Using A Blueprint for Character Development for Evolution (ABCDE) to Build Relationships Through Talk to Mobilise Attachment Theory to Develop Children’s Working Mental Models for Good Choices that Regulate Continued Good Lives

Abstract

This study is a Ground Work Case in Albania which aims to reveal how adults talking with children can build relationships between the adult and the children to support the children’s appropriate development through the four phases of Bowlby’s attachment theory. If trauma is experienced which is not the fault of the child or the preferred caregiver, the child can become stuck and unable to develop the mental models required to become self-determining and live a good life with the conditions for homeostasis (continued life) with good faculty of judgement. This has implications for adults who may have experience trauma, through no fault of their own, who have not passed through the phases of attachment theory, and are expected to support children through the phases of attachment theory with no working mental model of what that looks like. A groundwork case was conducted in a city in Albania with kindergarten staff and revealed i) the curriculum of kindergarten staff’s qualification did include attachment theory, ii) kindergarten staff were unaware of attachment theory. Findings reveal the Covid pandemic 19 has caused trauma that is preventing children from passing through the phases of attachment theory leading to poor working mental models and poor mental health. A Blueprint for Character Development for Evolution (ABCDE) is presented as an incremental model to enable staff, students and parents to evaluate progress through the phases of attachment theory and moving from fear to good faculty of judgement required for self-determining homeostasis.

Typology of Epistemologies for Democratising Knowledge and Policy Benefits for All Mainstreamed by Doctoral-Study

“…Such skills, dispositions and strategies can be developed through doctoral-study where the confidence can be gained for what counts as acting democratically that serves the best interests of the citizens, rather than acting as Leviathans and serving the best interests of the Leviathans. Hoadley and Galant (2019, 88-89) identifies that redesigning curricular requires 'classification of new codes of knowledge, and their institutionalisation with new sets of membership rules' with psychologies, philosophies and ethics of trust (Hysa & Taysum, 2022) that can be led by professional experts with doctorates, supported by professional researchers, the professoriate, in the academy (Scott, 2014).…”

“…Diverse classrooms that are multilingual and multicultural, as identified by Ursula von der Leyen above, have students with different knowledges of what is, or different 'epistemologies' (Popper, 1967;Taysum, 2012b). These students' different epistemologies reflect different world views and can be informed by migration, tolerance and understanding of ethnocultural and linguistic diversity, international solidarity and global citizenship, inequality, disability, hate speech, polarisation and extremisms, radicalisation, experience of war, crises and trauma, age of lifelong learners, ethnicity/race, religion, gender, those recognised as being disabled by society, and GLBQT+ and marginalisation (Hysa & Taysum, 2022;MacLeod, 1995;Ruşitoru et al, 2020;Taysum & Arar, 2018). In terms of legitimacy for inclusion, diversity and equity of access, process and outcomes, there are signs of a potential shift from governance based on expertise, multilateralism and consensual policymaking towards majoritarianism, unilateralism, nationalism, populism and polarization.…”

“…The shift reduces teachers to technicians who deliver prescribed curriculums where students memorise facts to pass tests and there is homogeneity in identity (Ball et al, 2011;Gewirtz et al, 2021). Democracy is associated with higher human capital accumulation, lower inflation, lower political instability, and higher economic freedom (Collins Ayanlaja & Taysum, 2022;Doucouliagos & Ulubaşoğlu, 2008;Hysa & Taysum, 2022;Imam & Taysum, 2022), self-determinism (Taysum, Beutner et al, 2020;Taysum et al, 2019) and closely tied with sustainable economic sources of growth, like education levels and lifespan through improvement of educative institutions as well as healthcare.…”