Children's conception of spirituality and morality : narratives of eight Grade 3 learners.
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Date
2015
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Abstract
Influenced by debates from the paradigm of New Childhood Studies and the sociology of
childhood, the epistemological and ontological stance of this study was that children are
individuals in their own right, and active social beings who are able to construct and make
meanings of events and issues in their lives. The study was also framed by debates from the
sub-field of ‘Children’s Geographies’ that enabled the analysis of the meanings children
assigned to experiences of spirituality and morality in various experiential spaces and places
of their lives. In essence, the study was about exploring children’s conceptions of spirituality
and morality and mapped out the spaces and places of spirituality and morality in relation to
young children.
This was a qualitative case study conducted at one primary school situated in an urban
township in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal. Participants in the study were eight (8) Grade three
learners (three male; five female), aged between seven (7) and 11 years. The various creative
participatory research techniques utilised in the study to produce data were found to be the
most appropriate when engaging with child participants. These included children’s drawings,
vignettes, or scenarios that contained a moral dilemma viz. conversation with a picture and a
letter to God.
A justice orientation was strongly evident in the children’s responses to the two
scenarios as children clearly had a sense of right and wrong. Data revealed that children reason
in terms of the norms they have been socialised to value, for example, justice. Morality is also
interpreted as a goal of pleasing others by acting as a good person in society thus its stands to
reason that morality is external to children. However, there was evidence that some reason
at a more advanced level beyond the stage of obedience and punishment when they focused
on themselves as members of a society or community i.e. maintaining the social order. The
focus of the children was on obeying laws and maintaining social order and as in the case of
the respondents of the study, keeping the school and community safe. The ethics of care was
evident in the responses of the children such as fairness, compassion, empathy, care for the
welfare of others, protection from physical and emotional harm and hurt. The study did not
examine gender differences in the care orientation of the participants.
Description
Master of Education in Social Justice Education. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Edgewood 2015.
Keywords
Spirituality -- Education -- South Africa., School children -- South Africa -- Conduct of life., Theses -- Education.