Moral Choice and Education

Moral education need not be construed as an attempt to inculcate particular moral beliefs; it can profitably be understood as an attempt to help children acquire the skills, attitudes, and dispositions that will enable them to make their own moral choices intelligently. If moral education is construed in this way, it is crucial that it begin with an adequate conception of moral choice. The thesis of the paper is that the conception of moral choice that has guided the very prominent approach to moral education associated with Lawrence Kohlberg is seriously inadequate. Kohlberg's interpretation of moral choice is criticized and an alternative view is proposed, one which locates Kohlberg's conception of moral choice as a stage in a larger process of moral deliberation that has a progressive structure. Consideration of the advantages of this broader conception of moral choice provides the background against which the serious deficiencies of the Kohlberg approach to moral education are discussed. The paper concludes by suggesting how these deficiencies can be remedied.