Why Johnny Can't Tell Right from Wrong
Townsend, Kathleen Kennedy
Why Johnny Can't Tell Right from Wrong by Kathleen Kennedy Townsend The most important lesson our schools don't teach "what would you like to be when you graduate?" asked a grade school...
...Despite successes in experimental programs, stubborn resistance to community service from educators is still the norm, even in Maryland where the Superintendents Association, the PTA, and the local boards of education all fought against the new service requirement...
...They figure, 'If my father can do it, so can I."' In other homes, parents simply aren't around...
...They held public forums and listened to community opinion and after months of extensive discussion, the groups produced a list of values with which everyone was comfortable...
...In fact, schools in an indirect way already present students with a set of values that is universally respected: What are our efforts to integrate our schools and prohibitions against stealing or drinking in school if not an education in values...
...But what to do about 12-yearold aspiring pimps and cheaters...
...Eventually he realized that he'd have to take a bath if he wanted his classmates to ask him to play...
...In a series of recent workshops sponsored by the Maryland state government, high school students suggested a number of solutions they thought would help them better withstand the antisocial pressures that buffet them...
...Changing will take courage, but we can take heart from one fifth-grade class I watched where the topic was "the right to be an individual...
...We grownups have got to change our thinking, too...
...The students actually vie for the privilege...
...Nationwide, assaults on teachers are up 700 percent since 1978...
...As part of the program, students are required to "prepare and reflect...
...As for parents, they may cling to concerns about which values their children should learn...
...Why not teach values in school...
...I like being a helper," she says...
...At the Waverly Elementary school in Baltimore City, values lessons are taught through discussions about peer pressure...
...Another student said, "Daniel could have decided to be different...
...The teacher then turned to a female student and asked, "Would you work for him...
...While the program is now voluntarily offered by only a couple of schools, Maryland, after years of heated debate, recently became the first state to require all high school students to perform community service in order to graduate...
...Teaching values does not mean using the classroom to push a particular point of view on any political issue— say, abortion or the death penalty—that has worked its way to the core of the values debate...
...In reflecting upon the skit, Daniel says, "All the friends were making the decision rather than me making my own decision...
...A survey of 176 schools that have adopted a values curriculum found that 77 percent reported a decrease in discipline problems, 68 percent boasted an increase in attendance, and 64 percent showed a decrease in vandalism...
...After the Merwin Elementary School in Irwindale, California, instituted a character education program, damage due to vandalism was reduced from $25,000 to $500...
...Here, they are girding themselves to accept an alternative...
...it takes time and thought, which, of course, takes effort...
...That means, for instance, keeping track of indicators such as rates of crime and vandalism in schools or the number of students involved in community service where values are being taught...
...If we rely on the family alone to instill values, we will fail...
...Community service, as the limited experience in schools has shown, teaches students values and citizenship...
...Quite the contrary, a smart values program includes parents, too...
...And in the end, nobody had to worry that little Petey would bounce home from values class clutching the collected works of Lyndon LaRouche...
...For instance, while fourth, fifth, and sixth graders at Jackson Elementary School in Salt Lake City, Utah, were studying ground water pollution, they discovered that barrels of toxic waste were buried just four blocks from their school...
...And while service programs can help students make a difference outside the school, they also have an impact inside the classroom: They make learning more interesting by simply helping students to understand how to apply textbook lessons in the real world...
...When this effort was stymied—Utah state law does not allow for private donations to clean up such sites—they lobbied the legislature and changed the statute...
...It may sound radical, especially when we are talking about methods like memorizing passages from the Bible, "bribing" kids with discounts at the school store to behave decently, permitting students in class discussions to describe problems they face at home, and allowing teachers to make it clear that they might not approve of some parents' values...
...Before a values program at Gauger's Junior High in Newmark, Delaware, was implemented, 100 people—parents, teachers, students and community representatives—attended a two-day conference in which they learned about the purpose and goals of the program and the ways they could help implement it...
...Daniel persuades his parents to buy Nikes and when he returns to school, the gang accepts him...
...But the moral had pertinence even for frequent bathers: Sometimes change is not only good, but necessary...
...Is it really possible to teach values that we all agree upon...
...In the kids-andsneakers stories you usually hear, children are assaulting each other for Air Jordans...
...At places like Hebbville Elementary in a low-income section of Baltimore County, the results are impressive...
...they can proudly say "Ours...
...Class war Many may resent this call for values as a way for parents to shirk their own responsibility onto someone else, or may see it as another passing fad...
...The impact, however, goes beyond helping the needy...
...That's well and good, but we're still missing one crucial element: accountability...
...How about with a notion relegated to the back burner in the get-it-while-you-can eighties: community service...
...Tiesha was picked to help out in a class of 15 seven- and eight-year-olds whose IQs are in the 30-45 range...
...Why Johnny Can't Tell Right from Wrong by Kathleen Kennedy Townsend The most important lesson our schools don't teach "what would you like to be when you graduate...
...But while students are sometimes taught that what happens at home is not always a good thing, teaching values does not mean separating the parents from the lessons...
...When I saw her write two, I was so happy...
...There, teachers hold out the promise of tutoring the mentally retarded as a reward for children who have finished their assignments, done well on a test, shown improvement, or been helpful in class...
...That's a remarkable figure not only because so many aren't willing to serve, but because so many of those who responded negatively have never served to begin with...
...disciplinary action decreased by 80 percent...
...Obviously, we've got a problem here—a problem not just of violence, but of values...
...Now, when people in these communities ask, "Whose values...
...If we want to instill values, why not take an even more straightforward approach: Teach them directly...
...Plain and simple, many of our kids don't seem to have any, or at least any of a socially constructive kind...
...As Pat McCarthy, vice-president of the Thomas Jefferson Center, a non-profit foundation specializing in values education, says, "The biggest impediment to values education is teacher education...
...It gives me a reason to come to school," she says...
...Starting next year, all students entering the ninth grade must complete 75 hours of service or classes which incorporate service into the lesson, such as stream testing in an environmental course or writing about visits to the elderly in an English class...
...Because, despite the family values chitchat, there's been no political or popular consensus that values should be as much a part of the curriculum as reading and writing...
...Three years after the Jackie Robinson Middle School in New Haven, Connecticut, initiated a values curriculum, the number of student pregnancies went from 16 to zero...
...Turn on the TV news and there you have it: Our schools are hotbeds of violence, vandalism, and unethical behavior...
...For all of Bill Clinton's 12-point plans, he has yet to come up with a specific agenda for restoring values...
...Alethea Kalandros, as a ninth-grade student in Baltimore County, missed more than 70 days of school and was tempted to drop out...
...For values education to succeed and prosper, schools need to show that it's paying off in tangible ways...
...I tried to teach my cousin that 100 percent and 100 percent equal 200 percent...
...Kathleen Kennedy Townsend is director of the Maryland Student Service Alliance of the Maryland Department of Education...
...The purpose was to help the children decide when their own actions are inappropriate and to develop strategies for improving their classmates' behavior...
...Teaching these sorts of values does more than yield heart-warming anecdotes of students helping old ladies across the street...
...What's really bothering the educators...
...You can make good money...
...Beyond that, the arguments against service become more strained...
...While community service teaches values through hands-on experience, that's but one piece of the puzzle...
...Parents provided input and teachers knew they had community support...
...Selective service So where to begin...
...We need a more organized approach...
...Why is it that schools that now teach values are rare—most often independent efforts by one or two inspired educators...
...But when students are exposed to this unknown— through activities such as tutoring, visiting the elderly, rehabilitating homeless shelters, lobbying for new laws—their reaction is appreciably different...
...Recently we've heard of a student-run LSD ring in one Virginia school and the bartering of stolen college entrance exams in one of New York City's most selective high schools...
...She enrolled in a program that allows her to volunteer at the Maryland School for the Blind...
...Serving others is held in such low regard among our youth that 60 percent of high school students said in a recent survey they simply would not be willing to "volunteer to serve their community for a year...
...But these days you don't need to work in education to hear such mind-numbing tales...
...But ask educators in Atlanta, Georgia, who have been operating a regional service program for eight years, and they'll tell you it doesn't cost a dime...
...And that, for some educators, is a tough concept to accept...
...Probably the fact that they would be required to change their teaching methods...
...Yet a year of podium-thumping in favor of "values" by the Bush administration was not backed by a single concrete plan of action...
...It's much simpler than that: Teaching values means quietly helping kids to learn honesty, responsibility, respect for others, the importance of serving one's community and nation—ideals which have sufficiently universal appeal to serve as the founding and guiding principles of this country...
...A survey of 176 schools that have adopted a values curriculum found that 77 percent reported a decrease in discipline problems, 68 percent boasted an increase in attendance, and 64 percent showed a decrease in vandalism...
...Any of a wide variety of activities fulfill the requirement, from repairing a local playground to tutoring fellow students...
...Alethea is part of Maryland's pioneering effort in promoting community service...
...Face it: In some homes, parents simply aren't paragons of civic or ethical virtue...
...One skit involves Daniel, whose three hip classmates mock him because he wears non-brand-name tennis shoes...
...But how do we get there...
...This means, for instance, complementing working in a soup kitchen with learning about the most common causes of homelessness...
...Teaching values is clearly worth the trouble...
...In his four years as president, George Bush offered nothing more substantial than a PR...
...They waged a vigorous public relations and fundraising campaign to clean up the site, eventually winning the support of the city's mayor...
...Clearly, the old ways of inculcating values in our kids are no longer working...
...Ultimately, the goal should be to help parents raise kind and law-abiding children...
...Before you dismiss this suggestion as a William Bennettesque ploy to end calls for more school resources, additional jobs programs, or parental-leave legislation—all worthy goals—hear me out...
...The discussion began with a very simple story about a boy named Bobby who never washed himself and had no friends...
...The next year she missed two days of school...
...And for the first time ever, the risk of violence to teenagers is greater in school than on the streets...
...If we are ready to instill a sense of values in America's youth, it will take a concerted effort by both political leaders and educators to make it happen...
...Still, at least the Republicans have been willing to talk about values...
...It brings results—tangible improvement to the lives of children and their families...
...asked a grade school teacher of her students in a Baltimore County classroom I visited recently...
...In districts such as Sweet Home, New York, and in Howard and Baltimore counties, Maryland, superintendents formed representative groups of community leaders that included people as ideologically diverse as fundamentalist ministers and ACLU attorneys...
...Sixtyone percent of high school students say they cheated on an exam during the past year...
...That's a lesson that should resonate, not just with fifth-graders, but with the next administration...
...Of course...
...A young man raised his hand: "A pimp...
...It is significant that the students made up this fact pattern...
...In my five years in the Maryland Department of Education, I've heard hundreds of similar stories—rueful teachers' lounge chronicles of abject moral collapse by children barely old enough to make grilled cheese sandwiches by themselves...
...One of the most common knee-jerk reactions is cost...
...Of course, that doesn't mean all service programs can be run as efficiently, but it does show that costs can be kept low...
...You might think the solution lies with that "family values" constituency, the Republicans...
...and—could it be?—academic test scores went up...
...As one 21-year-old ex-con said, "Kids grow up with a father or an uncle who is robbing stores...
...But our collective trepidations pale next to the alternative: another generation of children growing up _without a moral compass...
...We're not even talking about school prayer or requiring the Pledge of Allegiance...
...The president of the Maryland Teachers Association, for example, called the proposal "enforced servitude" and claimed that it violated the Thirteenth Amendment...
...The immediate lesson was about cleanliness—about as innocuous a value as you can find...
...I guess so," the young woman replied lethargically...
...The students' distaste for service could largely be a distaste for the unknown...
...Why not turn to the one institution that sees the problem more closely than any, and that touches children on a regular and sustained basis: the public school...
...To explain away that omission, Democrats argue that the ultimate responsibility for inspiring values lies not with the government, but with the family...
...While much of what they said was expected—more information about drugs, greater student participation in school and county decisions—one was a real eyeopener: They asked that their parents have dinner with them more often...
...It's not difficult to take this type of thinking one step further, creating a curriculum that teaches other values that are universally accepted but are almost never actually taught directly to our youth...
...In the schools, values education means lessons about friendship and anger, stealing and responsibility, simply being polite, respecting others, serving the needs of those who may be less fortunate—all lessons sadly absent from today's curriculum...
...A day in one of the nation's public schools might well convince the average citizen that those Democrats need a reality check...
...The teacher chooses 15 students, divides them into four groups, and asks them to perform skits about peer pressure...
...Each month 282,000 students are attacked...
...stunt—his Thousand Points of Light Foundation...
...What happened...
...You can't teach community service out of a textbook...
...So why is "values education" still one of education's neglected stepchildren...
Vol. 24 • December 1992 • No. 12
