EDUCATION IN HUMAN VALUES HEAD, HAND & HEART

EDUCATION IN HUMAN VALUES HEAD, HAND & HEART DR GRACE SARRA QUT SCHOOL OF CULTURAL & LANGUAGE STUDIES IN EDUCATION

Overview • Background to EHV • How and why implemented as a school program? • What is EHV? • 5 Core Values • 5 personalities • 7 teaching techniques • Workshop – teaching techniques • How could you implement this program into your work?

CHERBOURG STATE SCHOOL • Cherbourg State School is approximately 300 kilometres northwest of Brisbane. • It is situated in an Aboriginal community at Cherbourg with approximately 250 students, all of whom are Indigenous children.

Cherbourg State School aims to: • generate good academic outcomes for its students from kindergarten to year 7, ‘comparable to any other school throughout Queensland’; and • nurture a strong and positive sense of what it means to be Aboriginal in today’s society.

The EHV program consists of five core values and a number of sub-values. • The five core values of our human values programme: • Love • Truth • Peace • Right Conduct • Non-Violence

3 Levels • Cognitive Level: - understanding level of what the program is • Emotional Level: - understanding at a feeling level • Behaviouristic level: - How they behave in a certain way

5 Personalities – • Physical domain • Intellectual domain • Social domain • Spiritual domain • Emotional domain The 5 core values correspond to these 5 personalities

These core values represent expressions of inner needs of our 5 domains of personalities

Physical domain • Refers to the ability to use one’s body with increasing purpose, skill and control. During the years from 3-7, children develop the basic motor skills that enable them to respond to their social and physical environments as well as acquire healthy living practices.

Intellectual domain • This domain of cognitive-intellectual development includes: • perception • Language • Problem-solving • Thinking skills • Memory and educational achievement

Social domain • According to social domain theory children construct different forms of social knowledge, including morality as well as other types of social knowledge, through there social experiences with adults (parents/teachers/other adults), peers and siblings). • (http://tigger.uic.edu/Inucci/MoralEd/articles/smetana.html)

Spiritual domain • A belief that there is a realm controlled by a divine spirit • (World web dictionary definition)

Emotional domain • Promoting young children’s emotional development is vital for 3 interrelated reasons: • Positive social-emotional development provides a base for life-long learning • Social skills and emotional self-regulation are integrally related to later academic success in school. • Prevention of future social and behavioural difficulties is more effective than later remediation.

Progress in one area generally affects progress in others, conversely, deficits in one may impact on the rest • Examples: • Children who are malnourished cannot learn effectively and those with low self-esteem gain little confidence in the use of their intellectual skills And • Children who are emotionally abused and neglected show such damage to the social domain – ie they find it hard to learn directions from others • (Burke, P. and Cigno, K. Learning Disabilities and Child Development. Blackwell Science)

TRUTH • Truth is genuineness and authenticity. • Truth forms the basis of our consistent self. It is an essential aspect of character

RIGHT CONDUCT • Right Conduct forms the basis of moral behaviour. • Right Conduct is what distinguishes a ‘good’ from a ‘not so good’ action.

PEACE • Peace is a calm state of mind that arises when the mind is untroubled by conflict. • Peace does not come naturally and we require strategies to generate peace and calmness even when situations do not turn out as planned.

LOVE • The Love that is the undercurrent of EHV is the unconditional universal Love from a soft, tender heart that shows itself as kindness, compassion, acceptance, warmth and positive perception.

NON-VIOLENCE • Dhall & Dhall define non-violence as • … not being violent in thought, word and action.

Violence often does not take the form of physical violence but verbal violence – sarcasm, criticism, being ignored, being ridiculed, hearing hurtful comments – all these damage self esteem and self-worth

Seven teaching techniques are used to teach a value each fortnight • quotation • mind map • story • activity • music (song) • visualisation • silent sitting

SUB-VALUES FRAMEWORK

MINDMAP • What is it? • How do we feel when we practise it? • How do others feel when we practise it? • What does it look like? • What are the benefits? • What are the challenges? • What are the limits? • What is the opposite? • What are some related Values?

Advantages of a mind map • Creates structure to help the child to understand the value and how and why it is used • Builds and develops imagination and enhances storytelling and writing • Gives children a focus and a series of steps to work towards achieving a concept

Quotation– the quotations are positive statements that focus attention on the sub-value. They are designed to increase knowledge and reinforce the value for the fortnight. • Develops memory as well as vocabulary of values • Gives meaning to abstract words • Develops understanding of application of the value • Improves concentration through a short and fast focus • Reinforcement – provides a daily reminder • Encourages positive thinking, positive emotions and optimism • Sharpens intuition, moral judgement and moral reasoning

Silent Sitting Activity

SILENT SITTING • Silent sitting is a technique designed to calm the mind. The intention here is that in the classroom a calm mind is one clear of distractions and consequently able to learn more efficiently. • As Dhall & Dhall put it: • The mind of children, as of adults, is full of various thoughts concerned with their immediate lives. The thoughts flit in rapid succession with much momentum and speed. These thoughts arise from the subconscious. • EHV requires that the child learn to harness this energy in the mind. When this energy is controlled then the mind becomes calm, concentrated and focused

ADVANTAGES OF SILENT SITTING • Calms the mind and improves receptivity • Improves concentration and focus and facilitates learning, memory and retention • Decreases distracting energy, calms children down • Relaxes the body and mind • Provides reflecting time • Is a behaviour management strategy in that it de-stresses children • Encourages self-awareness • Initiates control of self-focus, improves discipline and determination • Develops self-confidence because the mind is clear, uncluttered and steady

CREATIVE VISUALISATIONS • The technique of visualisation is simply one of creating mental pictures of having or doing what it is you desire.

ADVANTAGES OF CREATIVE VISUALISATIONS • Keeps creative juices flowing • Enhances imagination and creativity • Encourages concentration and visualisation • Provides calm and focussed activity • Empowers • Enhances self-image and capacity t visualise success • Enhances understanding of the values, their operations and the good feeling they generate • Creates individual space of ‘hope’ amongst chaos and despair • Enhances capacity to control impulsivity

STORY-TELLING • Allows children the opportunity to relate to a particular value by painting a mental picture using: • Characters • Situations • Moral dilemmas • resolutions

Advantages of story-telling • Puts abstract concepts into real life contexts • Enhances listening, creative and critical thinking skills • Develops imagination in story writing • Reinforces the value

Advantages of group activities • Reinforces value in real life context • Provides a deeper understanding of values through experiential learning • Encourages group participation • Fun and challenging

MUSIC • Introduces the children to lyrics of a song that has been used to teach a particular value. • Through singing children have the opportunity to feel the rhythm of a song that reinforces the meaning of a value.

ACTIVITY • In 5 groups choose 1 of the CORE VALUES • Then choose a sub-value from that list • Discuss a suitable quote and complete a mind map on your chosen sub-value eg. Kindness

Example of a creative visualisation • Imagine you are sitting in your classroom looking out the window as lots of rubbish comes blowing across the yard. Pop John [the caretaker] can’t get all of it because he is on his mower out on the oval. The school looks untidy. The bell rings. Some students race over the rubbish to get a game started. But you and some friends choose to pick up the rubbish around your classroom. You reach down to pick up the pieces of rubbish. When you have your hands full you take the rubbish and place it in the wheelie bin. You feel good and helpful as you dump the rubbish in the bin. You feel proud that Pop John will be happy when he sees the clean and tidy yard you have created. Your pride grows as you and your friends wash your hands and prepare to start your own game in a clean yard.

ACTIVITY • In your groups write a creative visualisation that would be suitable for your sub-value.

HOT POTATO ACTIVITY • In your group brainstorm as many activities as you can relating to 1 of the 5 sub-values. • 4 minutes on each sub-value then rotate. • You need to be specific about the activity eg. Friendship -------a friendship flower in which students write what a friend means to them on the petals.

Strategies to promote self-concept and self-esteem • Make sure the learning environment is welcoming to every child and reflects his identity and culture; • Structure the environment to offer opportunities for children to share information about themselves, their families and experiences; • Provide appropriate levels of challenge to work at something and feel a sense of accomplishment; • Observe the child’s individual strengths and plan opportunities for each child to demonstrate his/her capabilities; • In planning curriculum, provide opportunities for children to succeed in both practicing newly acquired skills and working on more difficult, challenging tasks.

FILM: Head, Hand & Heart • It is specifically designed to: • Develop a supportive and more productive school environment for all students and staff; • Assist students to develop improved self-esteem through getting to know and understand themselves better; • Assist students to develop a better and more accurate sense of cultural identity; and • Assist students and the community to develop a more productive means to determine appropriate human responses to real-life situations.

EDUCATION IN HUMAN VALUES HEAD, HAND & HEART