| In times of increased lack of discipline, media influence and violence in schools in America, schools are struggling to find answers in dealing with these problems. Churched youth confuse right and wrong, and even administrators are struggling with TAAS ethics. Character is especially important to our future generations because it is the moral inheritance that we give to our children. Without character, America is without hope for the future.; In an effort to increase Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) scores and improve behavior, the faculty at Giesinger Elementary School and Mendel Elementary School, decided to begin a character education program. Whereas Giesinger's program originated at the campus level, Mendel's program originated at the district level and was mandated for all schools in the district; however, each school could design its own program.; The research questions in this study were: (1) What are the frameworks of the character education programs used by Giesinger and Mendel Elementary schools in Conroe and Houston ISD? (2) What is the role of parents, teachers, administrators, and students in initiating, developing, implementing, and evaluating the character education programs? (3) How does the interplay of school, home and culture affect the educational and character development of students at both schools? (4) What patterns of behavior and achievement are exhibited by the students that can be traced to the character education programs at both schools?; This research used the naturalistic inquiry process described by Erlandson, et al., (1993) in Doing Naturalistic Inquiry. Purposive sampling was used to maximize information from 88 students, 12 faculty, and 6 administrators. The researcher, a participant-observer, administered structured and unstructured interviews. The information collected from classroom observations using the Stallings Observation system, interviews, and other sources formed critical incidents which were unitized and transferred to index cards. These cards were categorized to reflect the emergent themes. From these themes, the final report was developed.; This research approach provided a rich description of the perceptions of the students and teachers of Giesinger Elementary and Mendel Elementary Schools concerning the introduction of Eagle's Citizenship and Product Wisdom as character education program. |
