| Summary: | Religious and character educators make implied assumptions concerning developmental processes in the programs they write. The developmental theory of character education presented in this article places individual purposiveness at its focus. At one extreme, an educator may assume that a child literally makes his own personality. This educator is then likely to depend heavily on giving the child freedom to decide his life and welfare. At the other extreme, an educator may de determined to persuade a child to make proper choices and decisions. All religious and character education curricula should be so designed that each of its elements clearly implies a testable hypothesis. During the middle elementary school years, self-expression takes the form of testing one's competitive position within his more-or-less defined social situation. Failure to compete successfully may lead to anger and frustration. As children pass through the first stages of puberty, a new hypothesis about life is necessary, one which defines the child as a personality in the social system.
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