THE NEED FOR VALUE EDUCATION:

 THE NEED FOR VALUE EDUCATION: 

Every individual cherishes desires and aspirations for his life and he is individually responsible for their fulfillment. This has been the way of life since time immemorial. Some desires are fulfilled and some are not. Some people meekly accept their failure to fulfill their desires and some do not. The cause behind the success of some and the failure of others is mainly wisdom which differs person to person. This means that the wisdom of every individual is his primary value for developing appropriate skills.

There are many other areas, too, where value education is deemed necessary

Identifying one’s own ‘self’:

In absence of right understanding of self or its aspirations, a person would naturally attempt to fulfill every desire appearing in his mind, if he possibly can. If such a person has picked up unethical values in the process of his upbringing, it is natural for his mind to generate unethical desires. In his attempts to fulfill such desires, he would continue learning the rights and wrongs from his success, failure acceptable and unacceptable social response. Such a process of learning is too slow and also painful. In order to improve upon his performance, he would need to differentiate between ethical and unethical desires in the first place. After identifying the unethical desires, he would need to develop skills to eliminate such desires. This is where value education is expressly needed.

Identifying the aspiration of self

Once clarity is established with respect to ethical and unethical desires, one must attempt to identify the core desires and aspirations of the self in the light of ethical values. There could be any number of aspirations which may be contradictory to each other and in such a case, happiness of fulfillment of one’s aspiration; one needs the skills for balancing his basic needs with his aspiration in life. Such a balance in individual needs and aspirations is generally conducive for a happy and satisfied life.

Actualization of Goals: 

The next stage after identifying one’s goals is the action-oriented implementation programme for the actualization of such value-based goals and aspirations that have been identified. The stages as discussed and explained earlier are internal exercises, whereas the action oriented implementation programme, apart from self-discipline, needs interaction with the external world. The individual values and skills need to meet approval from the external world. Both self disciplining and real action for actualization can be practiced simultaneously as self disciplining is a long process. Once the unethical values, immoral skills, beliefs and misconception are identified and sincerely accepted, self-awareness assumes the role of a strict guide by interfering each time one is tempted to tread the forbidden path. An important part of value education is to learn to listen intently to such inferences and suggestions and practice those suggestions diligently.

METHODOLOGY ADOPTED FOR VALUE EDUCATION

Universality The course contents of value education must be universally applicable to all human beings notwithstanding the geographical, religious or communal differences. Thus, the course must promote universal human values, not merely those of specifically selected groups.

Natural acceptability Openness to any suggestion or principles depends directly upon a person’s natural acceptability. Thus, the methodology adopted for teaching value education and the principles conveyed therein must be naturally acceptable as well as verifiable for every student. One cannot learn something that is not naturally acceptable or verifiable for every student. 

Reasonability :Value education cannot be taught by lying down fixed rules, regulations and commandments. Every value-based principle must appeal to individual reason in order to make an effective impact on the students mind. Rules and ordinances compulsive in nature often face defiance, whereas principles appealing to reason are willingly complied with. Therefore, value education needs to be imparted in such a manner that it spontaneously wins a willing acceptance.

Versatility of value education: values can never be enforced by an ordinance; they must make a deep impression on the conscience of a person for their strict adherence. This is where the versatility of a learning process justifies itself. Once such values are firmly established, they mould into the spontaneous behavior of their learner which is the ultimate aim of value education.

Universal harmony:There are no mathematical and scientific formulae that explain the technique of universal harmony. Only a value-oriented realization within can make a person feel the urgency for establishing harmony between each and every entity within the universe. Value education must make its learner realize that except humans, every other inanimate and animate being helps maintain total harmony in nature. Once humans realize this fact through effective value education, they can themselves become an effective tool in establishing universal harmony.