According to the Character Education Partnership, "character education is an educational movement that supports the social, emotional and ethical development of students. It is the proactive effort by schools, districts, and states to help students develop important core, ethical and performance values such as caring, honesty, diligence, fairness, fortitude, responsibility, and respect for self and others."

Websites

11 Principles of Effective Character Education
http://www.character.org/11principles
Character Education Partnership (CEP) is an umbrella organization for character education, serving as a resource for people and organizations that are integrating character education into their schools and communities. CEP offers a summary of its 11 Principles and a downloadable (PDF) publication on these principles.

CHARACTER COUNTS!
http://www.charactercounts.org/
CHARACTER COUNTS! is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, nonsectarian character education program sponsored by the The Joseph & Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics. It teaches the Six Pillars of Character: trustworthiness, respect, responsibility, fairness, caring and citizenship.

Character Education: Our Shared Responsibility
http://www2.ed.gov/admins/lead/character/brochure.html
A resource from the U.S. Department of Education addressing and supporting character education. The USDOE joins with state education agencies and school districts across the country to provide leadership and support to implement character education.

Heartwood Ethics
http://www.heartwoodethics.org/
Heartwood Institute promotes literature-based character education for youth in grades PreK-8. This site offers extensive materials on ethics and character education for schools, libraries and others.

Ohio Partners in Character Education
http://www.charactereducationohio.org/
This nonprofit organization promotes and facilitates the development and implementation of character education programs in Ohio schools and communities. OPCE works with the Ohio Department of Education to provide character education resources and technical assistance tthrough professional development workshops, a website, advocacy, a statewide character network, collaboration with other projects and agencies, and other programs.

Random Acts of Kindness Foundation
http://www.randomactsofkindness.org/
A nonprofit organization founded upon the powerful belief in kindness and dedicated to providing resources and tools that encourage acts of kindness. Lesson plans and school activity plans available.

Suggested Children’s Literature
http://www.kids-of-character.org/docs/SuggestedChildLiterature.pdf (PDF file)
An annotated booklist of character education literature from Kids of Character, an organization that promotes character excellence in youth.

Teaching Values
http://www.teachingvalues.com
Listed as one of the most extensive sources on the web for parents, teachers, and anyone involved with character education for children. Stories and activities are listed as well as links to other sites.

 
Books
Links point to records on WorldCat to help you find these books in libraries.
Gurian, Michael. What Stories Does My Son Need?: A Guide to Books and Movies That Build Character. Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 2000.
This book provides a listing of books and movies that are recommended for boys to reinforce positive characteristics. The entries are arranged by education level: Preschool, Kindergarten, Elementary, etc. Each title includes an annotation with an emphasis on the values content. Some entries have suggested “Discussion Starters.” Includes separate indexes for books and movies.

Hall, Susan. Using Picture Storybooks to Teach character Education. Oryx, 2000.
Defines character education, discusses various theories, criticisms, and means of implementation related to character education. There are sections of chapters devoted to individual positive character traits. Each chapter lists the trait, its common synonyms. There are examples of picture books that include treatment of the character trait. Other character traits included in the stories are noted as well. Includes bibliography and author and title indexes.

Norfolk, Bobby and Sherry Norfolk. The Moral of the Story: Folktales for Character Development. August House, Inc., 1999.
This book discusses character education and how storytelling may be used in conjunction with it. There is a sampling of stories with strategies for when, where, and how to present. The end of the volume includes a section, “Character-Building Stories Recommended by Educators and Storytellers.” Includes bibliographies.

Tillman, Diane and Hsu, Diana. Living Values Activities for Children Ages 3-7. Health Communications, Inc., 2000.
Each activity in this book contains symbols that denote: sharing and discussing, read a story, sing a song, artistic expression activity, action-oriented activity, teacher preparation and quietly being exercise. Very few lessons give a storybook to read and share. The appendix has several stories to use that go along with the themes.