Use of valuing pedagogy in Christian Religious Education for learner value acquisition: A study of national secondary schools in Kenya.

Abstract

Schools are mandated to enhance values in their learners through their school activities be they the subject areas or the extra-curricular programmes. Christian Religious Education (CRE) as a school subject has a unique responsibility in value instruction because its content and methodology is geared towards learner value acquisition. Recent evidence indicates that this area of teaching and learning for valuing is problematic noting from the increasing number of cases of indiscipline from learners in secondary schools. The purpose for this study was to investigate the use of valuing pedagogy in CRE for learner value acquisition in secondary schools. The study was guided by the following objectives; to identify the values CRE teachers enhance through the teaching of CRE content, to establish CRE teachers‘ perception on the use of valuing methods for learner value acquisition, to examine CRE teachers‘ use of valuing methods for learner value acquisition, and to determine the assessment methods CRE teachers use to assess learner value acquisition. The study was based on Raths et al`s theory of development of values. The theory emphasizes on the valuing skills required by learners to arrive at responsible value choices. This study was based on the pragmatic research philosophical concept and adopted the convergent parallel design also known as triangulation method that allows integration of findings from qualitative and quantitative data sources. The target population of the study was 95 national secondary schools in Kenya where 224 CRE teachers and 12938 form four CRE students were targeted. 30% of schools and teachers and 10% of students were sampled. The study employed stratified and simple random sampling technique to select the schools for study and purposive sampling technique to select CRE teachers and students to participate in the study. Data was collected by use of the questionnaire, document analysis, interview and Observation schedules. The quantitative data was analyzed using descriptive statistics presented in frequencies and percentages while the qualitative data was analyzed in themes and presented in frequencies, percentages and direct narrations. The study found out that CRE as a subject area has content that is rich in values. The values identified included: obedience, orderliness, honesty, perseverance, industriousness, patience, responsibility, fairness, generosity and humility all enhanced through the thematic areas taught. CRE teachers acknowledged the significance of valuing methods, although only 10% of the teachers used valuing methods of teaching such as the self exploratory exercise (SEE), group enquiry, the value clarifying response, thought sheet and diary writing, the value sheet, and project method. The Findings also indicated that CRE teachers used to a varying extent the following methods to assess learner value acquisition: observation-50(100%), project work-8(16%), attitude and value scales-4(8%), check lists-5(10%), comprehension exercises-47(96%) and formal classroom tests-5(10%). The study concluded that in the enhancement of values in schools, there is a lack of sufficient commitment by teachers and an environment that decimally favors the use of valuing pedagogy to a large extent. The study recommended that the Ministry of Education through the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) and Kenya National examination Council (KNEC) provide an enabling environment for the teaching and testing of value acquisition in schools. KICD subject panels for instance can develop measuring tools that teachers can use in schools to measure the affective domain in form of formative assessments. The study also recommended that teacher trainers put more effort in the training of teachers to enable not only CRE teachers use value acquisition methods to teach and assess values, but also all teachers to make the school an environment where values are learnt and lived.