ABSTRACT

. . . there existed strange peoples, with curious customs and bizarre rituals. Yet, interestingly, the travellers aboard theMillennium Falcon had little trouble coexisting with their fellow galactic citizens. The socio-cultural, pluralist society in which our children and we exist presents us, frequently, with peoples, customs and rituals that are, perhaps, strange and new to us. How then are we, as teachers, to understand our role in relation to this complex society we inhabit? What are our moral duties with respect to the children in our classrooms? It has been argued that:

Parents and society in general are surely right to expect teachers to try to foster and reinforce those basic moral and social rules and/or dispositions of honesty, fairness, courtesy, tolerance and respect for others presupposed to civilised interpersonal association - irrespective of the peculiarities of personal belief. (Carr 2003 :134)