In and Beyond the Classroom: Educating for Courage
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Transcript of In and Beyond the Classroom: Educating for Courage
International Conference on Character Education
Yogyakarta University
Nov. 9, 2011
Bernice Lerner, Ed.D.
How might we deliberately go about helping our students to
develop good habits/make wise choices/internalize virtue?
Courage• The attitude or response of facing and
dealing with anything recognized as dangerous, difficult, or painful instead of withdrawing from it
• Quality of being fearless or brave; valor
• Mind; purpose; disposition; spirit; temper
- Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, 1966.
The emotion of fear overcomes us when we...
• fear what we should not.
• fear as we should not.
• fear when we should not.
“The [person]… who faces and who fears the right things, from the right motive, in the right way, and who feels confidence under the corresponding conditions, is brave…”
-Aristotle
The Brave Person
• Is collected beforehand, and excited in the moment of action.
• Is motivated by a sense of honour.
• Will have fears, but will face them as he or she ought.
“Courage, as a virtue… presupposes some form of selflessness, altruism,
or generosity.”
- André Comte-Sponville
Courage is...
• the precondition of all other virtues
• will at its most determined, and, in the face of danger or suffering, at its most necessary.
• resistant to intellectualism
- André Comte-Sponville
Courage Look-Alikes vs. True Courage
• The courage of the citizen-soldier who is not motivated by penalties or prizes, but by an internal sense of what is right.
• The courage of the person who faces death with knowledge of the facts, i.e., that the odds are against him/her.
• The courage of the person who does not have time to prepare a response, who responds bravely to alarms.
• The courage of the person who stands by his/her convictions, no matter the consequences.
How does one become courageous?
“… the virtues we get by first exercising them….we become brave by doing brave acts.”
- Aristotle
“The bravest thing you can do when you are not brave is to profess courage and act accordingly.”
- Corra May White Harris (1869-1935)
“If a man has any greatness in him, it comes to light,
not in one flamboyant hour, but in the ledger of
his daily work.”
- Beryl Markham, West With the Night
Robert and Magdalene Scholl
Inge, b. 1917
Hans, b. 1918
Elisabeth, b. 1920
Sophie, b. 1921
Werner, b. 1922
Hans Scholl
• Became disillusioned with The Hitler Youth
• Intellectual• Soldier• Medical student• Founder of “The
White Rose”
Alexander Schmorell (Schurik)
• In medical school to please his physician father
• Artist & musician• Cherished his
Russian ancestry (on mother’s side)
• Lost his mother in infancy
Christopher Probst
• Soldier
• Medical student
• Married, 3 children
• Came from a family of Bavarian scholars
Willi Graf
• Soldier
• Medical student
• Devout Catholic
• Joined W.R. late
• Got supplies
• Traveled to recruit support
Professor Kurt Huber
• Popular professor of philosophy
• Carefully concealed biting remarks against Hitler
• Contributed to 5th leaflet
• Drafted 6th leaflet
Jurgen Wittenstein
• Medical student
• Introduced Alex and Hans
• Survived. Now a retired doctor and professor living in Santa Barbara, CA