|
Current Status -
June 2005
Kuwait American School
Values-Based Education
Written by Mr Peter Williams and Ms Aruna Ladva
The Kuwait American School (KAS) is the only one of its kind in the Middle East
offering a special values-based education program that is now operational in
over 7000 sites in 74 different countries.
At KAS children love coming to school, they are eager to learn and are reluctant
to leave at the end of the day. Teachers and students together in a co-creative
way generate a very positive and healthy atmosphere which is conducive to
learning and growing.
?No words can express the feeling, atmosphere and clear success of this school,?
said an international visitor sent by the Kuwait Education Authority. ?Wherever
I go, I see happy, smiling faces and children learning and helping one another.?
Many parents, education officials and visitors have witnessed the growth of this
school and ask, ?What is the secret of your success?? The secret is simple.
Value yourself and value others.
In the beginning, the dream of Mrs. Wajeeha Al-Habib, the Director, and Peter
Williams, the Founding Principal, was to establish the Kuwait American School as
a child-friendly primary school based on values. That dream has now turned into
reality.
Their vision was further enhanced by all the staff and the local community, who
also believed in the ?product? of a values-based education. The program takes
everyone towards the highest dimension of human potential, reaching beyond the
conventional and enabling children, staff and the community to live their values
together.
The program being implemented at the Kuwait American School is officially known
as Living Values Education Program (LVEP) and it has been produced in
response to the call for values in education.
LVEP offers a variety of experiential values activities and practical
methodologies to teachers and facilitators to enable children and young adults
to explore and develop 12 key universal values: Cooperation, Freedom, Happiness,
Honesty, Humility, Love, Peace, Respect, Responsibility, Simplicity, Tolerance,
and Unity. LVEP also contains special units for use with parents and caregivers,
refugees and children-affected-by-war. LVEP is already in use at over 7000 sites
in 74 countries.
Teachers implementing LVEP have only positive and heart-warming stories to
relate. The most frequent themes noted in educator evaluations are positive
changes in teacher-student relationships and in student-student relationships
both inside and outside the classroom. Educators note an increase in respect,
caring, cooperation, motivation, and the ability to solve peer conflicts on the
part of the students. Aggressive behaviors decline as positive social skills and
respect increase.
How do we empower individuals to choose their own set of values? What kind of
specialized training is necessary for educators to integrate values into
existing programs? How can values-based education prepare students for lifelong
learning in their communities?
The purpose of LVEP is to provide answers to these questions and offer guiding
principles and tools for the development of the whole person, recognizing that
the individual comprises physical, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual
dimensions.
The aim of LVEP is to firstly help individuals think about and reflect on
different values and the practical implications of expressing them in relation
to themselves, others, the community, and the world at large. And secondly to
encourage educators and caregivers to look at education as providing students
with a philosophy of living, thereby facilitating their overall growth,
development, and choices so that they may integrate themselves into the
community with respect, confidence, and purpose.
As UNICEF?s Commission, headed by Jacques Delors, reports in Learning: The
Treasure Within, "In confronting the many challenges that the future holds in
store, humankind sees in education an indispensable asset in its attempt to
attain the ideals of peace, freedom and social justice. The Commission does not
see education as a miracle cure or a magic formula opening the door to a world
in which all ideals will be attained, but as one of the principal means
available to foster a deeper and more harmonious form of human development and
thereby to reduce poverty, exclusion, ignorance, oppression and war."
The first step, at the start of each academic year, is to invite everyone to
share which values are important to them. Each year, we discover that everyone
shares the same universal values including respect, self-respect, love, honesty,
peace, courage, responsibility, cooperation and compassion.
One value is adopted every two months, nurtured through role-playing, stories,
dramas, games, paintings and anything else that works! Each value begins with a
special assembly that demonstrates what the value means in practice and how we
can all contribute to living that value in class and around school.
This month everyone?s focus is on the value of responsibility and it is Mrs.
Pat?s KG2 Flowers class that is in front conducting assembly. They sweetly and
eloquently describe their definition of responsibility! One pupil says:
?Responsibility gets the job done!? Another says: ?Police take bad guys to
jail!? And a third says: ?We can do lots of things we want, if we try, try and
try!? The school Principal, Peter Williams, narrated a story about a princess
who because she was irresponsible with her words would lose love and friendship.
His message was simple and powerful: Think responsibly and act responsibly!
When asked what the school is all about one pupil, Yasmeen, said, ?It?s not
about the outside, it?s about the inside.? What wise words from a young adult
who is completely enthused about her school environment. Values allow the
individual to operate from their inner beauty and so confidence, self-respect
and respect for others become natural. Everyone is valued and appreciated for
what they share from the inside not what they look like on the outside.
Sharing our academic success and the results of living our values within school
and the wider community is celebrated at special occasions.
?Thinking out of the box? is encouraged within a framework that highlights
social awareness, social cooperation, mutual respect and our own spiritual
integrity. Every subject and learning style is recognized and valued for its own
distinctive contribution. Practical programs for parents and caregivers are
offered so that the child?s first and foremost teachers ? their parents ? are
invited to be actively involved from the onset. ?I came in just to soak up the
atmosphere,? said one enthusiastic parent. ?Can I volunteer my time??
These special seminars are held to support the parent to continue the
values-based education from home. Within an informal setting the parents and
educators sit to discuss some of the common issues affecting the children in
school and at home and how best they can implement the Living Values Program.
The early programs focus on the unique learning styles of each child - visual,
kinaesthetic, auditory and tactile - and invite parents to work with their
children to help achieve mini academic learning objectives and practical
programs. The results build strong home/school links, especially with the
kindergarten children, and set the foundations to help develop the noblest of
personality traits in the children.
KAS also prides itself on a unique Etiquette Program. Emphasis is paid not only
to nurturing the inner child, but the outer one with the initiation of manners
and appropriate protocol when meeting new people, answering telephones and
eating at mealtimes.
Healthy eating programs put the stress on a healthy diet and the propriety
involved in preparing and eating wholesome and freshly-cooked food. The drinking
of water and eating of fruit in class keeps young minds fresh, alert and
healthy.
Speaking in public from the age of four builds confidence and helps children to
articulate their thoughts and feelings. As a consequence the children?s diction,
presence and posture have improved. Their conflict-resolution skills have been
greatly enhanced and they have also learnt how to accept differences in opinions
whilst being sensitive and understanding towards the beliefs and ideas of other
individuals.
We at KAS soon learned that nothing is perfect and that we, as individuals, are
the constant as the world changes around us. We learned that how we react to
change around us comes from within. As a school, we learned that it is all right
to do well and all right to learn from mistakes. On one occasion a teacher was
almost at their wit?s end with a child who just could not understand. Another
child, spotting some anger brewing up, pulled the teacher?s finger and said:
?Remember to live your values!?
When the school first opened, many of the children arrived with tendencies of
belligerence, aggressive tone of voice, competitiveness, yet within six months,
these tendencies significantly lessened. Children became happier, cooperative,
emotionally content and able to articulate their feelings in a values-based
atmosphere. Parents noted that their children were transferring what they had
learned at school to home in, for example, eating habits and the positive use of
common courtesies. ?No words can express what you are doing for my child,?
commented one parent. ?He is so happy and learning so well.?
The students are keen to share the way they learn with other students who are
waiting to come to the Kuwait American School. Grades 2 and 3 students were
asked to give a statement about what the school was all about. Some of their
comments are as follows:
KAS is respectful because it taught me peace, respect and harmony ? Ghadeer,
Grade 3
KAS is smart and full of happiness because they respect
everybody ? Anwar, Grade 2
KAS is respectful because they don?t use bad words ? Farah,
Grade 3
KAS is love and is peaceful because she is caring for us with
lovely and beautiful things ? Arayana, Grade 2
KAS is lovely because we learn more, have more and it is
peaceful ? Kawther, Grade 2
KAS is my red heart, a good place, beautiful, the best ?
Hussain, Grade 2
The school was invited to the ?Education for All? conference in Cairo to share
its methodologies for nurturing children with high behavioural and academic
standards. The values-based approach for learning was much appreciated and
struck a chord with the participants from across the Arab world. One of the aims
of ?Education for All? for the years 2000?2015 is to re-affirm our commitment to
a values-based model, and practicalities were shared and developed with Arab
ministers and their representatives at UNESCO in Beirut as part of a two-day
seminar presented by Living Values educators from around the world.
UNESCO invited the school to offer its 33 Quality Based Values Learning
Indictors as a blueprint for Early Childhood Education. Indicators of good
practice include education of the whole child, promotion of the ?well-being? of
the child, recognizing the unique contribution of each and every child, and each
and every adult, and love, peace and happiness in the classroom.
Dr Rashid Al-Hammad, Minister of Education said in reference to attending a very
successful concert, ?I have enjoyed attending your successful concert. I am
pleased with the concert organisation and directorship with all its variety of
scenes and messages. The reality, truly and genuinely, expresses the outstanding
sustenance and vision of KAS. I also appreciate all the great care that you have
put into building the characters of the students, especially in developing their
thinking powers, preparing them to cope with new trends whilst, at the same
time, maintaining the highest and greatest of moral values. In that regard it is
my pleasure to thank you and the school family for this honest work and to
express my deep gratitude. The schools message of love, as expressed by this
distinguished production contains very subtle touchings with great meaning and
eternal quotations. For that I will pray to God to bring more success and
blessings for you all.?
Mr Salman Shatti, the Senior Adviser from the National Committee for the Support
of Education, said, in relation to the school concert, ?I enjoyed every single
minute of it. You and your staff worked as a successful and wonderful team. Your
message to spread love among all human beings reached us all in a sweet and
simple way. Go ahead with this noble goal. Let me borrow Anthony Robert?s words
and add, ?Only those who have learnt the power of sincere and true love
experience life?s deepest joy: true fulfillment.?
Peter Williams, the Principal, said, ?The school offers a unique and very
attractive place where children can grow, not just academically to the highest
of standards, but inwardly to learn how to belong to society, how to apply what
they learn to the highest of ethical and moral standards, and how to be a human
being with the highest of personality characteristics. It is a great place to be
a child and to learn and grow.?
He continued, ?The UNICEF Delors report highlighted that as people we readily
learn to know and learn to do, but need to remember how to learn to belong,
contribute to our world and remember how to simply be a ?human being? and not
just a ?human doing?. At KAS, we seek to bring a positive difference to everyone
who works at and is associated with the school by, through our example,
educating how to know, to do, to belong and to be the best that we can be.?
Mrs Wajeeha Al-Habib, Director of the school said, ?The call of time in Kuwait
is to revisit the values that are important to us. Recent events suggest that we
need to re-set our moral compass and add all the inner as well as outer
attractiveness to schools. The call of time is to value the treasure within us
all and listen to our inner voice. It is a time when the Kuwait people and
educators of the world can come together with self-determination to create a
vision for Kuwait that will be a model for other members of our wider community.
It is my sincere wish to invite everyone who shares this vision to co-create
this reality and share in its growth.?
Education at KAS provides a hard-working, values-based environment where love
and peace work together to make a positive difference ? beginning with
ourselves. Experience has shown that all our futures are determined by our
thoughts therefore as we think and act, so we become.
The secret of the school?s growing success is a belief, vision and collective
consciousness to want to make a positive difference to our own and all
children?s lives by teaching and living from the heart and discovering our
common humanity.
We invite you to visit the school to experience its unique atmosphere and to see
how values education really works!
1999 - 2003
In the summer of 1999, Wajeeha Al-Habib, the Director of the
American International Montessori in Kuwait, attended the Living Values
Education Coordinators' Meeting and Educator Training in England. One of her
fellow-participants was Peter Williams, a Deputy Headteacher from the north of
England who has been at the forefront of LV activities since its inception and
is a LVE trainer. Wajeeha was so deeply impressed by LVE that she invited Peter
to move to Kuwait in September to be the Principal of Wajeeha's new Kuwait
American School! Inspired by the potential of helping establish a new school
with a commitment to values firmly at the heart of the learning community. The
Kuwait American School continues to implement LVEP with wonderful results.
 |
|
 |
| KAS students at their Messenger of Peace Concert, 4 June 2003 |
KAS students at their Messenger of Peace Concert, 4 June
2003.
Peter Williams comments: "The values of honesty, trust, equal worth,
co-operation, mutual respect and self esteem lie at the very heart of the Kuwait
American School for three to nine year old pupils. It is a school that is
interested in developing the child's intellectual and emotional achievement and
especially emphasises the social awareness and spiritual integrity that will
prepare children to contribute to the world community.
At the school?s very first Professional Development day, a very
practically-orientated Living Values session brought all of the multinational
staff together in an atmosphere of equal worth and equal value to visualise
their ideal school and together set realistic but challenging goals. These goals
were translated into five guiding principles as follows:
-
To build our characters and be beautiful
people to know;
-
To learn to live the noble qualities and
values we hold dear;
-
To build a positive and attractive working
atmosphere where hard work, accomplishments and learning can take place
without fear of ridicule or failure;
-
To learn with pride and humility that it is
OK to do well and OK to accept and learn from mistakes; and
-
To build an essential, strong and
challenging curriculum that is designed to recognise
and bring out the best in every child.
Through Living Values, we all learnt and shared the
importance of recognising and living our values, and that we show how we live
our values by our attitude and behaviour towards ourselves and each other in all
situations. Inviting the children to explore their own values helped to frame
the character and atmosphere of the school. The children discovered what is
meant to be peaceful stars and how to use their helping hands and helping voices
in practical ways. When asked: 'Is there an important person who we should
invite to open our new school?' the children replied with delight: 'We will open
it. It's our school.'
Developing the noblest of qualities at KAS generated many conversations and
meetings with parents and officials with responsibility for monitoring standards
and ensuring that regulations were met. The opportunity to listen to and work
together with all schools of thought helped to generate a shared vision of
mutual understanding, mutual respect, openness and co-operation. After
three months, the living-values-based atmosphere has created a living and
learning environment where the children have come to know the difference between
right and wrong, exhibit much improved work habits, show higher than expected
academic attainment and especially radiate a warmth of spirit and joy of
learning from their faces.
We are delighted that Living Values Education is helping to develop a holistic
curriculum that captivates and celebrates the special qualities and talents
within us all.
We began our year with the motto ?We are all wonderfully made?. Three months on,
?we are all wonderfully made and together we are better?."
|
 |
A Special Values Project - December 1999
Children from the Kuwait American School created "love in a shoebox". The shoebox appeal was for children who suffered in the earthquake in Turkey. Called "Operation Peace Child" children carefully chose items to send to boys and girls in the orphanages or tent cities. |
The following quotations indicate how a Living
Values approach to learning has been received:
Parent and Director of KAS ? Wajeeha:
?The Living Values Program is, for me, like finding the
treasure that I have been always looking for. It made all the difference at KAS.
We were fortunate enough to start the school from scratch using the Living
Values program. This was wonderful. Starting a school did present us with
challenges to test us from time to time, but when your ladder of success is
leaned on the right wall, the wall of principles and values you hold dear ensure
that the journey of success becomes the most joyful experience. With the Living
Values Program, there is no place for fear, confusion or stress. Things just
flow in complete harmony and the answers to questions simply spring crystal
clear in front of you like a fountain of water. You can even recognise each
individual drop and enjoy every bit of it.?
International visitor sent by the
Kuwait Education Authority:
?No words can express the feeling, atmosphere and clear
success of this school. Wherever you go you see happy, smiling faces and
children learning and helping one another.?
Parent:
?How on the earth are you disciplining our child at the
school. Before he came, we tried every way to make him behave, nothing seemed to
work, and now in less than two months, the boy is totally different, very well
behaved and all the values and manners are just emerging naturally from within
his personality. Please, tell us your secrets!?
Member of Staff:
?I don?t know what happened to me. After twenty five years
of teaching experience, I used to wait for and loved weekends, and since I
joined KAS, I miss the school during the weekend and I find any excuse to come
to school.?
Parent:
?The school does not feel like a school. It feels like
home. The atmosphere and warmth of the school makes my child jump out of bed
wanting to come every morning.?
Parent ? Nadia:
?I have been in schools in America, Switzerland and
Lebanon. The quality of education that KAS is offering is higher than any other
school I have ever seen. We do appreciate everything you are doing for our
children.?
Parent ? Anfal:
?When I first registered my child with your school, I
liked what you were offering and the school philosophy, and I was convinced
seventy % that this is the right school for my child, but after two months, I am
convinced two hundred % that this the right school. From time to time, when I
want my child to do something and she doesn?t want to do it, all I need to say
is: ?You are not going to school tomorrow.?
Parent:
?No words can express what this school is doing for my
child. He is so happy and learning so well.?
Parent:
?I came in early just to soak up the atmosphere. Can I
volunteer my time to help.?
Child aged five, talking about respect:
?All the children all over the world should be happy, free
and a shining stars.?
Child overheard at home looking into a
mirror one month after the Respect mirror lesson:
?You are beautiful, your smile, your eyes. You are
beautiful.?
Teacher:
?A testament of a good school is that the children don?t
want to leave at the end of the day. They don?t!?
Kuwait Ministry Supervisor/Inspector:
?What makes me pleased about this school is the
credibility and the honesty they operate with. It is a school that meets its
promises. They do their best to serve their students and they set their academic
standards high. Thank you very much for all these efforts.?
International Visitor ? Tsueta:
?Everytime I cross the threshold of this school, my heart
starts beating in tune with the pulse of a new world ? the world of real
knowledge, discovery and revived ethics among individuals. The young hearts of
happy children, teachers and staff are a universe of serenity, love and
creativity. Like the legendary phoenix bird which burnt itself to death and rose
fresh and young from its ashes, so the Director of the school has inspired new
virtues and wisdom in the minds of the future new people. The school challenges
the prevailing outdated frameworks and heralds the dawn of new educational and
cultural integrity.?
Number of Sites Using Living Values Education
Total number of sites
1
Impact
|
