On Values and Education

I was in grade 8, sitting in our mandatory “Moral Science” class, which was taught by the teacher who was also known as the ‘Discipline Head’ of our school (the kind that made even the most courageous hearts begin to simper). You know, the kind who would storm into class and demand loudly, “Is there anyone here who does not believe in God?” (I forgot to mention it was a convent) and many of us would sink down into our seats to avoid any eye contact, all the while forcing our mouths to stay shut.

Every week, we’d learn about the importance of kindness, and patience, and respect; and every week, we would struggle to remain awake in the class. Occasionally, to break the monotony, we were divided into groups and asked to come up with a skit to show a particular value – but not even once were we given the option of saying, “But what if…?”

**************

During my four years in college in Canada, I met many people from Pakistan, and got to know so much about the country, that by the time I had to leave, my closest friends were all Pakistanis. When I joined Teach for India immediately after, I wanted to create a classroom where students thought about Pakistan as openly as I did, and yet, seeing that they were in Grade 2, I felt it was too early to engage in such a conversation. Plus, I think a part of me just balked at the idea of trying to infuse values with education, given the damage that my moral science classes had tried to do on me. So, I did nothing about it. And one day, one of my students walked up to me with a drawing he had made and showed it to me proudly, saying, “Yeh India hai. Aur yeh Pakistan hai. Aur yeh India Pakistan par missile daal raha hai.” [This is India, and this is Pakistan. And this is India throwing a missile at Pakistan.]

****************

Over the years, I’ve gone back and forth on my stance on values in education. On one hand, I feel really strongly about the need for education to include (if not entirely focus on) values; on the other, the notion of ‘moral education’ makes me squirm in extreme discomfort and want to run in the opposite direction.

My two years with Teach for India only furthered the tug-of-war. While part of me still resisted the idea of moral education, another part felt that there has to be something more to education that just the learning of facts and the passing of exams. And yet, I didn’t know how to even approach the subject of values.

In my second year as a teacher, that decision was taken out of my hands as the school adopted certain value-based rules that all classrooms had to comply with: something like a moral code of conduct. There were rules like respecting others and taking care of school property and being honest and kind. I think the intent was genuine, and the students actually seemed to love it. They were given incentives to comply with the rules, and would also come up with skits to act out these rules (I’m seeing the pattern only as I’m writing this).

Yet the entire time, I had this nagging feeling that something was off about this. Something wasn’t working. The students still fought as much as before; they showed respect only where they knew it was worth their while; and there was really no evident concern for each other’s well-being. And I kept wondering that if these values could not even get them to care about each other, weren’t concepts like Pakistan, the environment, humanity and the world out of line?

I joined the Fellowship enthused with the idea of completely transforming the lives of my students. I left the Fellowship so disillusioned by the entire education system, such that I couldn’t even say why we even needed education. On one hand, I could see the mess that we called our planet – the wars, the rapes, the hurt, the pain, the suffocation. On the other, there was a hoard of people hailing education as our only savior. And I just could not see the connection between the two.

I thought an MA Education would offer some answers. But by the end of the first year, after having studied the sociology, philosophy, and psychology of education, I couldn’t even say what education was in the first place. There were too many questions, and no solid answers.

The only thing that I knew for sure (though entirely based on intuition) is that there had to be more to education that just academics – whether we call it skills or values; whatever it is, there had to be something more. And so, I found myself subconsciously pushing myself to take on research projects that were about values, such as analyzing the approach to moral education in Krishnamurti schools through a philosophical lens, and studying how children’s literature is used to ‘teach values’. And the more I researched, the more I realized how complex this subject was. But somewhere along the line, I think I began to form a more solid opinion of where I stand on the issue.

So here it is.

Question 1: How does one teach values?

Do you give students a list of values that they must imbibe? Do you guise values in the form of rules? Do you incentivize students with rewards and punishments? Do you instill values using the fear of God approach? Or do you regale with them with old and tested ‘moral of the story’ tales?

For me, I think the answer lies in the question itself.

How does one teach values? You don’t, because values cannot be taught.

At best, you can make students think about values, but you can’t teach them.

At best, you can present students with situations where they are forced to look at all the perspectives in the situations, and understand the conflict that each position holds.

At best, you can encourage students to attempt to reason out their own position on issues through a thorough discussion.

At best, you can let students know that no value is absolute, and that it’s okay to feel confused about your thoughts.

But you still can’t teach values.

At least, not the kind of values we tend to think of. You know: kindness, perseverance, respect, courage, honesty, etc. The stuff that we believe we should force into our students when all around them they can see a world that is clearly going in the opposite direction.

This brings me to the second (and perhaps most important) question: what do I mean by values anyway?

Clearly, my idea of morality is not the imbibing of the list of values society generally tends to propagate. It’s something much more abstract, and because I can't explain it, I’m going to hand it over to an expert.

Krishnamurti said that morality is “an awareness of and sensitivity to an individual’s relationship with everything around – to people, to nature, to property, etc.”

That’s it.

Think about it. Could this definition work? Could the development of a social consciousness and awareness of self actually encompass the kind of students we want to see in our classrooms?

If yes, then perhaps an approach that encourages thinking and discussion and reflection doesn’t seem so far-fetched after all.

*********** Original End of Post *************

A friend messaged me saying that this post ended too abruptly. And that's true, but I think I stopped writing because I thought it was becoming too long already. But as a result, I skimmed over what was probably the most important part of this post. So, for those of you who have the patience to continue reading, here it goes.

Assuming you've thought about the definition of morality (yes yes, I'm being presumptuous about the interactivity of this medium), let me try to hash it out myself.

When we say awareness, it's not just an awareness of your surroundings, but an awareness of your relationship with the surroundings. This means, an understanding of how your actions affect the people and the nature around you, and vice-versa. For instance, an awareness that throwing out that wrapper on to the street because you can't find a dustbin would mean that it would either lie there forever and add to the garbage on the ground, or that another person would have to come and pick up after you. An awareness that when you brandish your victory in a competition, you're possibly taking away a notch of your opponent's self-confidence. An awareness that when you chain up that dog to prevent it from biting your child, you're probably causing the dog a considerable amount of discomfort and pain.

This list could go on. But I'm hoping that you can begin to see the kind of consciousness that emerge from this kind of awareness. 

Notice, however, that these statements do not suggest a simplistic right or wrong. In each of these situations, there is a clash of beliefs: personal convenience versus public cleanliness; the joy of victory versus the disappointment of defeat; concern for your child's safety versus concern for the dog's pain. There really isn't one simple way of making a choice here that could be applied universally.

[On a side note, I think this is where most of our attempts at teaching values gets sidelined. We assume that there is a universal right thing that everyone can agree upon. We approach values with a kind of simplicity that completely neglects the complexity with which they work in our lives; sometimes, against each other. We teach honesty. We teach loyalty. Yet we never consider difficulty of the situation where my honesty could lead to a friend getting in trouble. Or a situation where kindness to one means unfairness to another. Or countless other situations that represent life far more accurately than the fairy tale black and white versions.*]

Yet an approach to morality that emphasizes awareness presumes that value-based decisions are difficult, and might lead to different conclusions for different people. It will push people to approach any given situation with an openness and eagerness to understand the situation from all possible angles, and then leave the individual to make their choice.

And really, that's all we can ask of people. Consideration of different perspectives. Thinking about the impact of their actions (or inactions). Such that going forward, whatever decision they make, it stems from an understanding of its merits and demerits. Imagine a world where people made decisions with the humility to accept its limitations, instead of the conviction that it's the best decision and should appeal equally to every other person as well. Well, it might be confused world, I suppose. But it might just be a world willing to listen to and learn from each other.

************** 

*Thought for the day: If we were teaching a lesson in class that emphasized forgiveness, do you think it would be worthwhile to get students to think about why it doesn't apply to the legal criminal justice system?


Disclaimer: This post may not be representative of Krishnamurti's beliefs. I've used his definition of morality and interpreted it in my own way.