In ancient China, some thinkers and educators put forward many ideas about moral education. Kong Qiu advocated the rule of virtue, regarded education as a tool to realize his political ideal, and put moral education in the first place. He said: "Disciples are filial when they enter, and they are younger when they leave. They sincerely believe that they love the public and treat others well. If they have spare capacity, they will study literature. " Monk also believes that "good governance is not as good as good education to win the people." He believes that the purpose of setting up a school is to "understand human relations." Once "human relations are above", people can "be close to the bottom". Confucian moral education thought, represented by Kong Qiu and Monk, involves all aspects of moral education, which is extremely rich in content and has a great influence on the education of feudal society in China. Many of their views on the implementation of moral education, such as determination, introspection, self-denial, consistency in words and deeds, learning from Si Qi, teaching students in accordance with their aptitude, being good at saving losses, preventing delays, following the trend and so on. Some thinkers and educators in ancient Europe paid attention to the harmonious development of human beings in many aspects, and also put forward their moral education thoughts. Education in the Middle Ages centered on theology, and moral education was actually religious education. During the Renaissance, humanist educators affirmed human values, advocated secular morality and demanded to get rid of the shackles of religious theology. /kloc-in the 0/8th century, J.-J. Rousseau, a French enlightenment thinker, lashed out at feudal religious education, denouncing it for destroying human nature and cultivating prejudice. He opposes strict discipline and forced indoctrination, and advocates respecting children and giving full play to their initiative. Let the children develop freely. Herbart, a German educator, represented the interests of the aristocratic bourgeoisie at that time. He believes that the highest purpose of education is to cultivate people with perfect moral character. In his book General Pedagogy (1806), he devoted a lot of space to moral education. Herbart believes that character is based on knowledge and will. Therefore, the primary problem of moral education is to develop children's discriminating knowledge and corresponding willpower. He attached great importance to the role of teaching in moral education and put forward the concept of "education and teaching". Herbart also believes that moral education must be combined with religious education. The book On Education (186 1) written by British educator Spencer contains papers on moral education. Spencer holds the morality of bourgeois utilitarianism. He believes that people always judge the good or bad behavior, good or evil from the happiness or pain of the result. Therefore, he regards natural consequences as the guiding principle of moral education. J Dewey, an American pragmatic educator, elaborated the pragmatic theory of moral education and wrote the book Principles of Moral Education (1909). Dewey believes that the most important issue in school moral education is the relationship between knowledge and action. He opposes the didactic moral education method and advocates that children should learn from personal experience. It is emphasized that the task of school moral education is to let children know all his social relations wisely and maintain them. He believes that the socialization of school life is the most basic condition of moral education. Dewey called for the school to become an embryonic society, so that children can develop moral interests and habits needed by a big society (that is, a capitalist society) in this "small society". Recently, American psychologist L Kohlberg applied the psychological viewpoint of cognitive development to study children's moral development and education. He believes that the task of school moral education is mainly to cultivate children's moral judgment ability, and children's moral development is staged; Teachers should understand the stages of children's moral development and create conditions for them to develop to a higher level. The theory of moral education develops with the development of society. In ancient times, the theory of moral education was scattered in philosophy and political ethics. In modern times, pedagogy has developed into an independent discipline, and moral education theory has also become an important part of pedagogy. In modern times, many educators have written monographs on moral education. At present, the theory of moral education has gradually developed into a relatively independent branch of education. China's moral education theory is guided by dialectical materialism and historical materialism, and formed on the basis of summing up the practical experience of socialist education in China. It absorbs and applies the research results of ethics and psychology, critically inherits the excellent heritage of China's moral education theory in history, studies the characteristics of the formation and development of Chinese teenagers and children's ideological morality in the new period, and the basic theory of moral education, so as to provide scientific basis for cultivating a new generation with ideals, morality, education and discipline.

The basic task of China's socialist moral education theory is to study the regularity of the formation and development of students' world outlook, political thought and moral quality, and to regulate and control this formation and development reasonably. The main topics it studies include: the content, process, basic principles and methods of moral education.