Values/Character Education

National Organizations and Programs

• Background and Discussion National Organizations and Programs State Programs Resource Clearinghouses Research References

  Character Counts!
  A voluntary nationwide initiative to support nonpartisan character education. The “six pillars of character” identified by the group include respect, responsibility, trustworthiness, caring, fairness, and citizenship. A Provides resource materials, trainings and awards recognition.

• The Character Education Partnership
  This partnership was founded in 1993 as a national nonpartisan coalition for character education. The CEP recognizes National Schools of Character which serve as models of exemplary character education practice in the country.

   

  • CEP’s Eleven principles of effective Character Education
    Principle 1: Promotes core ethical values as the basis of good character
    Principle 2: Defines “character” comprehensively to include thinking, feeling, and behavior.
    Principle 3: Uses a comprehensive, intentional, proactive, and effective approach to character development.
    Principle 4: Creates a caring school community.
    Principle 5: Provides students with opportunities for moral action.
    Principle 6: Includes a meaningful and challenging academic curriculum that respects all learners, develops their character, and helps them to succeed.
    Principle 7: Strives to foster students’ self motivation.
    Principle 8: Engages the school staff as a learning and moral community that shares responsibility for character education and attempts to adhere to the same core values that guide the education of students.
    Principle 9: Fosters shared moral leadership and long range support of the character education initiative.
    Principle 10: Engages families and community members as partners in the character-building effort
    Principle 11: Evaluates the character of the school, the school staff’s functioning as character educators, and the extent to which students manifest good character.

• Educators for Social Responsibility
  “Educators for Social Responsibility (ESR) helps educators create safe, caring, respectful, and productive learning environments. We also help educators work with young people to develop the social skills, emotional competencies, and qualities of character they need to succeed in school and become contributing members of their communities.”

• The Ethics Resource Center
  ERC offers schools assistance with the establishment and improvement of character development programs. “We believe that character development is the long-term process of helping individuals develop knowledge of, motivation to, and practices of living by a set of ethical standards.” Products include Making the Case for Character Education, Character Education Encyclopedia.

• The Giraffe Project
  This project “challenges participants to “stick their necks out” for good character. The program offers examples of heroes who “stuck their necks out” for the care and concern of others. Students explore the difference between “hero” and “celebrity” and work toward developing a caring local community. Resource materials are available for students in K-12.

Values/Character Education

Resource Clearinghouses

• Background and Discussion National Organizations and Programs State Programs Resource Clearinghouses Research References

  California Character Education Clearinghouse
  Contains annotated bibliography on character education, extensive links to resources, more.

• Center for the 4th & 5th R’s (Respect and Responsibility)
  Serves as a regional, state, and national resource in character education. “Helping schools, teachers, and parents develop good character in youth.”

• Character Education - Free Resources, Materials and Lesson Plans
• Character Education Extension Materials
  Available From Cooperative Extension Services across the nation
  Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service, USDA

• The Character Education Network
  The network “is a place for students, teachers, schools and communities to facilitate character education. This site is dedicated to providing quality online, ready-to-use curriculum, activities and resources that integrate with and enhance the classroom experience. It allows schools and students to network together by sharing ideas and experiences with others in their community and nationwide.”

• Education World 
  • Students Learn Respect — Thanks to Good Manners!
    “R-E-S-P-E-C-T, Aretha Franklin sings for it. Rodney Dangerfield never gets any. Educators who teach good manners find it every day in student behavior. Could mastering manners make a difference in your classroom? Included: Web resources for teaching respect and good manners through stories, poems, songs, games, biographies, lesson plans, and activities…”

• Indiana Clearinghouse for Citizenship and Character Education
• The National Character Education Center
  Center initiated by The Values in Action network, representing stakeholders from over 1000 schools nationwide who “feel Ethics Education and Value Centered environments make the most impact in a child’s success in school.” The Center provides resources for teachers, students and administrators for pre-school through high school levels.
  • Cultivating Values in Middle School Kids
    Gene Bedley, CEO Character Education Center, February 2003
    Eight Principles for Transmitting Values to Adolescents
    1. Describe what you need from kids rather than what they don’t do!
    2. Cultivate respect in your class or home by demonstrating high regard and consideration for others.
    3. Involve fathers in more decision-making opportunities.
    4. Promote responsibility management. Adolescents often don’t see the advantage of have a positive relationship with teachers or parents, especially since adolescence tends to be a self-focused stage. Help kids understand that when they demonstrate personal responsibility, you will reciprocate by allocating more freedoms. They’ll then see the important connection between responsibility and freedom.
    5. Recognize that adolescents need independence, yet they also need realistic, necessary moral and physical boundaries.
    6. Adolescents are going through one of the biggest physical changes in the human life cycle. Not since they were two years old has there been such a dramatic change. Through all the changes, adolescents need assurance and affirmations that they are a unique, unrepeatable miracle, and that they have a special place in school, in class, and in their home.
    7. Self disclosure can be your most powerful tool in building healthy relationshipswith adolescents.
    8. The most dynamic force available to teens is adults who can express genuine love and appreciation for their existence. Express genuine compassion to teens by valuing their ideas, looking in their eyes (to show genuine regard), and letting them know that they belong.
        
• NEA Today Online
  
  • My Turn - Helping Kids Beat the Odds
    NEA Today, March 1999
    Illinois school guidance counselor Cynthia Kowa Basler models respect and responsibility:
    “It’s our job to listen to the kids, to look out for them. And when we succeed–when the kids succeed–it’s easy to remember why we chose this profession.”
  • Teaching Kids About Hurt
    By Bob Katz, 11/2003
    One middle school found the keys to stop bullying and violence–and is setting a national example.

• Values Education 
  Teacher-made site with helpful tips and links
   

USA TODAY seeks
outstanding teachers

USA TODAY is accepting nominations for the 2003 All-USA Teacher Team, honoring both individuals and instructional teams as representatives of all outstanding teachers. The deadline for submitting completed nomination forms is June 30, 2003.

The 20 First Team members will be featured in USA TODAY in October. First Team members receive trophies and share $2,500 with their schools, with each teacher receiving $500 and the balance going to the school. Twenty teachers each will be honored as members of the Second and Third Teams. Certified, full-time K-12 teachers with four years of experience, and instructional teams averaging four years of experience, are eligible.

Teachers can be nominated by anyone willing to put in writing why they are outstanding. No self-nominations are accepted, but teachers must complete the form explaining how they achieve their success. The All-USA Teacher Team is co-sponsored by the National Education Association, National Association of Secondary School Principals, National Middle School Association, National Association of Elementary School Principals, and American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education.