Values Education: a fresh look at procedural neutrality
Titel:
Values Education: a fresh look at procedural neutrality
Auteur:
Ashton, Elizabeth Watson, Brenda
Verschenen in:
Educational studies
Paginering:
Jaargang 24 (1998) nr. 2 pagina's 183-193
Jaar:
1998-07
Inhoud:
The need for education in moral values is increasingly being recognised today, but how is it to be conducted in schools? In particular we consider the appropriateness or otherwise of a teacher assuming the role of a neutral chairperson in discussion. Advocacy of such a stance is especially associated with Lawrence Stenhouse who saw neutrality as a procedural device in order to empower students' own involvement. We point out many of the insights of Stenhouse's approach, but also some of its disadvantages which subtly encourage a popularist form of relativism. We suggest the substitution of procedural neutrality with a different approach, that of critical affirmation. Here the teacher advocates a stance alongside everyone else. This, however, is done in a way that affirms pupils, and their right to personal views, whilst subjecting all views, including the teacher's own, to a close scrutiny, especially regarding implications for the views of others.
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