To develop children's peaceful living competencies, a school can work in a
number of ways. They come under the following seven major levels.
1. Subject coritext
2. Subject perspectives
3. Teaching methods
4. Co-curricular activities
5. Stqffdevelopment
6. Classroom management
7. School management
The approaches take the following model.
Integration of peace education into school total curriculum
*Subject content
*Subject perspectives
*Teaching methods
*Total Curricululm
*1-b Co-curricular activities
*Classroom management
*School management
*Staff developtnent
*Model of integration of peace values into school curricuhm
This chapter focuses on the ways of integrating peace values at the subject
content level, teaching methods level and subject perspective level. Others levels
are discussed elsewhere here.
Subject Content
Since this handbook is for primary and secondary teachers, for convenience's
sake we name here six subjects broadly.
Language
Studies
Social Science Religion Physical Ed. Arts
Language includes listening, speech, reading, writing, second language and
secondary literature.
Social Sciences may include geography, history and civics.
Religion may be Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam or Christianity. In certain countries
they have values or moral education in place of religion. Meditations and quotations
given here are generally acceptable to all religions. However, if you differ then you
can use similar activities or quotations most appropriate to your religion.
Science may include environmental studies, mathematics, physics, chemistry,
biology and botany.
Physical Education includes game and exercises.
Arts include drawing, dancing, and music.
Integration of Peace into Formal Subjects
1. Identify peace values in the lesson
Here the word 'peace value' is used rather loosely to mean all the concepts,
values, principles, attitudes, skills and practices related to peaceful living. The
guide for doing it takes the following four steps.
To begin with it is useful to understand the difference of the words we use here.
Here is a basic clarification.
An attitude is a person's positive or negative evaluation about a particular
object, behaviour, a person, a group of people, ideas, e.g.
A Smoking is bad
B Reading is a good habit.
C A human value is an intrinsic positive human quality that enriches living, e.g.
Love
D Kindness
E Courage
A concept is a class of information (e.g. facts, images, attitudes, etc.) that we
group together on the basis of commonalities.
1 Motherhood
2 Compassion
(Note: Values are also concepts in this sense.)
An instruction is an informed guide to action, e.g.
As a teacher your ability to identify a peace value in their different forms as
explained above is important. Many lessons have peace values in different forms.
Sometimes they are given directly. Sometimes they lie hidden or given indirectly.
In some other lessons you may not find any of such. However, on close scrutiny
you may realize that a certain peace value could be brought into the context as a
compliment to enrich the lessons. Of course there may be lessons completely
lacking in any peace value and also no peace values incorporated. Even then you
need not be disappointed, because in all the cases you can adopt peace education
approaches such as bringing in imagination, positive feelings and emotions and
interesting learning activities in relation to the lesson objectives. The thematic
model presented in this guide can help you to identify many values in the
texts.
However the stress on peace value should be in line with the lesson objectives
and also within the time constraint. Therefore teachers have to find brief but
effective methods of putting across values in the formal lessons.
Peace education introduces a holistic attitude to subject contents, methods of
teaching and learning, including classroom management. Peace is said to be both
the end and process. Here we present a brief guide to adopt peace education into
the process of teaching and learning in the classroom.
2. Infuse peace concepts, attitudes, values andprinciples appropriate and relevant
to the lessons.
Once you identify a value in a lesson or bring in a complimentary value it has
to be done in a manner so that it gets characterized in children. For this purpose,
a teacher needs to analyse and identify the basic components of a value. A value
has three basic components. They are: the cognitive or knowledge component, the
affective component and the behavioural component.
Cognitive - (Knowledge)
Affective - (Feelings, emotions and attitudes)
Behavioural- (Skills, practices)
The three components in a value
To illustrate let us analyse the value Co-operation and identify the components.
Cognitive
Affective
Definition, ways and levels of co-operation, its benefits.
Feelings of sharing, and solidarity. Our past experience
Behavioural Skills, practices and exercises I
Analysis of the Value Co-operation
The ability to analyse values is necessary. A teacher has to provide the knowledge
base and build the concept at'first. Secondly, she has to awaken the feelings related
to the value by recalling p&t good experiences, telling stories, etc and develop
positive attitudes towards the value. Finally, behavioural skills are built through
practices.
In the pages above we discussed the way of doing it. Say, for example, that
there is a lesson about a traditional village. In developing the lesson, you can bring
in the value of co-operative living and discuss various social co-operation practices
that exist in traditional village:.
3. Bring in positive feelings and emotions to make the lesson lively,
interesting and appealing.
Example: Awaken the sense of curiosity, wonder, awe, beauty and joy into the
process of teaching and learning.
4. Present the lesson from a humanistic and peaceful perspective.
An example:
The French Revolution: Explain the socio-economic background to the revolution
from a human perspective. Help children to understand that people tend to be
aggressive under the deprivation of basic needs. Discuss how people experience
poverty materially, socially and psychologically. How does deprivation lead to
pervasive behaviour? Help students to,look at the issue with compassion. But can
we justify. taking violence away to change society? What are the non-violent ways,
which we can use to bring justice, equality, liberty and human rights?
In case of teaching history, as we discussed above, avoid arousing hatred in
students against the oppressors, invaders and villains. Rather broaden the vision
to understand the socio-economic and political conditions that lead to the emergence
of such personalities. Discuss the lessons we can leai-n from this human experience.
5. Guide to self-development
Every lesson may have certain clues that inspire the self-development of the
learner. Teachers can highlight and make use of them. Providing vision, insight,
action guide, exercises in consciousness expansion and helping to understand one's
potentials could facilitate self-development. Discovering one's own identity forms
the ground for self-development. Especially lessons on the biographies of great
personalities provide rich sources of inspiration of character-building, a part of self-
development.
6. Help children to build a peaceful vision
Adolescents are naturally inclined to have a good vision or philosophy of life
and society that will help to guide their action. This inclination arises from the
newly attained. capacity for abstract thinking in the process of growth. In their
enthusiasm to lay the foundation for a successful future life, they search for a good
philosophy of life. A good school curriculum should recognize this intellectual need
of the youth and provide such life guiding philosophy. In this connection a teacher
has to investigate the possibility of including such vision into the formal lesson.
Youth want to inquire:
1 What is the purpose of life?
2 How to live a happy life?
3 How to build a successful life?
4 What is true love?
5 What are the natures of inner drives such as sex?
What is really needed here is not an answer from an outside authority, but
encouragement, and guidance to inquiry and freedom. Imposing adults' views set
limitations to their thinking and therefore such efforts are harmful. An open
atmosphere to raise questions, doubts and express views is necessary for this
purpose. (See Critical Thinking)
7. Awaken students' spirit of creativity and imagination.
The traditional teacher-dominant approach in the classroom suppresses children's
spirit of creativity and freedom. It promotes single track thinking in line with the
teacher's ideas. On the other hand, child-centred learning promotes an open
atmosphere for creative and divergent thinking. Open inquiry, alternative perspectives,
and free generation of ideas are encouraged through various activities.
8. Awaken the spirituality, wisdom and intuition deep within.
Spirituality is the pure essence in human beings that seeks to fulfil itself through
communion with the creative energy in the universe. All religions originate from
the spirituality in man. This essence in its attempt to come in touch with the creative
energy motivates man to reach the highest consciousness and even go beyond it.
All the human values arise from spirituality. In fact, human values are different
forms of expression of the spirituality within us.
Wisdom is the intelligence of spirituality. In other words, it can be explained
as the perception of spirituality. Awakening of wisdom is the highest attainment
in human development. It is also described as enlightenment, the highest aspiration
of life and education.
Intuition is the instant eruption of an idea or solution to a problem without the
involvement of any conscious reasoning process. This happens as a result of the
working of the subconscious mind in searching for the idea or solution. Intuition,
as a flash of a creative idea, comes from a process of preparation, incubation, and
illumination. At the preparation stage you collect information, sort it out and
explore possibilities through the conscious mind. During the incubation stage the
search goes down to the subconscious level. The subconscious then starts the
process of analysing and synthesizing. Illumination is the instant discovery of an
idea or solution often in an unexpected moment. Illumination is usually followed
by verification where you try to test it with reality and form a course of action
accordingly.
9. Make learning joyful
Learning in the classroom should be necessary, happy and joyful for several
reasons. It helps to develop positive attitudes to learning. Secondly, such learning
is easily retained in the memory. Thirdly, it helps emotional development in children.
It also builds a happy classroom climate. To make learning joyful:
a. Present the lesson in clear language, easy to understand and in right sequence.
b. Have a thought provoking and catchy introduction.
c. Keep the attention intact.
d. Ensure that the attention does not flag through use of examples, humour,
stories.
e. Question problem-solving and use of audio-visual aids.
f. Make children participate in learning through involving them in interesting
and challenging learning activities.
g. Use aesthetic activities like singing, listening to recorded songs and
programmes.
h. Use role-plays, simulations and instant drama.
i. Give creative and interesting exercises in place of monotonous and dry
traditional exercises and assignment.
10. Build a friendly nmi co-operative climate in the classroom.
A conducive social climate emerges in a classroom basically through right
interaction between teacher-pupil and pupil-pupil. Mutual respect, courtesy and
kindness, immensely contribute to climate-building.
A co-operative relationship also helps to create a positive social climate in that
it discourages individualistic and self-centred behaviour in the classroom. Mutual
appreciation helps to elicit the best in students. Organizing such events as birthday
celebrations, get-together parties, singing, short excursions and other socializing
activities are also effective in climate-building.
As the second part of our exercise here we are going to analyse a few core
curricular subjects in the light of peace education and find out ways of presenting
them in the classroom.
Subject Perspective Level
Art
Art can be used effectively to build peace vision ard attitudes in children. Its
strength lies in the affective component it inherits. Art is a very powerful medium
of peace, which can be explored endlessly. Here are a few examples.
Select topics in the Arts-drawing, drama, singing, ballet, creative activities-
that focuses on concepts related to peace-building and self-development, e.g.
Appreciation and enjoyment of literature helps the emotional development of
children. Literature is also creative and stimulates imagination. Stories are every
effective tools in language teaching. Many children's stories convey deep human
messages through symbolic means. Such messages could be discovered in
appreciation sessions. The capabilities of the language as a subject can be extensively
explored in inculcating peace values in children.
History
History when viewed as the evolution of civilization and the story of man's
progress through time is an interesting subject. It could be presented either through
a narrow or broad perspective. A narrow perspective presents the events in isolation
and single track often biased ethically, religiously or nationally. It overlooks the
other sides of the stories. Such learning leads to closed thinking and biased views.
On the contrary, the broad perspective presents the events in relation to the social,
political, ideological and economic forces and the background prevailing during
the particular period concerned. It encourages understanding history from alternative
views and brings into light new perspectives. History is an interpretation of the
series of recorded events in the past in an attempt to enlighten our present issues
.
In other words, through history we try to understand where we are now and where
should we go from here.
The right approach to teaching history can build peace through the opportunities
it provides to understand and appreciate other cultures, religions and to realize the
strengths as well as weaknesses of man. It helps us to understand the nature of the
oppressions, exploitations, invasions and destructions committed by our ancestors
against humanity. For instance, how destructive a war can be and how power can
blind men. Reading history, which is mostly the story of man's greed and aggression
provides insights into the natural human psyche and the need to change it in order
to ensure the survival and advancement of mankind. It turns our attention inward
to see how the old psyche is still in operation with its roots in the primitive and
medieval mentality seeking for security in ethnic centredness, religious
fundamentalism, power craziness, selfishness, and aggression.
Unfortunately even in many school textbooks history is presented from a single
side. Take for example, how Hitler and his Nazi campaign are presented. The
writers have been unconsciously led to present Hitler as a hero. History is not only
the story of war. It is also the story of peace. But very little attention has been given
to portray the peace side of the history. To illustrate the point, let us again go back
to Hitler's Nazi campaigning. He massacred nearly 6 million Jews systematically
in his mania to preserve the pure German race. A child may wonder during the
history lesson what the civilized world did to stop it. And consequently he may
learn that the civilized way to respond to oppression and violence is to be passively
silent about it. This wrong learning takes place, due to the negligence of giving
the peace side of the story. In fact the civilized world protested against the massacre
of Jews. Some people in other countries worked dedicatedly to create pressure to
stop it, in their own ways. There were even Germans who attempted at protesting.
Some Jews in the concentration camps bravely stood in their moral strength and
died honourably as heroes at the hands of the Nazi, soldiers. But the history writers
grossly neglect that side of the story. They also do not tell us about the feelings
of the oppressed people.
History, as a subject can also be used to practice peace skills related to various
core values such as positive perception, empathy, alternative vision, critical thinking
and responsible decision-making. Using such methods as role-plays, group
discussions, drawing and debates makes learning history lively and interesting.
Religious Education
Religion as a subject in the school curriculum can distinctively contribute to
peace-building. Every religion has peace as the central value. However there is a
growing criticism that the present popular form of religious education is narrow,
divisive and fundamental. Realizing the inappropriateness of such an approach in
today's world many countries are increasingly adopting a broader perspective that
attempts at unifying mankind through inter-religious understanding. A good religious
teacher adopts the broad perspective approach in such ways as given below.
Adopt a child-centred approach to teaching religion. Begin with children's
experience of living.
Identify the spiritual needs of children in their respective development stage
and cater to them in your lesson.
Encourage religious inquiry, discussion, self-discovery, adopt actively or
experience base, in place of teaching domination lecturing, advocacy and
patronizing methods.
Absence from looking down on other faiths. Instead, develop friendly,
tolerant and respectful attitudes towards them.
Use creative methods to promote religious living practice.
Highlight the need for right action in moral situations, under the temptation
of self.
Use stories for the country religion message.
Discuss in depth human issues such as purpose of living, nature of suffering,
death and ignorance. In such a discussion, bring in the perspective of the
other world faiths in such a manner to help broadening of vision.
Use meditation constantly in your lesion to awaken spirituality.
Mathematics
Mathematics in traditional curricula is presented as an isolated subject that has
no relation with the social reality. However this subject could be related to peace
education in several ways. Such relation to the real world will surely make it more
meaningful to students. Mathematics can use more concrete activities, assignments
and exercises related to reality in order to raise awareness on national and global
issues affecting mankind. For instance, the secondary mathematics can include
calculations of percentages and ratio of population growth, infant mortality, adult
literacy, unemployment, life expectancy, etc. Obviously engagement in such
calculations will broaden children's social view. Teachers can design many interesting
and meaningful exercises based on figures in population growth, education, health,
and economic development. For assignments and exercises students can engage
in statistical surveys using such calculations.
Mathematics also provides an opportunity for cultural understanding through
studying different mathematical systems in the world and the contributions made
in different cultures. Basics in astronomical mathematics can provide insights into
the ways the universe operates.
Social Studies
The purpose of social studies is to broaden the children's view and the vision
of human society in order to qualify them to be good citizens. The subject is
developed through a multidisciplinary approach, consisting of geography, history,
anthropology, sociology, economics and political science. However, the richness
of these disciplines are rarely seen in the curricula of social studies syllabi in many
developing countries. Many of them are overloaded with geography or history
ignoring issues coming under the other disciplines. In the academic world today
there is a tendency of ignoring the human touch in social sciences. Some critics
call it dehumanization of social science. It is clear that many social scientists treat
people as objects, members of groups and mere sources of information. This
purposeful negligence is considered as academic discipline! Another danger arising
from the present form of social science is the fragmented views they produce on
complex social issues. Curriculum developers have to be aware of these dehumanizing
trends in science, including social studies.
The importance of social studies lies on the ground it forms to discuss issues
affecting the globe. Many important themes like democracy, citizenship, human
rights, child rights, social justice and problems of underdevelopment could be
discussed on that ground. Students come to know major current issues of their
society and of the world, such as international conflicts, environmental problems,
and advancements of science through it. Various projects can be designed under
this subject related to peace building. Examples:
1 Weekly presentation of global news in morning assembly.
2 Publishing a handwritten or printed magazine/ wall paper on current issues
related to the subject.
3 Visiting historical/ archaeological/ geographical sites.
4 Organizing exhibitions on world heritage and other important themes.
5 Conduct community surveys/studies on themes related to developmental
issues.
6 Organizing school and public seminars/lectures/discussions on current social
issues.
7 Organizing campaigns to raise awareness on issues affecting the people and
environment.
8 Viewing video and film shows on related issues.
Science Education
As all other subjects in the school curriculum, science also takes the narrow
view of the world in its preference to be fragmentary as the tradition insists. Leaving
aside the subject content matters here, let us focus on the hidden curriculum of
science education in schools. The hidden curriculum is communicated to students
primarily through the manner of presentation of the subject and the teacher's
general attitudes exhibited in teaching. It has been observed that the following types
of attitudes about science are suggested to learners:
These kinds of impressions may be unintended. In fact they come from the
outdated model of the image that science teachers happen to have, especially in
developing countries. The writer remembers that once a school student in Grade
10 said that only the West could produce scientific knowledge. These are the typical
attitudes that neo-imperialism wants to produce in developing countries! Teachers
in developing countries still view science in the model of the Newtonian mechanistic
paradigm, which has been abandoned in the West over at least three decades ago.
It is replaced by the quantum mechanics paradigm. Promoting the Newtonian
attitudes in science in the world of today, is really misleading. For a moment
consider the following implications of the old paradigm of science:
Natural resources exist only to be exploited by man for the benefit of man.
The chapter describes ways of integrating peace values into the formal teaching
and learning process in the classroom. For this a teacher should also be able to
identify peace values occurring in the lessons in various forms. Some lessons have
peace values. Bringing in relevant values could often complement those lessons
lacking in peace values.
2. Select a peace value, e.g. respect for human dignity, justice, long vision,
forgiveness. Analyse it and identify the cognitive, affective and behavioural
constituents.
3. "Spirituality is the pure essence in a human being that seeks to fulfil itself
through communion with the creative energy in the universe". How do you
understand the above statement? Discuss. Search for other definitions of
spirituality. How do you define it?
Science is pure knowledge that has nothing to do with human or social
issues. It has little or no relation with other subjects.
Science is the only true knowledge. It is fixed and therefore no one can do
anything about it.
Science does not recognize human values or inner knowledge.
Learning science is mostly accumulation of the given subject matter.
If anything is found to be immeasurable ignore it.
Environmental pollution is justified by production.(As seen in developed
countries)
Animals are there for the use of man. They have no natural rights.
Things To Do
Show that science is concerned with the needs and interest of mankind and
human welfare.
Convey the insight that the whole universe is interlinked and interdependent.
Science is not the only true knowledge.
Life in every form is precious. Science respects life.
Science is not above morality. It is responsible for the welfare of mankind.
Abusing science against such laws is wrong.
Scientific knowledge is ever evolving and everybody interested can participate
and contribute to the advancement of science.
Here it is worthy of mentioning what the physicist Victor Weisskopf said about
scientific thinking. He observed:
"Human existence depends upon compassion, and curiosity leading to
knowledge, but curiosity and knowledge without compassion is inhuman,
and compassion without curiosity and knowledge is ineffectual. "
Concluding Thoughts
Peace education attempts not only to infuse peace values into lessons but also
to adopt peace approaches into the teaching and learning process in the classroom.
The chapter describes those approaches. Apart from character-building, the whole
approach improves the quality of learning.
1. Turn to a lessen in a subject textbook and trace the peace values in it. If
such values are not seen, what appropriate values could be brought in?
4. Share with your colleagues one of your most self-satisfying experiences in
your teaching career. Why do you value that particular experience? Listen
to your colleague's experience. as well.