Hi everyone! If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you’ll know that my school has a new 3-year major concern and it’s ‘Live by values’. So, I can’t wait to tell you guys more about it!
Let me first introduce what values education actually is. It not only is an essential element for our whole-person development but it also helps us to develop positive values and attitudes through different learning experiences. I think it is really important to educate secondary students about the values.
Value education can play a significant role in helping us define our objectives in life. When we’re teenagers, we may get lost easily and don’t know what kind of people we want to be. Our natural curiosity leads us to different types of things but sometimes we’re not mature enough to distinguish whether we are doing the right thing or not. So, value education can act as a guide to lead us to the right track. C.S. Lewis once said, ‘Education without values, as useful as it is, seems rather to make man a more clever devil.’ Learning those values helps us not only make the right decisions but also develop our own interests and strengths.
Our ability to take proper action to embrace challenges in our different life stages can be developed through value education. It is inevitable that we face difficulties in our academic journey and there are many ways to deal with them. But do we really know which way we should adopt to solve the problem? I remember one day in the first recess, I realized that I forgot to do a piece of homework that had to be handed in before the second recess! In an instant, many thoughts popped up in my mind, ‘If I copy others’ work, I don’t have to hand it in late. Just change some of the words in case the teacher knows it.’ But at last, I chose to tell the teacher honestly instead of copying others’ work. Since my teacher once told me, ‘It’s ok to make a mistake. Everyone makes a mistake. But the main point is not to tell lies to cover it.’ Integrity – the quality of being honest – is what I wish to pursue so I dropped the evil plan. Keeping good values in our heart helps us choose the right thing to do.
Value education helps us to develop good manners. Communication skill is like a ‘must-have’ ability because your attitude of speaking can directly affect whether you can make a good first impression or not. However, without having any values in your mind, it’s pretty hard for you to make a good first impression or develop a good relationship. It is common sense that we should not say something to hurt others’ feelings. Though we may say something bad unintentionally sometimes, as long as we keep reminding ourselves of the values of respecting others, our attitude to getting along with people will change gradually.
So, there are many valid reasons why I think value education is important for secondary school students. If you want to know more about my opinions or have a discussion, feel free to leave a comment below or message me!