions includes identification of the assumptions regarding the salient psychological features of morality, the nature of those features and how those features develop and how they are likely to respond to various environmental variables (Sanger and Osguthorpe 2005, p. 63). Decisions about school organization, pedagogy, and materials are often based on assumptions regarding the psychological nature of human morality (Sanger and Osguthorpe 2005).
Moral assumptions are of course critical to the Framework which categorized them into two subtypes. Meta-ethical moral assumptions attempt to describe the nature and scope of morality. Normative moral assumptions prescribe or evaluate actions involving what is good, right, virtuous or caring (Sanger and Osguthorpe 2005, p. 64).
Educational assumptions deal with the scope of teaching and education in society and the aims of education. Approaches to moral education are constrained by assumptions about what the boundaries to education are. Of particular importance in the area of moral education is the boundary of public schooling, especially as it related to controversial subject matter that may be considered to have a moral element such as sexual or religious practices (Sanger and Osguthorpe 2005, p. 65).
Contingent factors include existing personal, historical, social, political and institutional factors which may help to provide informed understanding of an approach (Sanger and Osguthorpe 2005). Because the study examined polices, contingent factors—although potentially highly relevant to other matters beyond a descriptive study—were not part of the study and hence not included in this paper.
This study examined the documented policies within the various provinces, but did not examine the contexts of the policies’ development or implementation which would comprise what Sanger and Osguthorpe referred to as contingent factors. As such that category of the Moral Work of Teaching Framework was not utilized in this analysis.
A behavioural understanding of morality is consistent with the tradition character education approach. A cognitive-developmental understanding of morality is reflective of the justice-reasoning approach. These approaches, summarized in Table 1 are based on different and contradictory assumptions of morality. The traditional approach holds that morality is transmitted from outside the individual and that explicit teaching and reinforcement of moral behaviours are they means by which morality is developed whereas the cognitive-developmental approach holds that morality is developed within the individual and that an individual can only develop morally as they improve in their ability to make reasoned judgments.
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Leinweber, K., Donlevy, J.K., Gereluk, D. et al. Moral Education Polices in Five Canadian Provinces: Seeking Clarity, Consistency and Coherency. Interchange 43, 25–42 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10780-012-9170-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10780-012-9170-y