School of Education Home Involvement in Character Education: Lessons from the Narnian Virtues Dr Peter Hart, Dr Shirley-Anne Paul, Prof Mark Pike, & Prof Thomas Lickona

Is Character Education more effective when parents are involved? School of Education An English Literature Character Education curriculum based on the work of C.S. Lewis seeking to answer: Is Character Education more effective when parents are involved? Does family background make a difference to participation or effect?

School of Education The design: 12 week school curriculum with 11-12 year olds, 2 hours per week, September – December 2016. Included a home activity book: ‘Character Passport’ We ask parents to tell us how long they spend helping their children We ask students to tell us how beneficial these activities are.

Family Mission Statement School of Education Tasks Family Meeting ‘Good Deeds’ Family Mission Statement Movie Night

School of Education In our research, who do parents say influence their children the most? All-bar-one believed parents had the most influence over their 11/12 year olds when responding to a survey. [n = 56, self-selecting participants]

School of Education But in interview, the same parents had much more complex and nuanced answers: Influence is more historic than current (‘you help them develop their character from day one’) Influence is due to conversation, as the child grows they expect that to wane It’s who they spend most time with Influence of peers growing – coming to a tipping point.

Barriers to Parental Involvement included: School of Education Barriers to Parental Involvement included: Time Motivation Purpose A suitable pre-existing parent/child relationship Accessibility of the material.

School of Education Lessons from Narnian Virtues 1: Changing the language of character formation

So instead of [the child] saying, “oh I get frustrated at that,” or “I don’t know why I rage, I don’t know why I start shouting at him.” So it gave her the vocab to say, “actually it’s about self-control and it is about developing those sorts of characteristics of how I can control those emotions and try say to myself stop doing this

School of Education Lessons from Narnian Virtues 2: Fulfil parents’ expectation of ‘home work’

To be quite honest with you, for my son, there’s not been enough written work. It’s come a lot from what us parents think and I would have liked for everytime I’m asked a question for the learner to be asked a question more than me

Lessons from Narnian Virtues 3 Be Inclusive School of Education Lessons from Narnian Virtues 3 Be Inclusive

School of Education Lessons from Narnian Virtues 4 A focus on self-reflection and informal opportunities to teach and learn seems beneficial.

School of Education Rather [than] it’s just “mum’s going off on one again” it’s “let’s talk about this, let’s talk about the virtues, how do you think it’s going” getting her engaged, talking about it

School of Education Concluding comments Is Character Education more effective when parents are involved? Effectiveness seems to relate to : the removal of barriers; maintaining the ‘traditional’ aim of the subject curriculum; providing tools (e.g. language) to make use of informal teaching opportunities.

School of Education Questions? Invitation to participate Email narnianvirtues@leeds.ac.uk