In the current environment of standardized testing, school library programs can support the preservation and improvement of the U.S. constitutional democracy. Participants are introduced or re-familiarized with neglected civics education standards, assess collections with regard to implementation of these standards and learn of print and digital resources conducive to civics education instruction and collaboration.

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This study explores the impact of neoliberal education policies on the discourses of citizenship and citizenship education in an Australian citizenship education project entitled 'Discovering Democracy School Materials.' This project is the largest national curriculum development project in Australia and represents the official discourses of citizenship in Australia. The materials were developed in response to concern about the poor understanding of civics and citizenship in Australia and the lack of quality citizenship education materials and background information for teachers. The scope of the study was managed by focusing on a corpus of twelve text groups, selected from the materials because they related to the environment - an area of citizenship of interest to young people and which allows consideration of recent trends in the practice of citizenship. An approach to critical discourse analysis recommended by Fairclough (1992) was used. This involved a three-step process of identifying and analysing: (i) the discourse evident in the words in the text, (ii) the processes of production, dissemination and consumption of the texts, and (iii) the contextual social and cultural practices that influenced the development of the text. There were six steps in the discourse analysis. The first involved identifying the corpus related to the environment. The second was to identify and describe the discourses of citizenship and citizenship education evident in the text. The third involved interviewing key participants in the processes of text production, dissemination and consumption to ascertain their perceptions of the discourses evident in the texts. The fourth was an analysis of these interviews to interpret the discourses participants acknowledged as being within the text and the discursive practices that operated to establish those discourses. The sixth was an explanation of the impact of neoliberalism on the development of the materials. The results indicate that two discourses of citizenship and citizenship education were dominant within the materials - Legal Status and Public Practice. The same two discourses were evident in the interviews with key participants in the processes of text production, dissemination and consumption. In all cases, the materials lacked any evidence of the citizenship or citizenship education discourses of Democratic Identity, World Citizenship and Democratic Participation, although Democratic Identity was a minor aspect of one of the twelve text groups. A range of discursive practices related to neoliberalism was identified as influential on this pattern of discourses. Perceptions of teacher deficiency were influential in the process of text production as was the power of key individuals and groups such as the national education minister and his department, a government-appointed Civics Education Group, the Curriculum Corporation and, to a much lesser extent, teacher professional associations. Two discursive practices were influenced in text dissemination: the materials were provided free of charge to all schools and extensive professional development was provided. These provided significant inducements to teachers to use the materials. Discursive practices operating in the process of text consumption provided added inducement by showing teachers how to select key components of the materials for local use. However, this concern for local context was undermined by the extreme strength of the presentation of what counts as legitimate citizenship and the lack of opportunity for alternative or resistant readings of the texts. Three aspects of neoliberalism were seen as especially influential in these discursive practices - the strong focus on the development of legitimate knowledge, marketisation, and an emphasis on the need for evaluation. The study concludes with an examination of the implications of the findings to identify recommendations for teachers, teacher educators, materials developers and opportunities for further research.

This thesis is set in the Western Australian education system and centres on the question of how primary schools can actively foster conditions conducive to creating and sustaining education in and for democracy and human rights. In Australia, as elsewhere, there is a widespread acceptance of the need for democratic education also referred to as civics and citizenship education. The perceived lack of public understanding of democratic principles and practices has, in the last decade, led various Australian governments to commit significant resources ($ 31.6 million) to civics and citizenship education programmes such as Discovering Democracy (DD). This thesis argues that political engagement and civic learning is most effective when schools commit themselves to deliberately embedding a set of democratic educational principles in everyday practices. In contrast to traditional approaches to citizenship education that tend to focus on the operational aspects of representative governments, institutions and history, this thesis argues that education for Democracy and Human Rights (DaHR) can be effectively achieved through the fostering of DaHR in education. In this task the thesis draws on the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). The CRC is rooted in a range of basic values about the treatment of children in schools and elsewhere, and encompasses basic rights to which children are entitled. The study empirically investigates through up close observations, interviews and surveys the efficacy of pedagogy for civic and citizenship learning in four schools identified as places of strong democratic practice. This study was able to identify particular commonalities between the four case study schools that were conducive to creating and sustaining democratic principles and practices. These schools, although very different in their composition, were lead by principals who shared the view that children under their care were subjects in the making with increasing rights and responsibilities rather than objects to be manipulated, controlled and protected. The findings suggest that experiencing democracy and human rights in daily school life in a variety of situations and on a number of different levels can effectively contribute to the learning of the meaning and advantages of democratic values such as the rule of law, participatory decision-making and due process. It also concludes that there may be a relationship between parental socio-economic background and the possibilities available for students to engage in effective civic learning and citizenship practices. The relationship between socio-economic background and other structural factors including gender and ethnicity in relation to possibilities of civic learning needs to be investigated in a larger study.

Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 1993.

Syftet med föreliggande studie är att undersöka samhällskunskapslärares förståelse av solidaritetsbegreppet i årskurs 4-6 och detta i enlighet med styrdokumenten. Syftet är även att undersöka på vilket sätt dessa lärare synliggör solidaritetsbegreppet i undervisningen. Solidaritet är ett av de demokratiska värden som skolan ska förmedla och främst gäller detta för samhällskunskapsläraren. Studiens teoretiska ansats inspireras av hermeneutiken och livsvärldsfenomenologin. Genom intervjuer med sju verksamma lärare visar resultatet generellt att solidaritet är ett viktigt begrepp men som inte ges lika stort utrymme som innebörden av det. Solidariteten får definitivt en plats i undervisningen men den planeras inte in i lektioner, utan snarare framträder solidariteten ofta som en biprodukt av konflikter eller ordningsproblem. Lärares förståelse för begreppet visar att det är ett mångtydigt begrepp men att förståelsen för det stämmer väl överens med styrdokumentens definition. / The aim of this study is to examine the understanding of elementary teachers in relation to the solidarity concept in the subject of civics. This, in relation to the steering documents. The study also focuses on finding out which ways teachers express solidarity in the civics education. Solidarity is one of the democratic values that is required by the Swedish school to convey to all students, particularly by the civics teacher. The study is inspired by the hermeneutic and the life world phenomenological theory. Through interwievs of seven operative teachers, the result indicates, in general, that they find solidarity as a concept of importance but it is not used as per its concept. Teachers reference solidarity in the classroom, but they do not plan a lesson about it. Solidarity is more a question of order and is often given space when incidents of discord occurs. Teachers comprehension of solidarity indicates that it is a versatile concept but it is consistent with the steering documents.

The aim of this study is to examine perceptions among civics teachersactive in upper primary and secondary schools in Sweden regardingdisinformation. In particular, the study focuses on ways in which disinformation inthe classroom interacts with media literacy as well as deliberative democraticideals. The study design is based in qualitative research and has been conductedthrough a series of interviews with said teachers, analyzed mainly through thetheory of deliberative democracy with focus also on media literacy. In terms ofresults, perceptions among teachers on the subject of disinformation generally linesup with established research in the fields of disinformation, deliberativedemocracy and media literacy. In particular, teachers of both primary andsecondary school in my sample calls for increased efforts when it comes to medialiteracy as the modern digital media landscape calls for extensive knowledge andskill in discerning credible sources from fake news. / <p>21-01-20</p>

Abstract During the fourteen years between 1898 and 1912, the influences imparted upon the School System of Cuba were substantial. In the period immediately following the conflict with Spain, known in the U.S. as the Spanish American War, a concerted effort was underway to annex the island of Cuba. This study was undertaken to discover what courses were introduced into the K-12 curricula following the U.S. intervention, who introduced those changes, and what, if any influence those changes brought to the culture of the island. This investigation and analysis was necessary to reinvigorate the discussion regarding the history of the Cuban education system in view of the attempted cultural change brought about by the U.S. intervention. While many actions were underway by various factions both within the U.S. government and without to ensure that the annexation would be successful, one concerted effort was undertaken through the reconstruction of Cuba's schools. Changes that were made include: coursework, textbooks, structure of schools, selection process for teachers and professors at the University of Havana, holiday schedule, and the school-day and school-year. While the language of instruction remained Spanish, the method of delivery and training of Cuban school teachers was adapted through an extended summer Normal School program in association with Harvard University and a fulltime program at the New Paltz Normal School in New York. From the results collected regarding the coursework, individuals involved, and the changes imparted upon the culture of Cuba, it appears that a concerted effort was underway to impose a U.S.-styled school system on Cuba with the intended result of annexation of the island of Cuba by acclamation of the Cuban people.

A few weeks before the Swedish election in September 2018, a young girl named Greta Thunberg decidedto leave school every Friday and instead sit outside the Swedish parliament in Stockholm to raise awarenessabout the climate. This “school strike for climate” has since then developed to be a world-wide phenomenonand on the 15th of March more than 1.4 million youngsters participated in more than 100 countries.However, these actions have been subject of lots of debate in media; Greta being both cherished andcriticized. Framed within the questions about what motivates the political participation and in what way theschool takes a stand, this thesis aims to analyze “school strike for climate” in relation to the role of bothknowledge and fostering in the Swedish school. Through theories of street-level bureaucracy and politicalparticipation, accompanied by Carol Bacchis discourse perspective what´s the problem represented to be the studyexamines 32 Swedish newspaper articles. The result is a variety of problem representations, getting legitimized through law or moral, but also through a representation which hold both school and the pupils responsible for result in school. One of thedevelopments in the discourse is that during time and enlarging of the political activism, the youngster’sactions more and more is characterized as political participation than of an individual choice. This alsomeans that schools have to take a stand up on an organizational level, where many principals refer to schoolattendance and the law. When political activism is legislated through the curriculum it seems to be adidactical choice by the teachers, whom within their free space as professional street-level bureaucrats mayhave varying opportunities to use the theme within their teaching. Over all, the discourse focus more uponthe climate than democratic ideals, which suggests an unused potential of “school strike for climate” incivic´s education.

This project degree essay aims to analyze the ways textbooks made for the Swedish upper secondary school course samhällskunskap 1b [Social studies, 1b] describe the Swedish concept of källkritik [source criticism and information evaluation]. The essay uses theories formulated by prominent Swedish authors on the subject – as well as the National Agency for Education’s (Skolverket) guidelines – to perform a content analysis on textbooks produced by the biggest teaching material producers in Sweden. Furthermore, the study performs a general thematic content analysis of what kinds of source criticism the different textbooks use and how well they align with the theoretical framework. Finally, a report by the Schools Inspectorate (Skolinspektionen) is used to define four areas of development that the textbooks should be working with. The results of this study show that the textbooks vary in their descriptions of source criticism in terms of both their complexity and what core ideas are attributed to the concept. Three of the five textbooks show tendencies towards the most basic kinds of source criticism, while only one of the five show signs of the most complex kinds of source criticism. Overall, the textbooks often use a loosely defined version of source criticism and lack adaptation to the digitalization that the Swedish society is currently experiencing. Four of the five analyzed textbooks need to modernize their perspective on source criticism. All the textbooks are lacking in terms of preparing students for critically analyzing the information they meet in their daily digital lives.