Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 May 2010
background and objectives
In this chapter I will describe a program to create schools in which students' experiences in their classrooms promote caring about the welfare of others and the inclination to help others. The influences that give rise to caring and helping are in many respects the opposite of those that develop hostility and aggression in children and youth (Staub, 1986, 1996a, in preparation), and an additional central aim of this program is to lessen hostility and aggressiveness. The latter is best accomplished, however, by creating conditions and experiences that promote caring, cooperation, and helpfulness. Part of the focus of this program is to develop caring about members of racial, religious, or ethnic groups other than one's own, what I will refer to as inclusive caring. The program also aims to foster positive self-esteem, since children and adolescents have to value themselves to a reasonable degree if they are to value and help others. Beyond caring about individuals, the program also promotes feelings of responsibility for the social good. As a by-product of the classroom milieu created and the students' experiences in the classroom, positive effects on learning are also expected.
The program consists of workshops with teachers and other school personnel, and follow-up training with them to translate the ideas, perspectives, and skills they had acquired in the workshops into classroom practice. It also includes workshops with parents, so that their ways of relating to and guiding children at home may become supportive of the school effort.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.