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Values, Wellness and the Social Sciences Curriculum

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International Research Handbook on Values Education and Student Wellbeing

Abstract

Recent initiatives in values education in Australia emphasise the importance of the process of valuing and general methodologies that foster this in the classroom. Although a range of strategies are available, this chapter argues that inquiry-based approaches in the Social Sciences play a significant role in linking valuing processes with decision-making skills. Collectively, these approaches prompt the development of reasoning and self-awareness which also impact on student wellness. This chapter proposes some curriculum approaches to foreground values education in the Australian Social Sciences classroom. It argues that valuing is an important life skill that can be cultivated in the classroom through specific valuing strategies. It contends that the development of the capacity to make informed value choices is a critical factor in promoting wellness and resilience in students and in preparing them for the decision-making skills required for effective participation in society.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    As explained later in this chapter, the Australian Commonwealth and State governments attempted to coordinate a national curriculum approach during the 1990s via Key Learning Areas (KLAs), one of which encompassed important learnings in the Social Sciences and humanities. This key learning area was termed Studies of Society and Environment (SOSE). However, as curriculum development in Australia is the responsibility of the States and Territories, the specific curriculum emphasis for social sciences in the primary and lower secondary school continued to vary and from the late 1990s individual States issued their own syllabus frameworks for learning in the social sciences. Some States utilised a humanities framework and mandated discipline-based knowledge such as geography and history, whilst other states adopt a multidisciplinary approach that emphasises social and environmental understandings. A third approach integrates disciplinary-based knowledge from history and geography with the inclusion of particular Commonwealth initiatives such as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspectives, Studies of Asia, civics and citizenship education, gender or futures perspectives in the social sciences. This approach assumes that a single discipline-based approach does not adequately integrate the range of learnings that are essential for developing knowledge and understanding about society and the environment. Debates about what should constitute curriculum knowledge continued in Australia and by 2008, the Australian government embarked on a new national curriculum agenda that emphasises discipline-based knowledge in the Social Sciences via History and Geography.

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  1. Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, QLD, Australia

    Deborah Henderson

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  1. Deborah Henderson
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Correspondence to Deborah Henderson .

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  1. Newcastle University, University Drive, Callaghan, 2308, Australia

    Terence Lovat

  2. Newcastle University, University Drive, Callaghan, 2308, Australia

    Ron Toomey

  3. Newcastle University, University Drive, Callaghan, 2308, Australia

    Neville Clement

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Henderson, D. (2010). Values, Wellness and the Social Sciences Curriculum. In: Lovat, T., Toomey, R., Clement, N. (eds) International Research Handbook on Values Education and Student Wellbeing. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-8675-4_17

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