Reasons for living: Education and young people's search for meaning, identity and spirituality. A handbook Marisa Crawford & Graham Rossiter
ACER Press, 2006
ISBN: 9780864316134
This review, by Kate Gross, appeared in: Youth Studies Australia, v.26, n.1 2007 (p.57)
Growing up certainly ain't what it used to be.
In the past, young people trod a fairly stable path to adulthood, guided by the homogeneous and relatively unchallenged values issued from the pulpit, from the classroom and from the kitchen table. By contrast, those growing up today are presented with a multiplicity of beliefs and values. While today's world offers young people unprecedented freedom of choice, it can also be a source of existential confusion and uncertainty. As Murdoch University Emeritus Professor of Education Brian Hill says in his foreword to Reasons for living, '... amid the confusion of values, individuals are struggling to find personal meaning and identity, even to the point of questioning whether they actually matter to anyone other than themselves'.
In Reasons for living, Marissa Crawford and Graham Rossiter acknowledge that 'finding meaning in life and achieving some authentic sense of identity are key developmental tasks for adolescents'. The role of school education (whether public or private, secular or religious) in young people's moral and spiritual development has been a perennial source of contention among educators, parents, politicians and the media for many years. The evolution vs. intelligent design debate and the Australian Government's values education initiatives are recent cases in point.
Crawford and Rossiter draw on their experience as educators and experts in the field of moral and spiritual education to present a comprehensive yet achievable way forward in this area. Rather than lumbering already time-poor teachers with yet another curriculum design to digest and deliver, their approach seeks to enrich teachers' pedagogies with an informed understanding of meaning, identity and spirituality as constructs which can be used to engage with the 'natural spiritual-moral dimensions' that exist in all learning areas. Instead of avoiding 'value-sensitive' issues, this approach empowers teachers to address them as a 'normal part of good education' without compromising the integrity of subject content.
The book is divided into five parts. Part 1 introduces the constructs of meaning, identity and spirituality and how educators can use them to conceptualise and implement effective, relevant and appropriate moral and spiritual education across the curriculum in both public and private schools.
Part 2 presents typologies of the three constructs. These chapters examine the various ways in which meaning, identity and spirituality are constructed and communicated, highlighting their psychological and social functions. Youth perspectives and problematic issues associated with these constructs are explored, and general criteria for the identification and evaluation of 'healthy' meaning, identity and spirituality are identified. This section concludes with an excellent summary chapter which demonstrates how these constructs might inform a generic approach to 'personal development education'. It also explores the implications of this approach for teaching and learning. The following chapter describes a practical example of this approach through an investigation of the moral and spiritual influence of film and television.
Parts 3-5 outline the implications of this approach for three different educational contexts: across the curriculum in public schools, religious education at independent schools, and state-based Religion Studies courses. While discussions of religious education are limited to Christian (particularly Catholic) perspectives, general issues and principles raised in these sections may be useful to schools with other religious traditions.
One of the strengths of this book is that it affirms the important contribution that school education can make towards young people's search for meaning and identity while acknowledging the limitations of its influence, compared with influences such as family and cultural experience. Instead of placing 'unrealistic expectations for student personal change' on schools, Crawford and Rossiter's approach focuses on educating young people in meaning, identity and spirituality through the critical, evaluative study of culture and society in the hope that this will enhance students' capacities for personal change.
Although designed primarily to help teachers, education researchers and students of education bridge the long-standing gap between theory and practice in the field of moral and spiritual education, the theoretical principles found in Reasons for living (particularly those articulated in Part 2) would be useful background reading for parents, professionals in the youth field and anyone with an interest in the 'psychological, spiritual and moral development of youth'.
Source: Youth Studies Australia v.26, n.1 2007 (p.57)