MOE to merge moral education with school subjects
Singapore students will be taught about civics and morality when they learn various subjects at school.
For example, students will learn about research ethics in science classes, and human values such as empathy and respect in English language lessons.
That, at least, is the vision of the Ministry of Education, which has unveiled a 195-page toolkit to help teachers incorporate the imparting of values during lessons.
Education Minister Heng Swee Keat said the move is aimed at building character in an interactive way and helping students better internalise the values being taught, reported The Straits Times.
The ministry has recently set up a Character and Citizenship Education (CCE) branch to look after the teaching of moral education, national education and co-curricular activities.
Speaking to a 1,600-strong audience of principals and teachers at Nanyang Technological University on Tuesday, Heng admitted that CCE concepts are extremely difficult to teach, and having tests to grade students in this subject matter would be near impossible.
However, he added that CCE is working on a syllabus and updated teaching material that are more applicable to students’ lives, so that they can better identify with the values they are learning. CCE will be taught from Primary 1 to junior college level.
Heng spelled out what the ministry wanted to achieve – nurturing the good character in students to be responsible citizens who contribute to society. CCE will provide the foundation for the core values of responsibility, resilience, respect, integrity, care and harmony.
The toolkit’s five key points are:
• Have a clear purpose to teach values with a whole-school approach, rather than sporadically
• Profile students to customise better-suited programmes for them
• Infuse CCE into programmes to help students internalise values
• MOE to train teachers on how to deliver the CCE curriculum to students
• Reinforce values by fostering partnerships with parents, schools and the community
