Lifeworld and Systemworld

According to the contemporary philosopher Jurgen Habermans (1987), all social systems, including high schools, consists of two worlds: a lifeworld and a systemsworld. The systemsworld consists of the management designs, policies, rules, and schedules that provide a framework for students and teachers to engage in the practice of teaching and learning. The lifeworld is the culture of the school and is represented by the values, norms, and beliefs that determine the social interactions between students, teachers, and administrators (Habermas, 1987, Sergiovanni, 2000).

The lifeworld and systemsworld are both essential to school organization. When these worlds are in balance, they function symbiotically to create effective, efficient, well-ordered learning communities. However, in many high schools the systemsworld dominates, or colonizes, the lifeworld (Sergiovanni, 2000). The colonization of the lifeworld by the systemsworld is subtle and often goes unnoticed. When the systemsworld dominates, the rules, policies, and bureaucracy become a means to an end and stifle the lifeworld. A dominant systemsworld destroys the fabric of the school culture resulting in fractured relationships, dysfunction, alienation, isolation, and, far too often, violence.

The lifeworld communicates a powerful message. The lifeworld determines and perpetuates how students and teachers interact with peers and one another. It is important to note that student perceptions of the school environment are more important in determining student behavior than the perceptions of teachers, administrators, or policy makers (Schaller, 2000). However, many efforts to improve respect and responsibility focus on adult perceptions and systemsworld changes. In fact, the greater the perceived dysfunction in the lifeworld by policy makers, the greater the allure of the systemsworld. However, efforts to improve responsibility and respect should focus on the lifeworld of the school. Three examples of interventions to improve the lifeworld of a high school include a school-based character education program, peer mentoring, and peer conflict mediation.

Character Education

A renewed interest in character education resulted in some measure from the politicization of school safety issues. In response, several packaged character education curricula became available for purchase. At first glance, a purchased curriculum seems to be a good quick fix. However, purchased curricula are usually an example of a systemsworld solution to a lifeworld problem.

Character education should be viewed in the context of the lifeworld. In other words, character education should not be a series of lessons imposed on students. Rather, character education should be designed to improve the school culture, represented by the interpersonal interactions of students, teachers, and administrators. For example, in a study of how respect was taught to middle school students, Williams (1993) found that respect was best taught by modeling and quality teaching rather than by presenting prepared lessons on respect. Thus, if fairness is part of the school, students learn to be fair. If high standards are an everyday part of the school culture, students learn to put forth more effort (Ryan, 1993). Conversely, in a school culture viewed by students to be unfair and uncaring, students will not perceive fairness and caring as important characteristics of human interaction.

Character education as an intervention to improve respect and responsibility should meet five criteria: (1) the program should be unique to the school, (2) teachers, administrators, students, and members of the community must play a significant role in the development process, (3) the established values and norms must be embedded into and become an everyday part of social interactions, (4) objectives must be measurable, and (5) adults in the school must "walk the talk" (Stader, 2000a).

DeRoche and Williams in their book Educating Hearts and Minds (1998) suggested a five-step model that meets these criteria. The first step in the design and implementation of a character education program starts with two questions: Why are we doing this? What do we want to accomplish? NCA schools might ask, "What do we want student behavior, attitudes, and skills to be like/look like?" The answers to these questions become the program goals. In step two, program objectives are developed from the program goals. For example, if improvements in teacher/student and student/student relationships are important, then an analysis of the number and type of disciplinary referrals would be a legitimate criterion by which to measure effectiveness. Step three is deciding which values to model. This step is the most difficult and causes the most hesitation. One suggestion (Williams, 1998) to overcome this dilemma is to start with a list of values and by successive "prioritizing" by teachers, students, and parents arrive at four to five consensus values deemed most important by the school community.

Step four in DeRoche and Williams' model is developing clear definitions for each of the selected values and examples of behaviors that model these values. In step five, teachers begin to incorporate these values as part of the regular curriculum. Further, to impact the lifeworld, it is important to view school management rules and personal interactions in the context of these values. In short, lifeworld values of the character education program should help drive the systemsworld.

Peer Mentoring

The norms and values of the lifeworld determine and perpetuate the level of trust and respect between student groups. However, the systemsworld of many comprehensive high schools creates an inhumane institution that does little to promote learning and trust, much less the development of trust and respect (McQuillian, 1997). Caring communities do not "just happen," even in small schools, but require deliberate effort (Raywid & Oshiyama, 2000). Rather than leaving student relationships to chance, school personnel can help students learn to support one another. A comprehensive peer mentoring program can provide the framework for such an undertaking (Stader & Gagnepain, 2000a, b).

Peer mentoring is an intervention in student relationship building designed to positively impact the norms and values of the lifeworld. Simply defined, peer-mentoring pairs selected junior and senior students (mentors) with freshmen students (mentees). In a relationship building model, the selection and training of mentors is critical. Selection criteria should be designed to include as many students as possible. Attendance, citizenship, and trustworthiness are three suggested criteria (Stader & Gagnepain, 2000a). Initial training should include team building activities and basic counseling skills. However, mentor training should be ongoing and include issues facing teens, trust building, and continued clarification of the mentor role. Mentors should be continually instructed to know when it is appropriate to involve the school counselor or peer-mentoring sponsor.

Meetings between mentors and mentees should be both formal and informal. During the first part of the school year formal meetings should be relatively frequent but diminish in frequency as the school year progresses. The formal mentoring sessions in which the mentor sponsor should be present place a great deal of emphasis on bonding activities, survival in the classroom, homework/tutoring sessions, student skills, and school attendance. Team and individual goals can be set at this time. Celebrations are important when student or team goals are reached.

Informal meetings are typically arranged through the sponsor. Although supervised, the informal meetings should be between the mentee and mentor with as little interference as feasible from the adult sponsor. These times usually begin as tutoring sessions. However, interpersonal issues concerning other students, teachers, or home situations often come to the fore. These informal sessions can be the most beneficial outcomes of a mentoring program.

Mentoring programs are difficult to evaluate. However, this lifeworld approach can, over time, dramatically improve school climate, school culture, and the interpersonal relationships between students. Mentors consciously or unconsciously began to look after their mentees and hazing by older students often ceases to exist. Once a culture of respect becomes the norm, the lifeworld of the school takes on a new meaning (Stader & Gagnepain, 2000a, b).

Conflict Mediation

Anyone with even a passing knowledge of high schools recognizes that student-to-student interpersonal conflict is endemic to this culture. This type of insidious conflict has the greatest impact on students and voraciously consumes administrator time and energy (Thorsen-Spano, 1996). It is also one of the driving forces behind systemsworld interventions.

Conflict is a part of the maturing process. However, student-to-student conflict takes a toll on the psyche of many teens. Conflict often results in fear, alienation, withdrawal, attendance problems, and academic difficulty. Thus, adolescents do not usually view conflict as a positive force in their lives, and they often actively seek alternatives (Johnson & Johnson, 1996). The task confronting school administrators is to find lifeworld interventions to reduce student-to-student conflict so that these issues no longer disrupt the school environment. One of the more effective ways of reducing interpersonal conflict is peer conflict mediation (Stader, 2000b, Stader & Gagnepain, 2000a). Conflict mediation assumes that many students, stimulated by the negative emotions of interpersonal conflict, are willing to seek the relative safety of a mediation process as an alternative to physical confrontation.

Conflict mediation assumes that peer mediators are more effective at solving student-to-student interpersonal conflict than adult intervention. Peer mediators can be defined as students who guide their peers in conflict with other students through a mediation process to reach a mutually agreeable solution (Rozmus, 1997). Mediators should represent a cross section of the student body by race, gender, and achievement level. Mediators can be selected from a pool of applicants generated by self-nomination, peer nomination, teacher nomination, or some combination (Day-Vines, et al., 1996). The mediators should have the respect of their peers, speak the language of their peers, have the ability to remain neutral among varied peer groups, and possess sensitivity, maturity, self-confidence, and trustworthiness. However, academic proficiency, which can be a factor, should not be an automatic indicator of good mediation skills (Day-Vines et al., 1996).

Mediator training consists of an introduction to mediation, the mechanics of the process, and role-playing. Confidentiality, judgment, responsibility, and good manners should be stressed as well as when it may be necessary to involve either the sponsor or the school counselor. Mediators should also be cautioned that any signs or symptoms of student/student sexual harassment or abuse must be reported to either the sponsor or the school counselor.

A certain amount of trust must be given the mediators since the mediation process occurs in relative privacy some distance from the nearest adult. This trust is essential if the empowerment of students to solve their own problems is a goal of the mediation process (Rozmus, 1997). Thus, it is necessary to establish what peer mediators will and will not do in their role. In one model, the mediators assumed the following four roles: (1) to help individual students solve conflicts with other individual students, (2) to empower students in conflict to elect to solve the conflict in a positive manner, (3) to teach and model resolution skills to other students, and (4) to follow-up with students who have participated in the process. Mediators were not allowed to become involved in teacher/student conflicts, to solve group conflicts, or to mediate any student behaviors that were cause for disciplinary action (Stader, 2000b; Stader & Gagnepain, 2000b).

The concept of a mutually agreeable solution is essential to an effective conflict mediation program. The fundamental idea, similar to John Rawls' (1957) social contract theory, is the concept of justice as fairness. Effective mediation assumes that individual students in the mediation process have equal rights to an equitable solution that has not been arbitrarily derived. In other words, the mediators must view the needs, claims, and demands of both students as equal. For the mediation process to be considered fair by the students involved, the claims of students who are less popular, or less talented, must be considered equal to the claims of more popular or more talented students. A solution is perceived as fair only if the students involved could propose the solution to one another for mutual acceptance. Thus, an equitable solution will strike the students as fair if they believe that by agreeing to the proposed solution one student has not been taken advantage of, been forced to give in to claims by the other student, or had the solution imposed by the mediators. It is this foundation of fairness and respect that has the greatest impact on the lifeworld.

Summary

To effectively promote respect and responsibility, an understanding of the importance of the lifeworld is necessary. Respect and responsibility cannot be imposed on students. Rather, it is only when respect and responsibility become part of the norms, values, and everyday interactions of students and adults in the school that significant improvements will occur. Although not panaceas, school embedded character education, peer mentoring, and peer conflict mediation hold great potential to positively impact the lifeworld of the school.

Literacy center activities can last for longer periods of time at this level.  For example, activities in the writing center can follow a process writing format as students work through drafts, edits, proofreading, and publishing. Centers can also allow for more independent study as students investigate topics of interest through a variety of resources.  A literacy center at this level is the ideal place to extend and expand student literacy by promoting participation in a literature circle or a class book club. The Book Club model developed by Raphael, Pardo, Highfield, and McMahon (1997) provides a framework that can be easily integrated into literacy centers.  This framework includes Book Club discussion groups, reading, writing, a community sharing session, and direct instruction from the teacher.

Integrating Technology

Literacy centers are the perfect place in which to integrate technology.  A computer area makes a great center as students access CD-ROM storybooks, Internet sites, and literacy games that help to reinforce important literacy skills while enhancing technology skills.  Reading and publishing student work are ideal center activities.  Tape recorders and overhead projectors are important and useful literacy center tools.

Summary

To effectively promote respect and responsibility, an understanding of the importance of the lifeworld is necessary. Respect and responsibility cannot be imposed on students. Rather, it is only when respect and responsibility become part of the norms, values, and everyday interactions of students and adults in the school that significant improvements will occur. Although not panaceas, school embedded character education, peer mentoring, and peer conflict mediation hold great potential to positively impact the lifeworld of the school.

References

Day-Vines, N., Day-Hairston, B., Carruthers, W., Wall, J. & Lupton-Smith, H. (1996). Conflict resolution: The value of diversity in the recruitment, selection, and training of peer mediators. The School Counselor, 43(5), 392-401.

DeRoche, E. & Williams, M. (1998). Educating hearts and minds: A compressive character education framework. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Habermas, J. (1987). The theory of communicative action, (Vol. 2) Lifeworld and system: A critique of functionalist reason. (T. McCarthy, Trans.) Boston: Beacon Press (Original work published 1981).

Johnson, D. & Johnson, R. (1996). Conflict resolution and peer mediation programs in elementary and secondary schools: A review of the research. Review of Educational Research, 66(4). 459-506.

McQuillian, P.J. (1997). Humanizing the comprehensive high school: A proposal for reform. Educational Administration Quarterly, 33, 644-683.

Rawls, J. (1957). Justice as fairness. In O. A. Johnson, Ethics: Selections from classical and contemporary writers (pp. 400-409). Orlando, FL: Harcourt Brace.

Raywid, M.A. & Oshiyama, L. (2000) Musings in the wake of Columbine: What can schools do? Phi Delta Kappan, 81(6), 444-449.

Rozmus, K. (1997). Peer mediation programs in schools: Resolving classroom conflict by raising ethical concerns? Journal of Law and Education, 26(4), 69-92.

Ryan, K. (1993). Mining the values in the curriculum. Educational Leadership, 58(3), 16-19.

Schaller, L. (2000). The evolution of the American public high school: From prep school to prison to new partnerships. Nashville, TN: Abington Press.

Sergiovanni, T. (2000). The lifeworld of leadership: Creating culture, community, and personal meaning in our schools. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Stader, D. (2000a) Character education and the high school. Voices from the Field, 2(2), 40-42.

Stader, D. (2000b). Reducing violence in the high school: The power of peers. The Journal of At-Risk Issues. 7(1), 6-11.

Stader, D. & Gagnepain, F. J. (2000a). Mentoring: The power of peers. American Secondary Education. 28(3), 28-32.

Stader, D. & Gagnepain, F. J. (2000b). Humanizing the high school: The power of peers. ERS Spectrum. 18(2), 28-33.

Thorsen-Spano, L. (1996). A school conflict resolution program: Relationships among teacher attitude, program implementation, and job satisfaction. The School Counselor, 44(1), 19-28.

Williams, M. (1998, July). Assessing character education in classrooms, schools, and communities. Paper presented at the Cooperating School Districts of St. Louis National Character Education Conference, St. Louis, Missouri.

Williams, M. (1993). Actions speak louder than words: What students think. Educational Leadership, 51(3), 22-23.