Character Education In Schools

Character education has been shown to be effective in helping with behavior and academic success of students in schools. Studies have been done on various character education programs to determine the effectiveness of those programs in teaching students character, which decreasing behavior referals, major incidents at school, which also then increases learning. “Schools that have implemented character education programs have reported varying results (Stedje, 2010). Overall, the schools that spent more time and money implementing a character education program had more significant results than the schools who implemented their programs to a lesser degree.” Based on this, schools who use these character education programs with fidelity have …show more content…
“According to Lockwood (1997), about 80% of character education programs target elementary schools, while only 5% take place in the high school setting.” “At Lakeview Middle School in Michigan, discipline referrals declined from 425 in the first semester of 1997-98 to 389 in the first semester of 1998-1999, after CHARACTER COUNTS! had been implemented.” “The Lombard police provided reports from 1997 to 2002 that indicated improvements in youth crime. For example, incidences of graffiti decreased 61%, curfew violations decreased by 68%, absenteeism decreased by 63%, marijuana use or possession decreased by 18% and illegal alcohol use or possession decreased by 41%.” This is a small sample of some of the study results that have been done based on the implementation of character education programs. In general these education programs have been successful in meeting their goals of increasing learning and character …show more content…
Several of these include the following. Character Counts! Character First! I Care. Making Meaning, Project Wisdom, Peace Education, Pathways to Character, Smart and Good, Second Step, Zone of Regulation, ect. There are many programs that are researched based. Each program aims at creating and better students through teaching skills such as listening and respect, compassion and other ethical states. Many of these programs focus on one or more of the topics. Some programs even delve into issues such as bullying, cyber bulling, drugs, alcohol, sex, stress management and many other issues. Many of these programs have been researched and have been shown to be successful. Schools or districts may also choose to do a broader program. Some of these programs fall under Positive Behaviors Instructs Support (PBIS). These programs often chose very few expectations and then work with the same ones under various