Cultural Values In Education

“The question we all face is what sort of culture we will live in for the rest of our lives and then hand on to the next generation - one that embraces these most basic of values, or one that collapses because of their absence.” Tammy Bruce.

According to free dictionary (2017) values are principles or standards, as of behavior, which is considered important or desirable. Values have a major impact on a person's conduct and attitude, they also serve as strategies in situations. The Social Studies subject located within the curriculum of the education system of Trinidad and Tobago is multidisciplinary and aims at educating the students to become more aware and interactive with their personal and social environment. A major focus of Social Studies

Values are important and lasting beliefs or ideals that can be shared by the members of a culture about what is good or bad and desirable or undesirable. The culture of a country is a set of norms that set standards for a society of what is acceptable behavior and is important to the future of the country, instilling the correct values to the children is of utmost importance. Three values a teacher can reflect when developing strategies towards the cultural growth of our country are respect, responsibility and integrity.

Respect is a value to be reflected upon when developing strategies towards the cultural growth of our country. Cambridge dictionary (2017) defines respect as a feeling that something is right or important and you should not attempt to change it or harm it. Cultural differences are unavoidable; showing respect for those differences is imperative for successful

IGI Global, (2017) defines responsibility as the state or fact of having a duty or being held accountable for something or someone. Educators are charged with having the obligation to teach students how to become responsible. This is a character trait that is of merit, and is essential in the learning environment.Teaching students to become accountable for their actions develops good citizenship. Responsibility empowers and engage students to understand that they should accept the consequences for their actions whether positive or negative. Social media showcases our country, especially the education system as being incompetent. Students are become more disrespectful to their elders and peers, but no one is being held liable and the punishment is always suspension, expulsion or counselling. Gone are the days when everybody respected each other, “we are breeding a monsters” words from the Honorable Dr. Keith Rowley. Each child needs to be aware that for a country to flourish each citizen should do their part so that the country could develop. Some effective strategies that can be used to teach students to be responsible to their culture are through cooperative learning, in the Jigsaw cooperative learning method, students work together to achieve a common goal, but they cannot achieve that goal unless each group member has done his