Gaining academic success does not necessarily mean overall success in life. Only bookish knowledge and academic works do not make sure a learner will grow up into a well-mannered individual in the family and society. In another word, we can say to become successful in the real world students must not study only academic subjects such as history, mathematics, science, and geography. Character education gives them the necessary tools that they will be using more often than those that they learn from the other subjects. Character education helps the students grew up as ethical and responsible individuals by teaching them about the good values that people should have. It teaches the students the values of caring about other people, honesty, responsibility, and other important traits. Since students spend most of their time at school, it is the perfect place to instill moral values in them. The reason for teaching good character is to help prepare the students to face the many opportunities and unknown dangers lying in today's society.
Diligence and a sense of responsibility are some of the main core values taught in character education. With these, students learn how to focus on their studies, and more importantly they will have the drive that will make them want to do well in their academic subjects. Building character also helps them to interact properly with their teachers and fellow students, turning their classroom into a better learning environment. Research done on the subject has found out that schools that employ character education have fewer incidents of disciplinary referrals, suspensions, and truancy. Character education includes and complements a broad range of educational approaches such as whole child education, service learning, social-emotional learning, and civic education. In his book, The Educated Child, William J. Bennett writes, "Good character education means cultivating virtues through formation of good habits." According to Bennett, children need to learn through actions that honesty and compassion are good, and that deceit and cruelty are bad. He believes that adults in schools and parents should strive to be models of good character. Character education is most effective when it is spread throughout regular school courses. In science, teachers can discuss the value of honesty in data, and in math, students can learn persistence by sticking with a problem until they get the right answer. History holds valuable lessons and tells of heroes of character, such as the honesty of Abraham Lincoln, who walked three miles to return 6.0 cents and Abdul Qader Zilani who spoke the truth with the bandits, even though he knew it was dangerous.
A 1997 report from several education associations and civic groups states that "character education holds that certain core values form the basis of 'good character,' i.e., the kinds of attitudes, beliefs, and behaviours that the school wants from, and is, therefore, committed to teach to, its children" As schools strive to instil good character in their students, they must also define good character. Kevin Ryan and Karen E. Bolin, authors of Building Character in Schools: Practical Ways to Bring Moral Instruction to Life, have described it as "leading a life of right conduct in relation to self and others; it is values in action" (1999, p. 5). The word "character" is taken from the Greek charassein, meaning "to mark" or "to inscribe upon." Over time the meaning has evolved into "a distinctive mark or sign," and from there grew our conception of character as "an individual's pattern of behaviour . . . his moral constitution" (Ryan & Bolin, 1999, p. 5).
Character has three interrelated parts: moral knowing, moral feeling, and moral behaviour. Another way of expressing this is to think of good character as knowing the good, loving the good, and doing the good (Lickona, 1991). Each of these aspects of character has implications for the education of young people in modern societies, and the recent concerns about youth violence and disaffection have spotlighted the role of schools and the need for character education. The goals of building an ethical climate in a school are to support academic achievement, develop a caring community, and provide a safer environment for teaching and learning.
Parents are children's first moral teachers. Jean Bethke Elshtain, the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Professor of Social and Political Ethics at the University of Chicago, argues that "parenthood is an ethical vocation." Parents, or other primary caretakers, are the most enduring influence on children, and the parent-child relationship is laden with special emotional significance that schools rarely match. Despite the primary role of parents, schools do have a role in character development-one that many educators believe has become more difficult with changes in our society. Teachers, particularly at the primary level, sometimes feel that they have to start from scratch in the character development of their students, because they are not coming to school with a sense of the importance of moral values.
It is particularly difficult to assess character education, however, because character education is a long-term proposition. The standards debate also raises the question of for whom potential character education standards should exist: Schools? Students? Teachers? Mary Williams, professor of education at the University of San Diego and a leading character educator, cites one proposed standard for teachers when she says that "teachers will practise and reflect on their role and responsibilities as character educators and values transmitters; communicate high expectations for all students regarding pro-social behaviours, ethical analysis, character development, and the practice of democratic values; and form collaborative partnerships among home, school, and community that involve others in character development efforts."
David Brooks, a prolific writer and accumulator of vast amounts of research about social behaviour, has said, "We are good at teaching technical skills, but when it comes to the most important thing, like character, we have almost nothing to say. Modern society has created a giant apparatus for the cultivation of the hard skills. Children are coached on how to jump through a thousand scholastic hoops. We are good at talking about material incentives, but bad about talking about emotions and intuitions." We cannot neglect this important part of students' well-being, which is essential to any mentally and emotionally peaceful, responsible citizen.
The writer works for BRAC Education Program as an specialist and writes regularly on various national and international issues.
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