CONSTRUCTING STUDENTS' IDENTITY WITHIN RELATIONAL EPISTEMOLOGY
Z. Alsuwailan
Kuwait University (KUWAIT)
Schools, as vital transmitters of societal values, help to shape students' values and personalities. In Kuwait, school system is a reflection of a larger society that emphasizes the value of appropriate gender roles. Female students are subjected to a continuous stream of messages from teachers and textbooks regarding the social role they are expected to occupy. In order to help them develop a sense of self and better understand the society in which they live in, we need to pay attention to the significance of relationships in constructing a student's identity. There are various forms of relationships that we need to consider in our schools, including teacher/student, student/student, and student/school environment. These relationships need to be based on concern for the well-being of student in order to be healthy and successful. Therefore, this paper reveals the relationships in schools that are behind constructing female student's values and identity and attempts to develop a student who is able to question her own position and play a proactive role in the society. This can be achieved by reexamining our educational tools and exploring the relationships between societal values and a relational epistemology, developing knowledge via relationships, through investigating how female student construct their own gender identity in relation to their world.