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Howard J. Curzer, Aristotelian Character Education, The Philosophical Quarterly, Volume 66, Issue 265, October 2016, Pages 851–854, https://doi.org/10.1093/pq/pqv107
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Aristotelian Character Education (ACE) is the application of contemporary Aristotelian virtue ethics to the discipline of education. Kristjánsson elucidates and critiques ACE in ways which will interest and inform both philosophers and educators. Aristotelian Character Education is a wonderful example of something much called for, but seldom attempted or appreciated: interdisciplinary work.
Kristjánsson likes lists. After some preliminaries, chapter 1 lists ten assumptions of ACE which distinguish it from other sorts of character education. ACE (1) has a naturalist basis; (2) provides a nuanced, empirically grounded account of flourishing; (3) attributes intrinsic value to virtuous characters traits; (4) utilizes ordinary language rather than technical jargon; (5) provides an architectonic of virtue namely the doctrine of the mean; (6) makes emotions, rather than mere reason or behaviour, central to virtue; (7) provides a mechanism for resolving conflicts among virtues; (8) acknowledges the importance of communities for character education; (9) is well equipped to meet the situationist challenge; and (10) includes both direct education (e.g., behaviour modification) and indirect education. This is a nice list; it introduces philosophers and educators to many of ACE's strengths. Most of these points are uncontroversial, but quibblers might object that ACE provides a mere term (namely phronesis) rather than a method for resolving virtue-v-virtue conflicts.
