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Palak Patel

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How do we teach morality at a primary level?

I am from India that this question is relevant to people from many parts of the world.
A large population of India still lives in rural areas, and such lifestyle is still very integral to this country. The problem is that the social culture in these regions is still marred by archaic thinking, which runs down from one generation to the next. High gender inequality, caste system and apathy towards education are parts of the normal lifestyle.
I believe that one of the major steps you can take to weed out such mentality is by targeting those who haven’t developed this mentality yet: the children. Morality is not a part of the curriculum and I strongly believe that it should be. But the question is, how do we teach morality to kids of say 9-12 years of age? How can we ingrain in kids thoughts and beliefs that are completely contradictory to the social dogma? When even in their households, which is where children acquire a major part of their values, ancient beliefs are pervasive, how do we teach them the difference between right and wrong?

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Topics: children education individual versus society morality rural communication society teaching
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    Ben Moulson

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    TEDx Organizer
    Aug 18 2012: Palak, this is a great question and one that very much needs to be addressed all over the globe. I think the answer lies in environment, and it comes down to the parents to create such an environment for their children so that they can grow up with and develop their own sense of morality, it's in us all but for children especially in the stages where they have no choice but to learn from their surroundings (environment) it's essential for the parents to lead by example.

    When a certain lesson is forced upon a child or anyone for that matter, it usually only generates negative reactions, but if a lesson is all around you, it becomes a sense and you learn from it instinctively. Imagine, if all parents of this generation knew that..

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