Many school websites state that their purpose is to nurture the holistic growth of every student. The more interesting question is how schools translate that aspiration into everyday practice.
One way schools can bring this aspiration to life is through virtue literacy: giving students the language to understand, recognise, and develop character strengths in themselves and others.
As Aristotle observed, ‘We become just by doing just actions, temperate by temperate actions, and courageous by courageous actions.’
For students to develop these qualities, they first need to be able to recognise and talk about them. Character grows when schools create opportunities for students not only to learn the language of virtue, but also to put it into practice.
Before students can intentionally develop qualities such as truth, courage, and service, they need the language to recognise and discuss them. As Wittgenstein famously observed, ‘The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.’ The words available to us shape what we notice, value, and aspire to become.
Research (Lamb, M., & Brooks, E. 2026) suggests that virtue literacy strengthens moral awareness, supports character growth, and helps students become more critical about how virtue language is used every day.
What stands out is how many ways schools can develop virtue literacy through classroom discussion in all subjects, case studies, mentoring conversations, and structured reflection. Even small practices, like ‘virtue spotting’, noticing and naming student’s strengths drives positive learning.
If schools are serious about educating the whole person, then character development needs to be treated with the same intentionality as academic learning. Students need both the language to understand virtues and regular opportunities to practise them in meaningful ways.
How is your school approaching character education?
Source: Lamb, M., & Brooks, E. (2026). Teaching virtue literacy: A strategy for character education in the university. Journal of Moral Education, 1–20.
This article was first published on Queenwood’s LinkedIn.
