Character Education Interview Assignment PDF

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You will not be able to copy my answers, however, I received full credit for this assignment and it will help you be able to follow my exact format. ...

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Character Education Interview Assignment Kayla Hillmann Liberty University

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Part 1: Demographics First and Last Name of person you are interviewing: Melissa Monti and Amber Matyi and Terry Rogers

The person’s role: Behavioral Analyst for Special Education and k-5 grades education and Parent Age level of children/students: K-12 Date of the Interview: 10/08/2019

Part 2: Questionnaire Interview for Parent of a Child(ren) As a parent, what goals do you have for your child? “My daughter has Autism and my son has learning disabilities and sensory disorders. My daughter loves school because she has this keen sense of gaining knowledge. If you ask her, she will tell you that she believes there is no point in life where you will stop learning. My son dreads going to school because of embarrassment, bullies, and not receiving the help he needs. Not only as a parent, but as a teacher my goals involve making sure each and every child that comes across my path receives the help that they are entitled to. After struggling with the school system to give my child an IEP, I understand now what parents may have been going through when they felt as though they were not receiving the help their child needed or deserved. I am not quiet about the struggle the school gave me and I consistently make other parents aware of what processes they will have to go through. My only goal in life for my children is to protect them and have them succeed.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8th, 2019)

“I am not a parent, but I have worked as an educator for my entire adult career. I worked with special education, juvenile delinquents, to just being a regular teacher. I am currently in the process of adopting a

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little boy from China. I went overseas to work with an organization on Special Education for children over there. He has autism and barely speaks english. I decided to learn Mandarin chinese so that when he comes here to America, he will still feel like he has a piece of his home. My goal for him is to adapt to this new world, to feel that he is loved in every aspect of life, to feel as though he can succeed, despite the circumstances.” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8th, 2019)

“To see that they get a good education, make sure that they grow into respectable people, and to be successful in all areas of life.” (T. Rogers, personal communication, October 12th, 2019)

Do you, or have you given any thought to the moral development of your child? “Absolutely, moral development most definitely is influenced by the environment they grow up in. I have kept my children from watching things like Harry Potter, um, but school has now introduced my child to Harry Potter. So instead of sending him on his own to read and decipher the book and figure out why it is wrong from our morals, I decided to take the time out of the day and read it with him. He is at an age where he is soaking up everything. So instead of having my kids live under a rock, I choose to confront things as they come so that I can play a large role in their moral development.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8th, 2019)

“I have definitely pondered on the moral development of my future children. I had always wanted children of my own. But I am not married and I have not found the man that God may have out there for me. Right now, he has given me other opportunities to help children. It has taken me an immense amount of faith to follow along with his plan, even though it is not what my heart desired. We, as parents, as adults, play a large role in the moral development of children. Take a child for instance, who sees his parent constantly displaying vulgar language; you will then see that child display vulgar language. Moral development is also learned by watching what is around them. Their brains sponge in a lot more than we think they do.” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8th, 2019)

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“Most definitely. I treat my son to treat people the way that he would want to be treated. I treat him to see everyone as equal, that no one stands over anyone else. I am black and we constantly see racism all over the place. White men shooting black men, black men retaliating; and while I do not want my son to fight back with violence, he sees the violence everyday and I believe it cripples his moral development.” (T. Rogers, personal communication, October 12th, 2019)

What values do you try to teach? “Some of the most important values to be are honesty, respect, love, kindness, and compassion. I am a strong Christian and I work hard to instill some of the values into my child. I teach my child not to see skin colors, I teach my child not to see status, I teach my child to respect authority. It is important in today’s world that we lead our next generation up to be leaders.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

“One of the greatest values that Jesus taught to us was kindness and compassion. When working with children, whether it will be my future son, or working with children in the classroom, I try to teach them by modeling kindness and compassion. I try to not yell, but to level with these children. I want my son to grow up being a light and bringing these values towards every other person he meets.” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

“To be respectful, truthful, to stand up for yourself, stand behind your word, and uh to be a man basically.I try to forward the values my mama taught me growing up.” ( T. Rogers, personal communication, October 12th, 2019)

What family traditions do you try to maintain, and what is the importance of these traditions to you?

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“One of the traditions I had as a child was on Christmas. It was very important the day after Thanksgiving that we would go get our Christmas Tree. We would get up extremely early, go get breakfast, get our tree, go home and Dad would set up the lights on the tree. Mom, my sisters, and I would listen to Christmas music and decide on our theme of the tree. Once Dad was done, we would start decorating and for dinner we would order pizza. At the end of the decorating we would curl up together and watch a Christmas movie with hot cocoa and admire our tree. That night, we would all curl up by the fire and sleep in our family room for the night. Just this one tradition taught me what it meant to be with and spend time with the family. Now as I have a husband and three children of my own, I carry on this tradition and teach my children the importance of working together as a family.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8th, 2019)

“One of my family traditions was having dinner every night together at the table. We would all go around in a circle and talk about our days and what was something we had learned that day. We often shared jokes and laughed quite a bit. It is important to me and important for me to continue because not very often do we pay attention to our families any longer. Everyone is to busy running around, hustling and bustling. Our children need to see that we still value family and traditions. Otherwise they will no longer be carried out.” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8th, 2019)

“Even though my wife and I are separated, we try to maintain together a united family front when working with our child. We are always together on holidays because it is important that our child understands even though we did not work out, we will work together. We will always be co-parents, we will not ignore the value of family and teaching our children the importance of standing together.” (T. Rogers, personal communication, October 12th, 2019)

When do you have discussions about values?

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“I shared above how I have tried to shelter my children from Harry Potter. I believe that witchcraft is witchcraft, no matter how you spin it. It may not be other parents views, but it is my view. When our school wanted my child to read the book, I realized he is old enough. No matter how I try to hide these things from them, they go to a public school and will eventually learn. So while reading the book we discussed the difference between the values we carry and the values in the book. I can shelter my kids as much as I want, but we will always have discussions about what is right and wrong and whether or not it follows the values they have been taught.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8th, 2019)

“When I worked with the little boy I am in the process of adopting, I discussed some of the things that are important to me, value wise. We shared a lot of the same ideas. It was hard at first, putting my Mandarin into practice, but I told him some of the things that I would like to teach him, some of the values that are important to me, and asked if I could share those with him. I told him if he had questions about things he didn’t understand or wasn’t sure of, it was okay to always ask questions.” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8th, 2019)

“We have conversations all the time about values. We have conversations if we see something on TV, or even if he did something wrong. Recently, while at his brothers football game, he took ten dollars of his mother's purse. He then convinced a friend to walk to Dairy Queen. He came back and threw out the remainder of his cone so that he wouldn’t get caught. But another parent saw it. He is only seven. We had a long conversation about whether or not that was respectful and honest.” (T. Rogers, personal communication, October 12th, 2019)

What are your concerns or worries about your child’s moral development? “My worries are that the world is increasingly getting worse around us. Everyday they are surrounded by violence and people who are teaching our children that drugs, violence, and sex are okay. It scares me, especially since they are attending a public school and they are surrounded by things I do not agree with.

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I have seen children my daughters age smoking pot underneath bleachers at the school. One of her friends was caught with marijuana. This world has hit rock bottom and it is a scary thought wondering if my child's moral development will not go the way I had hoped it would.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8th, 2019)

“The world only seems to be getting worse. We have seen an increase in hate crimes recently. It is surrounded and hate is taught. No one is born to hate, we are all taught these values and ideas by those around us. Recently, I read a study about a man who showed a bunch of children a picture of a black man (who was a teacher) and a white man who was known as a threat to national security, he had bombed something. Most of those children said the black man was a criminal and the white man looked nice and was the teacher. The point proven is their moral development is being stumped by parents who hold negative views of a human being and has reflected it onto their children.” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

“I guess, all the influences that are constantly around my child. Many of the rappesr now adays promote sex, money, and drugs. Whether it be at school, other family members, or media. That is why when he is around me, I try to be a good role model, you know?” (T. Rogers, personal communication, October 12, 2019)

How do you feel about our society, media, and moral development? “Society is increasingly growing worse. The role models we have out there are not what I would call a role model. They are not people I would want my children viewing as someone to follow. Media is including violence, anger, lies, sex, drugs, and a love for money now more than ever. It is cramping their moral development, it is thwarting our jobs in developing our children's morals. With everything that is around us it is making our jobs as parents more difficult. But that does not mean that we should ever give up!” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

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“Society can be a beautiful thing. However, with the leaders we have today, we are slowly drifting away from being beautiful. As parents we can protect our children til we are blue in the face, but it won’t matter if we are not constantly having discussions with them about our morals and values. It won’t matter if we don’t have them growing up in an environment where Jesus is constantly taught. Our children definitely need to be protected from the media we have. There are so little positive media models that are healthy and good for our children. I had been watching a newer episode of Sesame Street with my nephew and there was a gay child who was only seven years old! What is happening?” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

“I think society and media are more focused on negative energy and the negative things that happened around us, there isn’t much positivity out there. It can have a negative effect on my child's moral development. We can try to shelter our children completely, but it doesn’t always work. They learn about things we may want to protect them from, whether we like it or not.” (T. Rogers, personal communication, October 12, 2019)

How do you feel about character education programs in schools? “Personally I struggle with character education programs, especially in public schools. If I could afford to send my children to a private school, I would. But they do not have very many financial friendly schools around here. The reason why I have a problem is because they are not even allowed to reference God in public schools anymore. I like our kids schools, but I am not happy with the government indoctrinating their values onto our children. There have been many teachers who are pushing their views onto our children even though they do not align with our values.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

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“I think character education programs have the potential to be wonderful, minus the fact that God is not the center for most of these teachers. I once attended a character education program at a public school in Pennsylvania. I was disheartened by the lack of education that was happening. Most of the children were simply sitting at a desk and playing games amongst themselves. There was no teaching, but a teacher sitting at her desk on her phone.” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

“I think it's a good idea to be honest with you. Having someone that is able to teach a child during the day, when parents are not around, is helpful to the moral development of our children. Teaching them to be respectful, ask questions, and stand up for what they believe in is helping not only develop their character, but also their moral development.” (T. Rogers, personal communication, October 12, 2019)

What words of advice would you give teachers for teaching character education or integrating character in the classroom/curriculum?

“I would say the teachers should work on getting to know their students on a personal level. They should spend time figuring out where their moral development is and what their values are as well. If you can not talk about God you can still show God’s love through encouragement, empathy, compassion; you can still show them there is a difference in you.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

“I would tell teachers who are in public school to spend time in prayer for their students. Being a role model is a tough gig, it is important to make sure you are fulfilling the role properly. Asking God to be present in every situation with a child could be the difference between life and death. It sounds so literal but it is. If a student comes to you and asks you if you are a Christian and they choose to confide in you, do not report it! Handle it.” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

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“Treat them as if they were your own child. How would you want your want child to be treated/raised? How would you want them to act towards other kids. It's important to stay strong when teaching children who have nothing but negative influences around them. Practice what you preach.” (T. Rogers, personal communication, October 12, 2019)

Part 2: Questionnaire Interview for Teacher Tell me about character education in your classroom/school/district. “I have taught in many different settings. I have taught at Christian schools and at public schools. In the public school setting we were not allowed to bring God into the picture. However, I make sure that no matter where I am, I am acting the way I am teaching. If I am teaching kindness, I am kind. If I am teaching about empathy or compassion, I am empathetic and compassionate. While working with other people's children I still use my values, but I do not cross boundaries, as they are not my children.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

“I once worked in a juvenile delinquency hall, that was ran by a Christian church. I was able to train these children in the values that Christ gave to us. Teaching them to do unto others, as they would have done to them. Teaching them it is not their job to judge others, but to love others. Teaching them things like patience and commitment. I helped them with their walk with Christ. I faced my challenges, like a child spiking brownies that we were cooking, and I survived, but I never lost hope.” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

In your opinion, is character education a new initiative of schools? “I believe the special programs are newer, but since the beginning teachers have always been the primary example of character education. When a teacher cares, it is obvious. When a teacher is simply there just for the money, it is obvious. Children learn by observing you, if you are not showing a positive

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example, they will not be a positive example to the peers around them.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

“It was never a new initiative. I think in lieu of all the mass shootings character education has become more important within schools, but it has always been there. It was not held in high esteem until now.” (M. Monti, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

Do you believe character education should be left up to the family or church? “I absolutely do not agree that it should just be left up to the family and church. I believe as educators we are supposed to be the utmost character educator there is. We have these children for eight to nine hours, five days a week. It is important that we continue to be examples for these children. Training them up to make a difference, to lead not follow.” (A. Matyi, personal communication, October 8, 2019)

“I think the church and the family are extremely important in playing the role of teaching children character education. However, when we spend massive amounts of time with these children, for nine to ten months out of the year, it is important that we focus on teaching them properly. Even if we can not insert God into the situation, teaching them simple things like being polite, being honest, sharing, and being kind is part of our jobs.” (M. Monti, personal commun...