Debate: Positive education, a hollow word or a real revolution?

Over the last ten years or so, the term "positive education", often linked to benevolence, has become very popular with both educational institutions and families. A whole range of variations are possible: positive parenting,positive authority or positive discipline.

Sylvain Wagnon, University of Montpellier

With positive education, we have to be careful not to turn a process and an ideal into an injunction.

Although it has yet to be defined, it is already clear that it is above all a matter of respecting the rights and needs of children and adults through more understanding, empathetic and constructive human relations.

Child protection

At a time when we are celebrating the 30th anniversary of the International Convention on the Rights of the Child, signed on November 20, 1989, positive education must be seen in the context of this historic desire to take into account the needs and "interests" of the child.

This protection of the child was developed through legislation on the rights of the child, as well as those of the State. The 19th century built a "protective system" to counter the omnipotence of parents, and more specifically of the father over his offspring.

The rejection of child abuse punctuates French legislation right up to the July 10, 2019 law on "ordinary violence", which some, by denigrating it, call the "anti-spanking" law. Yet this unbearable violence exists, and children remain the forgotten victims in the fight against violence.

In France, a child dies every five days at the hands of his or her parents, 165,000 children are victims of rape and sexual violence every year, and children are still the first victims of domestic violence. All these factors make positive education a necessity.

School climate

Since the law of July 8, 2013 on the refoundation of the school of the Republic, official texts from the Ministry of National Education have emphasized that "the conditions for a serene school climate must be established in schools and educational establishments to promote learning, the well-being and fulfillment of pupils and good working conditions for all".

Benevolence and empathy are part of the concept of a new "school climate", strengthening students' motivation and skills. This consideration is linked to the results of international assessments carried out as part of the OECD's Pisa program, which show that the education systems that make the most progress are those that are based on benevolence. These elements illustrate the importance of the quality of the pedagogical relationship between teacher and students for real educational change.

Positive authority, a concept that spread from the world of top-level sport, emphasizes the link between firmness and flexibility. In the school environment, "positive discipline" once again emphasizes the importance of exchange, dialogue and respect for children and teenagers. School punishments and humiliating appraisals, symbols of a coercive education, are normally outlawed.

Parental investment

The issue goes beyond the school setting, and is defined by some as a revolution in the family, with positive parenting. While no one can oppose the desire for harmonious relations between children and parents, this notion is open to debate when it is perceived as an imperative.

In a book to be published in September 2019, Béatrice Kammerer highlights the risk of making mothers feel guilty, which would be caused by these demands for emotional labor without changing the division of roles between parents.

La Maison des maternelles program (France 5), 2018.

Parenting is all about trial and error. Education is never an exact science, and fortunately so. Scientific knowledge, and neuroscience in particular, is certainly a contribution, but it should not and cannot be used to set educational standards. However, the proponents of positive psychology often try to validate it with measurable results.

The idea of evaluating an education and, above all, its aims, has been put forward. What do parents want from positive education: their child's self-fulfilment, their children's cognitive performance, the elimination of family conflicts, better obedience?

The risk of the standard

Today's evolution is linked to this quest for happiness. In HappycratieÉva Illouz and Edgar Cabanas analyze the progressive control of our lives by the values of positive psychology, which support the imperative of personal fulfillment and well-being. It's not this desire for happiness that's at issue, quite the contrary, but the means and intentions used.

Turning a process and an ideal into an injunction leads to frustration and a never-ending quest. The well-being syndrome can lead to suffering linked to this injunction to be positive and the inability to be happy. Is there not, behind the question of what we call being happy, the risk of creating an archetype of the positive, young, healthy and beautiful person?

It's clear, then, that positive education is a necessity in the face of the abuse and coercion to which some children are subjected. It's a prerequisite. Now it's time to think about positive education in terms of the rights, respect and freedom of children and their parents, while avoiding the definition of a single, coercive educational standard.The Conversation

Sylvain Wagnon, Professor of Education, Faculty of Education, University of Montpellier

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read theoriginal article.