Excerpt

This book is designed to equip you to meet the deepening and urgent need for addressing character development. It is only through your knowledge of character education and your mindset and heartset to implement it that individual classrooms of this nation will be changed. And it is only through consistency in addressing character education year after year throughout all grades that admirable character traits will become second nature to children and young people.

It is estimated that children devote 17,000 hours to school-sponsored educational experiences during 13 years of education. During this time, you have control over what, why, when, where, and how you focus on character. This book puts resources for wise use of those 17,000 hours at your fingertips with a how to for character education. The amount of effort you give toward the character development of your students is up to you. Pursue it well, because the rewards in childrens lives and the potential influence on our nation and the world are tremendous.

The overall goal of educators should be the development of fine character and the accompanying promotion of successful interpersonal relationships. Suggested objectives toward that end are listed here and discussed throughout the book.

1) Develop operational knowledge and understanding of how to become an increasingly better role model of good character. (See chapters 3 and 4).
2) Develop operational knowledge and understanding of how to teach toward character development in all curricula. (See chapters 3 and 4).
3) Develop for yourself, and when possible, for the entire faculty, administration, and staff of your school:
a) A well-designed, systematic plan for how to become increasingly better rolemodels, especially to your students (chapters 3 and 4 and RM 1-32 and 59-183).
b) A well-designed, systematic plan for how to teach toward character development in all curricula in your school. (chapters 3 and 4 and RM 1-32 and 59-183).
4) Implement these plans in your school, monitor progress, assess needs for improvement, refine the plans, and re-implement refined plans every year.
5) Assist other schools and their personnel to do likewise.
Working with Parents
The primary responsibility for training up children in the way they should go (which includes character development) rests with parents, but educators can be key figures in helping parents achieve this goal. It is important for teachers, administrators, and other educational leaders to assume leadership roles in assisting parents with the ideas and concepts provided in this section.

The molding of fine character takes time and focused attention. If we are to revolutionize the focus on character development in our homes, our schools, our nation, and our world, a variety of key individuals and groups must be allied for the struggle. No individual or group, however, is more important as a role model than parents and family, and they play crucial roles during the impressionable years. By the example of their own behavior, parents and other family members have an opportunity to lay the foundation for character development when children are very young. The home is the site of the earliest and most important modeling of character traits, and children will learn by example, whether this example is admirable or not. It is obviously critical that parents and other family members work at being effective role models of exemplary character.

Effective modeling is foundational to resolving our family, national, and worldwide concerns regarding displays of bad character by children, young men and women, and adults. We face a major societal problem that is at least fivefold:

1) A lack of knowledge and understanding regarding what traits to deliberately model for our young.
2) A lack of appropriate heartsets and mindsets to motivate us toward a deliberate focus on modeling particular traits.
3) A lack of conviction.
4) A lack of commitment to act.
5) A lack of carefully designed and systematic plans for effective modeling and teaching (a lack of the how tos).

The awesome responsibility to train up children in the way they should go has become increasingly difficult in our modern world, even for two-parent families. Many homes today, however, are guided by a single parent. The pressures on that one parent are often overwhelming, not only in nurturing children, but also in providing the necessities of life through a demanding work schedule. With due respect and consideration for those single parents who must work, the responsibility to train their children still rests upon them.

With such limited time for even two-parent families to devote to raising children, where can parents turn for assistance?

As teachers and administrators, we are directly responsible to parents for offering that assistance in the proper education of their children. We must focus on the total growth and development of youngsters, which includes character development. As Teddy Roosevelt is reported to have said, to educate a child in his mind and not in his heart is to train a menace to society (Kilpatrick 1993).

Suggested Goals for Parents
Some suggested goals for parents regarding the character education of their children are listed below. Teachers and administrators are encouraged to assist parents with these goals.

1) Develop an operational knowledge and understanding of how to become increasingly better role models of admirable character (chapters 3 and 4 and RM 1-32 and 59-183).
2) Develop an operational knowledge and understanding of how to teach toward character development, line upon line, precept upon precept (chapters 3 and 4 and RM 1-32 and 59-183).
3) Develop a systematic plan for your own home by which you will model selected character traits throughout the year (chapters 3 and 4 and RM 1-32 and 59-183).
4) Develop for use in your own home a systematic year-round plan to teach toward character development (chapters 3 and 4 and RM 1-32 and 59-183).
5) Implement both plans.
6) Promote the use of such plans with the teachers of your children.
7) Promote the use of such plans with your relatives, friends, and others in your church, synagogue, or other faith affiliation.