Educational Psychologists Essay

Lawrence Kohlberg’s view on Moral Development and Education has widened the view in the study of educational psychology. His theory provided new inputs in understanding the manner that individuals acquire information and learn. By defining these process through three important stages namely pre conventional level, conventional level, and post conventional level (UC Berkeley, 2008). It is through this that he ascertains how individuals gain moral maturity and the capacity to respond to others and develop relationships. Assessing Kohlberg’s contribution to educational psychology, he tried to critique the traditional system of teaching especially in shaping and honing moral values. Rather than shaping students, it only forces them to achieve a specific values mandated or dictated by the educator or the curriculum. It is in here that he tries to promote the concept of moral education. The particular process involves immersing students towards effectively utilizing moral discipline so as to help students react effectively based on their current reasoning (UC Berkeley, 2008). In essence, Kohlberg’s contribution revolves around his out-of-the-box approach in dealing with educational methods. Rather than being strict with these policies, he reinvented the process of moral reasoning and acquisition of values by collaborating new means to create collective norms. Given this process, students then become more reactive in dealing with the manner students react to specific moral issues responsibly. Seeing this, the work of Kohlberg is an expansion on the view of Piaget’s and often critiqued to be mainly an extension of what Piaget provides. However, Kohlberg tries to step away from this by trying to define and argue that the central element of moral development is a concrete facet different from what Piaget points out. At the same time, he tries to showcase his perspective on how collective and responsive the acquisition of morality must be. It must not only come from one source but rather through a collective undertaking. References UC Berkeley (2008) Moral Development and Moral Education: An Overview. Retrieved from http://tigger. uic. edu/~lnucci/MoralEd/overview. html#kohlberg