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A Moral Education

Making Children Moral

In the first part of our mini-series on moral education, Michael Hand considers whether schools should be involved in trying to make children moral.

Should schools be in the business of making children moral? I don’t mean: should they help children to think well about morality? It’s obvious they should do that. I mean: should they try to shape children’s intentions, feelings and habits in a way that disposes them to comply with moral standards?

To mark the distinction just drawn, I’ll use the terms ‘moral inquiry’ and ‘moral formation’. Moral inquiry is the rational investigation of the nature, content and justification of morality. Not nearly enough room is made for moral inquiry in most school curricula, but few would deny that it ought to be there. Moral formation, by contrast, is the cultivation in children of moral intentions, feelings and habits – the shaping of moral character.

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