VALUES FORMATION: A HUGE CHALLANGE TO ALL DISCIPLINES

RODA A. SALAYSAY

Values formation has been the compass of interest and exploration that have manifested rapid development in contemporary years. It is one of the essentials to become an authentic human being inside the school. It is the instrument that leads students towards maturity and guides him in the change of his behavior. In the same manner, the goal of education is to lead the student in connecting vitality through which he shapes himself as human person, armed with knowledge, strength of judgement, and moral virtues. It is also the role of education in all disciplines or academic subjects to help the students understand their own selves through the knowledge acquired in school, and in due time adopt it to real life situations to be more effective in their roles in the society where they are included. Furthermore, education does not only consist of amazing knowledge, but it is a continuous process of development of the person specially his external power, spiritual and moral, intellectual and physical, social and emotional, including aesthetic. Especially nowadays that numerous crimes in the country are suspected to be done by the Filipino youth, values education to each subject and school environ is chiefly the colossal challenge to all leaders of schools and classroom teachers.

In the same manner, values formation enables the students to change, to establish self-discipline and self-management, to make their lives more evocative, and to achieve total and complete contentment. The school for this matter has to intentionally guide these students through formal edification in order that they may be able to co-opt the desirable values needed for their improvement. The significance of this is highlighted by the fact that values when well-defined in the classroom or discussed at the family table tend to be abstract. Indeed, a thing has value when it is perceived as good and desirable, hence, the desire to acquire those things influence the attitudes and behavior of the students. Nevertheless, not only material goods but even ideas, and concepts are valuable the verity, scrupulousness, justice and the like. These are inscribed in their characters, and may further be internalized in them under the control of the teacher in all subjects and as they interact with their instant environment. It cannot be denied that as the students enter the school, they already have with them, their own set of values which may either be strengthened or modified in their school years. Values education therefore is the concern of the institution, the home, the church, and the community. Knowing consequently, the importance of values education in the universal growth of the students, school administrators and all subject teachers should completely comprehend the relationship of value orientation to institutional outlooks, individual student needs, and social behavior if they are to function effectively as leaders and mentors of the school. School heads and subject teachers in particular should be sensitive to the student value orientation and those with whom they recurrently interrelate. They too and the teachers must evaluate both their own values and strengths of their tending to attribute and development of these values to others for better academic achievement. — oOo—

The author is Teacher I at Pulong Palazan Elementary School, Candaba, Pampanga